Leave No Stone Unturned


The point of this book is to leave no stone unturned in the search for PR success, the easy, not to mention thorough and successful, way. So how do you copy the things that agencies like ours do well, or that we’ve been successful at? First, remember that news is subjective. And in the business of promulgating news, you must always put your own spin first and listen to your gut. Don’t listen to what other people say is the best story; go with your own instincts, because if this is your story, you will definitely know best.

Many times a CEO has confided an offbeat idea to us, one that his immediate reports thought was lame. We usually counsel these folks to go for the CEO’s idea, unless he’s an out-and-out egotist or otherwise deluded. The reason? If it’s his company and his vision, he’ll be passionate about it, and he may just have the idea that puts the company on the buzz map.

Show Glamorous Passion

Always be gutsy. Yes, “always” doing anything is hard to imagine, but dealing with press people is a game, and it’s a two-way street that never ends. Be out there with your heart in it, don’t take no or maybe for an answer, show glamorous passion, and just, well … go for it. You’d be surprised at how many reporters or producers will stop what they’re doing, sit up, and pay attention, because these people darn well respect your gumption.

Stay informed about the world (see sidebars “It Happens to Be News, Dummy” and “Cruise the News,” below). We can’t say this enough! Any reporter will tell you to tie your idea to a trend. Sharpen … sharpen … sharpen! Smart PR pros need to make trend watching a 24/7 habit. Only then will you be sharp enough to spot the fresh ideas that make your company a natural tie-in to the news.

Take the words “I don’t care” out of your mouth forever. Do you hate sports? Well, before you paper your bird cage with the sports section, at least skim through it. You may find a tie-in to your company that you would never have dreamed of if you’d considered it fit only for canary carpet. By the same token, if you don’t normally talk to people who are interested in arts and culture—maybe you’re a techie who lives and breathes routers—start hanging out with a cultural crowd in your workplace. Or just go to a new play or art exhibit once in a while.

Everyone in the biz will tell you that reporters like to talk to well-rounded people. Plus, you’ll be much more fun at parties. But if you talk nothing but gobbledygook, journalists will get bored even if their job is to cover your industry.

We also suggest identifying some well-known trend watchers whose ideas you respect and trust. Perhaps it’s a pundit with political leanings similar to your own, or a writer for the New Yorker or The Economist whose work you find insightful. Or, better yet, start reading the work of writers with whom you don’t agree, for a different perspective and a better shot at seeing the whole picture. Whomever you choose, follow their work as often as you can. Seek out their books, their articles, and their broadcast appearances. This knowledge gives you grist for all of your dealings with the media.

Here’s one piece of advice that PR pros know but won’t tell people outside the industry: Think kindly toward the media! Journalists aren’t as jaded as you’ve been told or led to imagine. That “I’ve-heard-it-all-before” attitude doesn’t exist, at least not among journalists of any repute. Faced with shrinking newsroom staffs and resources, plus far heavier workloads, journalists today can’t afford that brand of cynicism. No, they want help from good sources.

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It Happens to Be News, Dummy

It’s a cool world when people can talk to each other with more than just a semblance of knowledge. PR people, especially, need to be informed. That’s harder to be in an info world that is, strangely, becoming overpersonalized and overcustomized. Marketers flood our mailboxes, real and virtual, with all sorts of offers customized for us alone. Hundreds, if not thousands, of websites offer services akin to My Yahoo! or mywashingtonpost. On a more profound level, the ease with which we can arrange to be spoon-fed only the information we deem worthy is a real danger, however. Suddenly you’re less informed than you ought to be, or would be if you had to seek out all this information yourself. All this overcustomization has led us down a wily path of surreal and distorted knowledge.

My elders told me the folks who didn’t crash and burn in the post-1929 Great Crash days were the well-informed ones: They saw the cultural indicators that told them to react—fast! In post-Crash 2000 we’d do well to follow our forefathers’ advice and cull our information from broader sources.

