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Scoop.it!
If you run into one of these characters at a Halloween party, you’ll be truly frightened.
PR professionals have nightmares all year long that are much scarier than anything to do with ghosts and goblins. Ours actually pertain to real people—the clients we serve.
Forget black cats, this Halloween season we’re highlighting the most terrifying clients to cross a PR pros path....
[Ahhhh. Clients from hell. Who hasn't been there? ~ Jeff] 
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Scoop.it!
I hired a PR agency & all I got was a lousy T-shirt Are you searching for a PR agency? Do you know where to start? I've got seven guidelines to help you make the right choice for a PR agency partner.
Today, many agencies offer a full complement of services in addition to traditional media relations. The best agencies also know social media, marketing, research and business management too.
Planning an agency cattle call? Don’t do it. You need to design a smart process to follow. What’s your experience working with a PR agency? Positive, negative or excruciating? Don’t make the same mistakes the second time around.
Time and again, clients and prospects share similar experience that’s best captured as “I hired a PR agency and all I got was this stupid T-shirt.”...
[I've run PR agencies and also been the client. It' all true! LOL - JD]
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Not too long ago a company entered Beta and realized they needed help in “spreading the word”. The goal was to help generate publicity and placements during the Beta period. The company, LogMyCalls, hired a PR firm to help with both strategy and execution of an aggressive public relations campaign.
The most pressing need was to ramp up coverage during the Beta period in preparation for their hard launch in May 2012. The company researched a variety of PR firms and eventually settled on one that said they track PR with advertising-style metrics. This is appealing for any business managing their budget and seeking a positive return on investment.
The PR agency came highly recommended and seemed like a sure thing. They assured the company that their strategy was centered around hard metrics, data and results. According to McKay Allen from ContactPoint, the parent company, “We were excited about working with them and so we signed the contract.”
5 months later we fired them....
[Great PR agency reminder - it's about the results - JD]
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PR agencies sell their clients advice on how to 'manage' social media. But how good are they at doing it for themselves?
Our view is that big agency networks offering social media advice must walk the talk. Those that cannot show they know what they are doing for their own brands will lose out in the battle to advise others.
So, to see how some of the world’s largest PR agencies stack up, we have, for the second year running, analysed the comparative performance of 25 leading global networks, measuring the effectiveness of each agency’s social media presence.
Scoop.it!
A recent Wakefield Research survey of 1,000 American officer workers showed that more than two-thirds felt “...the worst type of boss is one who steals our ideas.” I agree. But, I'd add that the worst type of employee is one who steals ideas from her co-workers.
...Getting back to intellectual capital theft in the workplace, I can tell you we've experienced it at Peppercom. In one of the more egregious examples, an otherwise exemplary account supervisor repeatedly presented her team's media placements as her own. “Oh, I've known John Smith at Fast Company for years. He always takes my calls,” she'd tell the pleased client (even though a junior AE had secured the hit).
This went on for several months until the entire team (and this blogger) met with the client for an in-person quarterly review. After exchanging pleasantries, the client contact began raving about “Abigail”, her amazing media contacts and the quality of her placements.
I looked around the conference room to see looks of astonishment followed by rage....
Scoop.it!
The average PR agency revenue for 2011 reached 18.6%, not quite as high as in pre-recession 2007, but heartening to agency owners nonetheless.
PR agency profitability in North America spiked from a 2009 four-year low of 13.5% of revenues to an average of 18.6% in 2011 (see chart), according to the annual StevensGouldPincus Best Practices Benchmarking Survey results released in June 2012.
Averaged from a total of 105 PR agencies in the U.S. and Canada, the 18.6% number compares with 15.6% in 2010, 13.5% in 2009 and 15.6% in 2008. “In pre-recession 2007, revenues averaged 19.7%,” says Rick Gould, managing partner at StevensGouldPincus, a N.Y.-based merger and management firm specializing in the communications field....
[PR agency rebound underway? JD]
Scoop.it!
As I scanned the monthly issue of PR Week (a thought that always makes me chuckle, by the way), I was startled by the glossy, full-page advertisements from a few of our industry's global firms. They literally jumped off the pages at me.
