PRBreakfastClub

I have to admit, I can be a bit of a crank when it comes to how the mainstream media covers PR. It either verges on a near fascination with celebrity publicists — one minor faction of the broader and fast-growing public relations industry — or the belief that PR can easily be wrapped up into a report on the general advertising industry.

Quick and easy, right?

So I’m always a bit bemused when I read articles with headlines like “When Publicists Say ‘Shh!’,” which ran in the April 18 edition of the Sunday New York Times. What followed was a series of clichéd examples from celebrity publicists of how they either act as mouthpieces for their clients or do everything they can to tell them to “shut up” when thinking about oversharing online. Read the rest of this entry »

For any PR pro who has jumped on the bandwagon and thinks that newspapers no longer matter, I urge you to read a great report just out from the Poynter Institute. The report sought to measure the total online and print reach of newspapers in their local markets, and the results may surprise you.

First: newspapers still reach a massive audience. The combined local market reach (online and print) of the top-20 newspapers is 47,370,687. That’s 15 percent of the U.S.’ 307 million population. (Note: The Wall Street Journal and USA Today were excluded because their local market isn’t clearly defined.)

via Poynter.org

I don’t know about you, but if I’m able to tap into even a sliver of that size of an audience, I’m absolutely going to give newspapers a bit more of my attention going forward.

Perhaps most surprising, however, Read the rest of this entry »

There are a lot of things in life that get better with automation. Alarm clocks. Coffee makers. Calendar reminders of your wedding anniversary. But as PR pros, could we make our written communications and messaging better with automation?

That’s the question apparently attempted to be answered by a slate of new automated news reporting services, including one called StatSheet, according to a recent New York Times article.

It’s an interesting question to ponder. The Times article notes that so far, StatSheet is mainly being used as a sort of fill-in news service for collegiate sports programs that lack the level of media attention and coverage that their big-time brethren get.

As a former collegiate sports information director, this obviously piqued my interest, so I gave StatSheet a closer look. It’s worth a quick glance at one of the service’s customized news sites for every NCAA Division I school . . . if only to see for yourself why the concept of automated news, and possibly automated PR, is doomed. Read the rest of this entry »

Over the past year, we have talked a lot on PRBC about the changing role of a PR practitioner, how the profession is perceived by reporters, bloggers, executives and the public and some of the backlash the PR business has received due to a multitude of issues.

Through all of these changes, I’m still very optimistic that the profession is progressing along the right path; that we’re taking strides toward becoming more transparent, more focused on helping companies build their businesses (rather than building our own egos) and more in line with the goals of our clients and their key audiences and constituents.

My optimism is enhanced by recent anecdotal evidence noting how others, many of whom were once staunch opponents of the value of PR, view the strategic value of retaining PR counsel. Specifically, a post on blogger relations by Gizmodo UK editor Kat Hannaford, and another post by Jennifer Walzer of Backup My Info! leave me with the impression that our profession, as a whole, is beginning to learn from its mistakes. And while we certainly have many areas in need of improvement (media relations, agency turnover rates, mentorship, etc.), I feel we are beginning to see the hard work of many to reshape the public’s perception of the value of public relations taking hold. Read the rest of this entry »

Last Thursday (Aug. 26), the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) announced that Reverb Communications had settled charges alleging that the public relations firm had engaged in deceptive advertising practices by having its employees write and post positive reviews of clients’ games in the Apple iTunes Store, without disclosing that they had been compensated to do so.

The settlement brings to a close the Commission’s first case under its revised “Guidelines on the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising,” which took effect Dec. 1, 2009.

Those guidelines state, in part, that advertisers (in this case Reverb) are subject to liability for failing to disclose material connections between themselves and their endorsers. In a section entitled, “Disclosure of Material Connections,” the guidelines state that: Read the rest of this entry »

Flipboard’s rapid ascension to the fandom of the social media and tech scene, and just as quick outright derision and speculation about its struggles to scale among some tech and media reporters/bloggers offers an interesting glimpse into what is more and more becoming an issue within the technology and media sectors: Heavily-funded start-up makes big splash with big influencers, only to suddenly realize it’s nowhere near prepared for the onslaught of actual people using its product and service. This, inevitably, creates a perception among consumers, partners, advertisers, etc. that tech media darling just isn’t quite ready for prime time.

Thus, all of that build up and hype is wasted, and it’s back to square one. Read the rest of this entry »

In a world where there are now thousands of print and digital publications and blogs, covering everything from the nuances of sports law, to the ways in which technology affects our everyday lives and culture and  the joys of botany, securing media coverage for your business has arguably never been easier. On the flip side, there is a vast chasm of noise now coming at us every day, which makes it exceedingly more difficult for your big product announcement, or CEO profile you are pitching, to get the attention you think it deserves.

And it’s only going to get worse before it gets better. A recent study of business media reporting by the ITDatabase found that, in general, the top-8 business publications in the U.S. (The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times, Forbes, Fortune, BusinessWeek, The Economist, the Financial Times and USA Today) were, “follow[ing] the lead of the media at large in focusing on what’s new and where the money might be going rather than where the money is now.” Read the rest of this entry »

“Success is peace of mind, which is a direct result of self-satisfaction in knowing you made the effort to become the best of which you are capable.” – Coach John Wooden

John Wooden’s death over the weekend, at the age of 99, got me thinking about the man they called “The Wizard of Westwood.” As someone who spent the early years of his career working in sports marketing, I thought about Wooden’s NCAA-record 10 national championships while coaching the legendary UCLA Bruins of Lew Alcindor (Kareem Abdul Jabbar) and Bill Walton and many others. I also remembered the man’s great humility and sense of humor, as well as his uncanny ability to get the best out of his players without overtly trying to put his ego or his own highly-respected reputation ahead of the game, his team or his employer (UCLA). Read the rest of this entry »

It’s Monday morning. You grab your coffee, sit down at your desk and flip through a few articles before you dive into the tasks ahead. As you skim your New York Times, your Wall Street Journal, your PRDaily, Mashable and the like, it catches your eye. The holy grail of Monday. The article you absolutely, positively have to tweet.

You login to your management console and along the way the phone rings, emails multiply, crises erupt and your Monday morning is gone before you know. And the article remains untweeted. You call it quits and hope for a better Tuesday, one where you can tweet that beloved article that you are certain your followers will love. Read the rest of this entry »

I have been reading a lot lately. Really, way more reading than I was doing in previous months. From the Wall Street Journal and the Financial Times on the weekend, to amNY and Metro weekdays, and a slew of business and advertising trades in between, I have been trying to immerse myself in two of the professional areas I have the most passion in: small business and media.

Despite the fact that many of the publications that I have been reading have their own unique audience (For anyone who hasn’t done it yet, check out FT Weekend. Honestly, one of the best papers you will read.), the underlying fact of the matter is that each and every one of them tries to do the same thing at the end of the day: tell its readers great stories in a compelling medium that they enjoy. Read the rest of this entry »