Thankfully, in-the-know types are pushing for change. What’s the media of the future going to be like, then? Soon interactive news will mean a broader world, allowing us to see much more than ever before. According to veteran news guys, networks will put up a “barker channel” that will steer you to interactive applications. If you want to get more information on a current event, you’d simply click on a certain spot on your screen. The result looks like Headline News, except that you’ll be able to click on the little paragraphs to get in-depth information on the story in broadcast-quality video. Dreams like that bode well for us in the news-gathering and information industry, which is exactly what PR people must match and compete with daily.

The people who make news are coming to grips with a news flash: Digital doesn’t have to mean trivial. Matt Drudge, master of all things light and airy, said a few years ago: “Sure it will be digital, but it will be larger, more gorgeous than ever before, and completely and utterly fascinating, in order to grab [the] attention of an ingrained, thrill-seeking world.” And a super well-informed one at that.

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Cruise the News

Read the following every day, or just casually glance at each of these, and the news of that morning is yours. Staying informed is a part-time job. Don’t get fired.

  • The Wall Street Journal Interactive Edition

  • MSNBC.com

  • The New York Times on the Web

  • Nikkei Net (for Asia watchers)

  • USA Today

  • The Economist

  • The Washington Post

  • Bloomberg.com

  • The Street.com

  • BusinessWeek

  • Yahoo! News

  • CBS Marketwatch

  • BBC News

  • CNET’s News.com

  • Der Spiegel

  • CNN Fringe News

  • Les Echos

  • Forbes

  • El Mundo

  • Financial Times

  • Gazeta Mercantile

  • Los Angeles Times

    And if you’re a news junkie like we are, you will also want to bookmark each of these places to visit daily, and we mean even on Saturdays:

    www.sjmercury.com

    www.ananova.com

    www.reuters.com

    www.washingtonpost.com

    www.sfgate.com

    www.prorev.com

    www.metafilter.com

    www.robotwisdom.com

    www.modernhumorist.com

    europe.cnn.com

    www.eonline.com

    ea.nytimes.com/cgi-bin/poppage?position=bottom

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One of the coolest things about being a really informed person is that you’ll be brimming with fresh ideas, from fashion to corporate management. You then become one of those sources reporters love: a PR pro who tosses out interesting ideas and trends, even if they’re not always linked to a story about your company or product. And voil ! You will soon become an expert in the “thought-you’d-be-interested-in-this” e-mail subject, one of our favorite things to do (except, of course, in 2001, when it became the header of an e-mail containing a huge virus). This way, the next time you call with a pitch about your company, you’ve already built up a reservoir of honest respect.

Think

Make time for self-examination. Companies should view the recent rough economic times as a gift. The slower pace of activity is allowing companies to take a step back and reevaluate what they are doing and how they are doing it. This break in frenetic action is important because “with every hour in the day accounted for, we risk losing our culture and creativity,” says a wonderfully profound marketing expert we know.

Being too busy for reflection happens on both a corporate and a personal level, and it has real consequences for creativity and fresh thinking. This same smart fellow takes time each week to see his nieces and grants hours each day just to think. “Everyone I know gets on a train,” he says, “and instead of contemplating something or giving their thoughts free rein, they get on their cell phones. Cell phones allow you to have conversations to pass the time, instead of passing the time in actual thought.”

Speed is good in sports and fabulous in microwaves. When we begin to hurry through life, however, things get ugly. Many of the most important things in the world take time and thought! When we sacrifice that, we lose in the end, and there’s nothing touchy-feely about that result. Slow down and contemplate. Your ability to create brilliant, imaginative PR—not to mention a host of other things—will only benefit.

Finally, as the sergeant said in Hill Street Blues, be careful out there. We mean that in the simplest manner. Don’t rush into things without thinking out your message, and don’t be ill prepared for even the briefest phone call. One of our folks made that dastardly error when he phoned a reporter to double-check his name, explaining helpfully, “I want to send a bylined article to you at Forbes.” Unfortunately, the disgruntled gent on the other end of the line worked for Fortune.

Watch your step, watch the news, and watch your competition. We’re going to show you the best ways to do all three. And once you know those basics, you can watch your sales go through the roof. And come to think of it, why stop there?




Full Frontal PR[c] Getting People Talking About You, Your Business, or Your Product
Full Frontal PR[c] Getting People Talking About You, Your Business, or Your Product
ISBN: 1576600998
EAN: N/A
Year: 2005
Pages: 105

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