Each was exquisitely designed and executed. Each obviously cost a ton of money to place. Each said exactly the same thing. And, here's the kicker, each MISSED the most important word in today's strategic communications landscape.
Before I reveal the word, I must first share the holding company taglines...
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When deciding whether to work with a new client, how do you tell if you should invoke the "Life's too short" rule?
That's the subject of this month's newsletter....
[Michael McLaughlin shares heartfelt advice any consultant can appreciate - JD]
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I distinctly remember my first boss at Hill & Knowlton telling me Uniroyal was very late in paying its invoices and that I needed to collect the outstanding monies ASAP. ”This makes both of us look really bad to management,”...
But, before I could pick up the phone, my boss provided some additional counseling. “Come up with a list of day-to-day activities, provide Lynn with updates and, then, at the very end, apologize to her for having to even mention the subject of money, but ask if she'd mind checking on our invoices,” he suggested....
[Great financial tips for PR agencies and solo PR pros - JD]
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There’s no such thing as a stupid questions, only stupid answers.
Faced with pressure to generate pageviews, content managers have gotten into the habit of being a mile wide and an inch deep in their coverage. Trading depth for breadth and playing to the lowest common cultural denominator. We have to, right? Because today’s content consumer is pressed for time and brain cells and will probably only scan your headline and your bolded keyphrases before they will largely blindly like, Tweet or pin your just-another-post-in-the-sea content. Except that that’s not true. Despite what people might say, society is not getting dumber, we’re getting smarter. We want better information faster....
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Each week, Dear Gracie answers questions from ProfNet Connect readers with advice from our network of nearly 50,000 ProfNet experts.
Dear Gracie, Some of my clients repeatedly ask me to pitch announcements that I don’t think qualify as “news.” I know if I do pitch the information, journalists will be annoyed and I could damage my media relationships. How do I explain this to my clients?
Peeved Pitcher
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Courtesy of Odwyer’s PR I learned today of a speech he [Lord Chadlington] recently gave at the Public Relations World Congress, and of characteristics he looks for in his senior employees and just had to share it....
Scoop.it!
While rummaging through my sock drawer the other day, I found myself unable to locate a clean, matched pair. I asked my wife if there might be any in the wash. She responded by telling me to check the mismatched sock pile in the laundry room.
The name triggered a Pavlovian response, and I was immediately transported back in time to a major new business pitch we were making.
We were up against some major players and challenged by the prospect to present “ideas that would get an agency fired.” As you might expect, we soon found ourselves struggling to formulate three truly innovative (and agency firing worthy) suggestions....
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Scoop.it!
For years now, leaders within our industry have been talking about how social and digital will either help transform PR firms, or be the cause of their slow and painful death spiral into irrelevance. The truth is that the social and digital evolution is just but one important part of a confluence of functional, operational and cultural shifts that will re-shape our PR firms.
[Thoughtful reflection on PR agencies' future by Aaron Wittken- JD]
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Repman readers have patiently read my many missives about misbehaving clients. Since turnabout is fair play, I've asked Syd Steinhardt, a former agency colleague and current client-side type, to share his story of the agency from hell.
It is the scourge of every PR agency pro: the client from hell.
This occupational hazard can be any one of the following: the inexperienced manager whose insecurity compels him to insert himself to such a degree that he impedes progress on the account; the corporate bureaucrat who thinks that he knows everything, but really knows nothing, about PR; or the onetime agency person who acts out his pent-up hostility to former clients by abusing his outside PR firm.
Having been an agency guy myself for 12 years before going in house five years ago, I have seen them all. To help manage such clients, I offer the following tips to make your life easier....
[Great piece for clients of PR agencies - JD]
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I imagine you’re reading this post because you want to help your PR or communications firm reach industry profitability standards. If you haven’t read them yet, I think you’ll find Part 1 and Part 2 helpful.
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I stand by my passion and conviction that PR agencies can attain at least a 20% bottom line with proper counsel and guidance, can build ongoing value in the firm, and can ultimately sell the firm for a price beyond their wildest expectations.
The question many of you are asking now is “how”?
