Towards a new PR
Between the ‘PR people are dolts’ meme and the ‘News releases are not fit to line bird cages’ argument, we’ve had quite a few weeks in the PR blogosphere.
But after managing to poke holes in both arguments, despite being right we’re all wrong here.
PR people who make asses of themselves to bloggers and journalists are a problem for the whole industry. And while the news release format is still useful and still has a lot of life left in it, the concept of ‘the message’ and ‘control of the message’ and the language we use itself in releases, pitches, etc., is the problem.
Richard Edelman wrote something last week that got me thinking about this:
We talk with pride about developing messages for our clients. What about Doc Searls’ view that in this democratized world, we don’t need messages? Maybe the idea of controlled messages is something that worked in a world of relatively few media and is now obsolete. We have to get away from anything that smacks of control and manipulation of audiences. We should opt for public relationships where the operational words are dialogue, transparency and speed to market.
The way we deal with journalists is a problem precisely because we make assumptions about ‘control’ and ‘message’ that are fundamentally in opposition to how journalists see the universe. And in the networked world we’re living in today, those assumptions are fundamentally wrong.
The larger point is that ten years after the Internet and five years after the Cluetrain, most PR agencies are still in denial that the age of control is over.
In my last agency job we would sit in meetings for hours working over every detail of what to say to a single reporter, when a simple ‘hi, are you interested in this’ would have sufficed. Instead we sent out six paragraph long monstrosities that ended up in the proverbial circular file. But it was the tone that mattered to us, how could we justify our retainers if we didn’t maintain that tone?
I’m sure this scenario plays itself out in most agency and most reporters can smell a contrivance a mile a way. But PR folks still do it. And journalists and bloggers still hate it.
And I’m still getting through to reporters by talking like a human being and holding a conversation with them. Not dictating to them.
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Comments
The Message Is The Message
David Parmet is talking his usual good sense about the need for PR shops to get clued in. Sez David: “The way we deal with journalists is a problem precisely because we make assumptions about ‘control’ and ‘message’ that are…
One Doc blog post = MBA in PR
You could look at Doc’s post today on PR and get a nice, compact graduate degree in what’s going on with PR today. Cuts included from Edelman and my friend David Parmet, both of whom contribute valuably. These three speak
[...] Of course, that’s overstating it. We’re not of the mind that the ‘press release is dead’ (one of many memes tech savvy PR types are wrestling with today). We do thinks blogs are great tools for PR. At the very least, they are a super efficient way to distribute & syndicate the PR materials your company invests so many resources to develop. Many journalists have already been vocal about preferring to get RSS feeds instead of email pitches. This article talks about a security firm who garnered international press attention from a single blog post. Sunbelt Software wrote about an identify theft ring on their blog devoted to security issues. The next day, media picked up the story, and other bloggers reposted it. [...]
Hey Dave - I couldn’t agree more. I have been in PR for almost 8 years and reporters have not changed - less is more. Press releases will always have their place, it’s one document that captures all the specifics. But, as we all know, reporters can read that and use what they want. What they need is a knowledgeable, savvy PR person to bring news to their attention and tell them WHY they should write about it - all in a sentence or two - or 30 seconds, depending on your preference of course.