You keep complaining, you keep asking us to stop. We do our best to listen, but some of us make mistakes. Now you have taken to outing PR firms and blacklisting their entire email address books via wiki (image by Sam Foster).
This is your right. And unfortunately, because of the very nature of our business most PR firms have to take it and in some cases apologize. Writers of any nature have the power. We need you more than you need us.
But this doesn’t make you right. In fact, you are in the wrong:
1) You are carpet bombing entire PR firms because of the error/mistake of one PR person.
2) The very nature of email pitches is so subjective that there are now shades of spam.
3) Even when a blogger/journalist states their preferred method, they are often thorny and downright nasty when you contact them in stated manner.
4) By shutting off sources wholesale, you are limiting your ability to deliver valid information to the readers you serve.
5) Because each person is unique, each blogger/journalist’s preferences can be so particular there is no way all of you will be satisfied.
6) These situations come down to relationships versus cold contacts. If we don’t have them, you won’t listen. But there needs to be a starting point. Email may not be the best way, but are phone calls? Snail mail? Each relationship begins somewhere.
I don’t feel bad for reporters and A-List bloggers who get this kind of attention. It’s part of the job and/or results of tremendous success. Get over it. With the good comes the bad. I’ve been a reporter in the past and got the daylights spammed out of my inbox, and to some extent get the same kind of pitches because of this blog and my book. That’s what the delete button is for… And for the record, PR is much harder than journalism or blogging.
Livingston Communications was not on the Trapani list, nor the Chris Anderson list. But we’ve had our own mistakes. We address them and do better. Training? Yes, we invest. Best practices? Yes, we discuss them and implement them… Weekly! Pay attention to specific requests for how to contact individuals? Yes, we listen (image by traveljunkieoz).
Is Stowe Boyd’s call for open PR a good solution? I don’t think so. The very nature of clients and competitive business will prevent this. But because of his request, when my firm wants to pitch him we’ll do it openly on Twitter.
Stowe also hit the nail on the head when he noted clients or companies as being the primary cause of these issues. Heat from clients is the name of the game. Good PR pros push back, fulfilling a role as an ombudsman. But corporate money often does the talking. Some firms won’t cross the line, others will.
How Outing Impacts People
Errors come to my attention because someone has the courtesy to contact me. That’s what executives are supposed to do: Address these problems.
When reporters or bloggers publicly act on a wholesale basis instead of asking the lead exec or account team leader to handle this issue, you never give us the opportunity to succeed. Worse, you doom some individuals to lose their job, to never get an opportunity to learn.
Here’s the fact: Nasty actions like publicly outing PR professionals and firms hurt real people. Bloggers (and some reporters) often act without professional ethics or thinking about how these acts affect others. I got one thing to say back to you: Take responsibility for your words and stop harming people.
Shocked? A PR person talking back like that? I’m just saying what almost all of us feel. Seriously, holster your guns, cowboys and cowgirls.
And for the record, sometimes nasty reporters/bloggers like you end up getting blackballed. Just something to keep in mind, but you’ll never read this will you? Because in your opinion, PR isn’t worth listening to… You know better.
For another excellent post in the same vein, read Jason Falls “Why PR Folks Should Blacklist Bloggers.”
But Geoff, people can contact you because we know who to contact. What about Ogilvy or Edelman. Or, as in my case a few months ago, Monster… Bloggers don’t know who to contact, nor should we. If every PR person put a link to a “complaints” email on the bottom of these emails (such as is typical with opt out/unsubscribe) emails, then there might be a different level of accountability. End of the day, if PR wants to remain honest in the views of those they are trying to pitch, then they should provide transparent accountability. Quit getting self righteous about bloggers outing bad PR when PR isn’t doing a very good job of outing themselves.
I can’t speak for those firms, Aaron. But I am sure if you wanted to, you can find a way to get in touch with senior management. Publicly outing is a real bad demonstration of values and ethics. Two wrongs don’t make a right. So, sorry, I won’t stop getting self righteous about it.
That’s the point. I don’t want to have to figure that out. I didn’t opt-in. I shouldn’t have to opt-out. THAT my friend is where the questionable ethics and morals are in question.
You know, Aaron, I think that’s a good point. All firms should have some sort of a person to serve as a complaint point for these issues.