The answer requires more than a “business” philosophy. PR executives don’t normally think or act from a “business,” can-do-it philosophy or standpoint. The way the 20%+ profitability is attained is by shifting to a determined, goal-oriented, can-do-it mindset. A 50-55% labor cost and 25% operating expense costs guarantees at least a 20% operating profit. You CAN do it. You SHOULD do it. You NEED to do it to survive, prosper and grow your firm the right way....
[Excellent counsel for PR firms from Rick Gould - JD]
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There’s been yet another brouhaha about ethics in PR, and rightly so. A staffer at one of Wal*Mart’s public affairs firms got it terribly wrong, posing as a reporter at a “closed” press conference given by a union. And smarter folks than I have weighed in.
(Since first publishing this blog, I learned that Wal*Mart fired the public affairs firmed involved.)
[Great advice for PR agencies from Ken Jacobs - JD]
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Once again, a public relations firm is in the news for the unethical professional conduct of one of its own.
And once again, it’s over the issue of disclosure.
Reports surfaced in Gawker and elsewhere yesterday that a young professional employed by Mercury Public Affairs had posed as a university student and registered under a false name to gain access to a “closed press conference” held by Warehouse Workers United (WWU). Mercury’s client, Walmart, is trying to open a store in the Chinatown area of Los Angeles, and local labor groups, among others, are challenging the store’s permitting. Allegedly, the Mercury employee infiltrated the meeting to interview union members, one would assume to gain inside information that would benefit her client.
This woman’s actions—and the subsequent reactions—have rippled through the profession, leaving her unemployed and the public relations profession with yet another black eye that erodes the public’s trust in our craft....
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My good pal and now co-author of “Marketing In The Round,” Gini Dietrich, says we should be more personal in our blogs. Tell more stories. Acknowledge when we need to get better at how we run and market our businesses. In her blog, Gini has spoken with ruthless honesty about some of the challenges she’s faced in her business.
[Great reminder for any business or solo consultant - JD]
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From
holtz
...In fact, those self-promoting blogs Marshall seems to think characterize agency efforts don’t represent the best agency blogging. Agency blogs that produce the kinds of results H&K has achieved spotlight thought leadership, not awards and new-hires. The ain’t-we-great style of blog—whether from an agency or a company—never appealed to anybody, a fact reinforced by Forrester research that dates back 3-1/2 years.
When I asked study author Josh Bernoff about the Digiday article, he asked, “Did (agency blogs) have anything to say in the first place? Blogs are for thought leaders.” Which is exactly how Forrester approaches blogging. “Only Forrester analysts blog,” he points out, “and they are all, by definition, trying to be thought leaders.”...
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Every now and then, I think back to when we were first setting up shop in 1989.
...Back in the early days of Crawford/Mikus Creative Marketing & Design, collaborating with clients was the name of the game. We were constantly on the road, meeting with clients about campaign strategies, discussing new projects, sharing layouts and doing press checks.
Fast forward to 2012 and it’s a very different world. We’ve gone from face time to Facebook. Now, days or weeks could go by without seeing a client in their offices or in our studio...
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Lots of agencies have booze on hand—Arnold in Boston even has an impatient and lonely beer vending machine that harasses employees on Twitter until they visit it. But JWT's Casa in Brazil has the most annoying agency beer fridge.
It's hooked up to the shop's computers and refuses to open on Fridays until all staffers complete their weekly time sheets.
[PR agency CEO, CFO, bosses, managers' alert! Must-have management tool! ;-) JD ]
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Hiring public relations interns? Here are 14 ideas for creating a rewarding internship experience.
[Great suggestions - JD]
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...According to the Content Marketing Institute, content initiatives now account for more than 25% of overall B-to-B marketing spend, and 60% of marketers plan to increase that amount in 2012. A full 90% of B-to-B marketers do some form of content marketing, even if they don’t realize it, while B-to-B companies invest on average a quarter of their total budget on creating content.
Other research has found that 90% of customers “find custom content useful,” and 61% of people “feel better about a company that delivers custom content and are more likely to buy from that company.” With outside firms now picking up a lot of important and available new content work, the folks at LaunchSquad decided to start a new kind of content marketing firm, Original9 Media....
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