Dave Donohue: nerd-in-residence

Entries categorized as ‘Media relations’

Social media is not a shotgun

August 26, 2008 · 4 Comments

I first remember PR people being publicly flogged when Josh McHugh, Dan Roth, and Scott Woolley (later joined by Caroline Waxler) started The Buzz Saw in 1999.  Similar observations about the quality and frequency of PR pitches have been made in newsrooms and on bar stools since long before my time.

Twitter has become today’s Buzz Saw.  It’s not just a back channel for people to bitch about SXSW and Gnomedex - it’s frequented by frustrated journalists, analysts, and bloggers.  If you work in PR, these Tweets should disturb you:

  • “and the JavaOne PR takes its toll: if i don’t answer a morning voicemail, that doesn’t mean “please call me four more times”"
  • “PR People… if I didn’t reply to your email, what makes you think I will reply to you on Facebook?”
  • “this PR freak who spammed me on facebook won’t leave me alone now. he keeps msging me. had to block him. any wonder why i’m so down on PR?”
  • “Bloggers keep putting pitching guidelines on their blog, & keep getting bad pitches cause mst PR firms pitching never read blog”
  • “NOTE TO PR PEOPLE AND ENTREPRENEURS: I am far less likely to talk about you or do what you want if you DM me than if you just beg in public.”

Why the hate?  One reason is that too many - WAY too many - PR people are looking at social media as the ultimate shotgun approach.  If an email or a phone call goes unreturned it’s tempting to message someone on Facebook, dm them on Twitter, send an IM or two, call and email them again, etc.  Saying that you exhausted all those options might placate a boss or client for a little while, but in all likelihood you’re seriously hurting your chances for future dialogue with the person you’re trying to reach.

In the PR industry’s rush to show how social media-savvy it’s become, too many people are focusing on distribution rather than consumption.  Hitting someone on every number, address, and social media account they have isn’t “reaching out” to them.  It’s annoying them.  The proof is in the links above.

Social media has changed many of the rules for PR, but not the most important rule: You can’t effectively pitch someone unless you’re reading what they’re writing.  What leading influencers are writing isn’t limited to news, opinions, and trends.  Often they’re telling us exactly how and where they do and don’t want to be pitched.  This is the kind of information that’s never going to be found in Cision or MediaMap:

  • Robert Scoble:  “I hate Facebook and Twitter direct messages.  I can’t answer those, so don’t even try.”
  • Sarah Lacy:  “facebook is for friends, not press releases”
  • Rafe Needleman:  “Twitter pitch? Ok, but direct only, and provide link and reply email in the Tweet.”
  • Rafe Needleman:  “A pitch on IM? Ugh. A least make sure I want to hear it before you start. Better yet: EMail”
  • Stowe Boyd:  “I am shifting permanently to twitpitching as the sole medium for companies to pitch me.”
  • Stephen Baker:  “Our common love of the Rolling Stones does not a relationship make.” [OK, that's a paraphrase I took some liberties with.]

Similar sentiments can be found from practically every blogger I’ve pitched in the past six months.  These folks are generous in providing PR rules of engagement, and it’s just silly not to be aware of them.  Even sillier not to follow them.

Following a blogger’s rules of engagement is no guarantee that you’ll get their attention.  However, when paired with awareness of what they’re following and participation in the discussions they’re driving, it’s an important way to build a relationship.

Bombarding people with a social media shotgun is the quickest way to make sure a relationship never develops.

Categories: Blogging · Facebook · Media relations · Twitter · Uncategorized

Michael Kanellos is a funny guy

August 14, 2007 · No Comments

I have been accused, sometimes correctly, of zoning out a bit during long calls and saving myself by blurting out something about RSS feeds. RSS is an important technology to those of us in PR, but for a long time, PR (and the tech industry in general) was fond of phrases that ended up on the Bullshit Bingo board.

Today, c|net’s Michael Kanellos gave us a new top 10 list of terms to avoid. If you’ve ever struggled with an executive who insists on making “inflection points” the centerpiece of their keynote or product managers who talk about Web 2.5, you’re going to bust a guy laughing at it.

Categories: Humor · Media relations

PR: Pick your top 10 list

May 25, 2007 · 3 Comments

Actually, pick between your top 10 and your top 6. But do go visit Guy Kawasaki’s post of Margie Fisher’s Top 10 Reasons PR Doesn’t Work, many of which focus on flaws on the client side. Then read Dave McClure’s sort-of-rebuttal, which focuses on his top 6 PR firm no-no’s.

The posts and their comments are driving an interesting discussion about what’s right and what’s wrong in tech PR. The two posts aren’t necessarily at odds, but it’s a much more interesting discussion than the usual “PR is a dinosaur in a transparent Web 2.0 world” opinions that come up now and again.

Categories: Blogging · Media relations

The more things change…

May 22, 2007 · 3 Comments

It’s difficult to work in tech PR and escape talk of another bubble. Sentiments that had been (excuse the horrible, horrible pun) bubbling under the surface came to a head last night when Mike Arrington posted his thoughts on the topic. By the way, should you ever doubt the sphere of TechCrunch’s influence, check out Techmeme - his post is squarely at the top, having spurred at least 19 other posts, including a couple from BusinessWeek, where Mike’s views are being discussed.

At any rate, while this kind of is-it-or-isn’t it discussion didn’t happen in Bubble 1.0 until it was much too late, I’m noticing a lot of odd coincidences between 2000 and 2007 lately. None of this makes me think that Bubble 2.0 is upon us - rather that as with Mark Twain, reports of the death of the tech economy, and with it tech PR and tech media - have been greatly exaggerated.

Some examples:

  • The news remains focused on the Internet’s role in financial markets and how tricksters can make things dangerous for investors. On August 25, 2000 the victim was Emulex, temporarily wiping out $2.5 billion of its market cap. Last week, it was Apple, whose investors lost $4.5 billion thanks to a hoaxster playing games with Engadget in what Caroline McCarthy calls the “Dewey Defeats Truman” moment of our time.
  • Similarly, the Web’s going to put print journalists out of a job. Just ask the March 27, 2000 edition of the Wall Street Journal, though to be fair that article is much rosier than its headline would lead you to believe. While this is happening with some outlets, as Dan Gillmor reported over the weekend, companies like Dow Jones are attracting very nice
  • On December 28, 2000 the New York Times covered a little company called Blogger (The NYT article was actually preceded by the New Yorker’s Rebecca Mead in the excellent “You’ve Got Blog”, but I can’t find my bookmark for it and neither can Google). It notes that the Guardian in London had implemented a blog to point online readers to other sites, thus breaking “a fundamental rule of commercial Web publishing: keep people on your site for as long as possible.” Today, BusinessWeek’s Stephen Baker is noting that Arrington has succeeded where BusinessWeek didn’t in making CEOs cry, which I think is his way of getting a laugh. Still, we’re all familiar with the underlying competition for readers’ attention that’s still making headlines in 2007.
  • Most personally, Kara Swisher noted her own memories of Bubble 1.0 today in response to the TechCrunch post that started it all. In addition to giving a bunch of tips to anyone who wants to hang up on people like me, she noted some war stories from the first boom, including:

“I [had] one start-up exec tell me with a straight face that his company was ‘pre-revenue’ ”

I’m not sure how many times Kara heard that, but I know that she heard it at least once. Unfortunately, I know because I was there, and my ex-boss was the one who said it to her. This afternoon we had a nice email/comment exchange laughing about it.

What’s promising for all concerned is that people like Kara are noting that she finds “the landscape quantum levels higher than the mostly ridiculous roundelays of world-shaking claims by subpar start-ups that took place in the last bubble” and that “the new companies, for the most part, are actually useful and much more disciplined and with much less lofty goals”. That’s a hopeful note, since in her new role with Walt Mossberg at D she must be getting pitched by every tech startup under the sun.

If I had a point in all this other than that I’m dating myself and remember far too much about the year 2000, it’s that markets are always going to ebb and flow and that media outlets are always changing. However, PR people with the ability to follow those changes and establish longstanding relationships with influencers will always remain relevant so long as they can help influence a discussion.

Categories: Blogging · Media relations · Publishing · Web 2.0

Tech PR War Stories

April 4, 2007 · 1 Comment

Last week, my old friend Billy James passed on David Strom’s announcement of a new podcast series he and Paul Gillin have put together called Tech PR War Stories.

I’m enjoying these. There are three podcasts thus far, and they’ve kept a witty edge to them - some of the horror stories sound a bit like Kevin Murphy’s (excerpt: “PR pitches fascinate me. They make me feel like a dog that has dozens of people stroking it, all trying to find that one special place that makes its leg kick”).

If you’ve been doing this for a while, you will find a lot to remember, but younger PR people will find a lot of context (I’d say history, but it makes me feel so old) in these as well. Our industry wasn’t always Web 2.0-centric.  The brands from the good old days have largely changed, but  the core competencies remain the same and there’s lots to learn from people who have been around the block and share their stories. I recommend checking these podcasts out.

Categories: Media relations · Podcast