I think in some of these instances, like Tripani, both SHIFT and FutureWorks have highly accessible CEOs: Todd Defren and Brian Solis. In those cases, I am 100% certain that if they were contacted — and I know they are openly available — that the matters would have been resolved. So I am still wagging my finger a little… ;)
LOL… Obviously the companies that are out there that we do know are accessible. They are also less likely to be outed, as you noted. The ones that are more likely to be outed, are generally inaccessible or I’ve got to do too much work to gain access – which is only going to piss me off more.
Could it not be argued that if you publish in the public eye – and are successful at it, and enjoy the rewards of that success (access, advertising revenue, tsotchkes, etc.) – that you are a public persona (a.k.a. a journalist, albeit amateur) and can thus expect some of the downsides that come with that success? Just askin’.
I think this post is worth a read, Aaron:
http://www.blogworldexpo.com/blog/2008/05/11/should-bloggers-blacklist-pr-firms/
Every journalistic publishing organizations have standards and codes governing the relationships between its journalists, staff, vendors and advertisers. If you want to go down that road, Todd, I am my own publishing organization and have established policies governing these relationships.
As a PR person, I’m getting awfully sick of the “PR people are HORRIBLE” comments that have been going around lately. But in all honesty, I think it’s been the lazy / untrained / stupid PR people ruining it for the ones who take the time to understand the space. At the same time, I agree that publicly outing those people or blacklisting an entire firm is a step too far for most. Blog or not, Lifehacker is a media outlet as much as the WSJ – neither would be able to do their job if they didn’t get tips from sources.
I can understand the frustration of personal bloggers getting spammed with impersonal press releases, but media sites that happen to be blogs have to expect it. From our end, we need to know their preferences and understand what they want and what they don’t want, but to call out a group based on the actions of a few is akin to online lynch mobbing.
Technosailor.com is a media outlet, not a personal blog, and I too get tired of impersonal press releases. In fact, I just talked to a CEO of a company who reached out to me about a product a month ago. I was grateful for that. But then today I got a PR flack email regarding the same product. I’ve forwarded that email and have gotten a personal pledge to ensure that doesn’t happen again. It happens, we understand that. But it happens more than it should and not just to “personal bloggers” so thank you for not insulting me.
I think this might speak to a larger trend, which may be unavoidable. The reality is that most bloggers don’t need to be pitched via email with press releases and story ideas. When PR companies fail to provide value to their various stakeholders (bloggers, journalists, consumers, etc.) then they get systematically weeded out. Yes, there are many brands out there that need a skilled PR person to get their story out or else we’d only be able to read about Apple and Google every day but impersonal pitches probably aren’t the most efficient way to do it. Sure, the better PR people out there read blogs and try to pitch relevant stories but most firms still issue news that isn’t news and they are paid to disseminate it. This creates spam and then they get filtered out with everything else. In a best case scenario, maybe some of the firms on this list will go back and look for other ways to garner attention, like building relationships and finding innovative ways to distribute their news.
That said, as a member of a big agency that was thankfully left off Gina’s list, I appreciate having email be an open channel. Rarely a week goes by where I don’t need to contact a blogger by email about a correction or to provide some piece of information that I’m pretty sure is useful to them. I guess it’s a fine line.
But Aaron, the difference is that you didn’t intentionally and publicly embarrass and forever blacklist the person that sent you an il-prepared pitch. There is a MAJOR difference. Accompanying Geoff’s post, I’ve (unrealistically, but for the sake of a point) suggested PR folks should blacklist bloggers and journalists whose coverage theoretically would suffer as a result.
http://tinyurl.com/6lpg3y
I’m a blogger (amateur, not pro) and I’ve been reading this article and surrounding conversation with quite a bit of interest. I’m of two minds about this situation where PR firms are being publicly blacklisted:
a) On one hand, the behavior of some people working in the PR industry may resemble that of the telemarketer, except E-Mail is the medium instead of the phone call. With all due respect to all those people who are trying to make a living as telemarketers, virtually no one wants to speak to a telemarketer and, taken in the aggregate, they disrupt one’s life with little chance of finding a receptive listener. A similar thing happens with the mass E-Mail campaigns used by some PR people, or so I understand. Eventually disruptions will produce a negative response.
b) On the other hand, many beginning bloggers and journalists have probably been in the same situation as both the telemarketer and the faceless PR employee: no one knows you, no one cares about you, and no one has time to talk to you, let alone read your blog. I’ve been there and it took months of work to start to build a network of contacts. You can become quite desperate to make contacts and you may try mass-marketing techniques because you’re willing to try anything. And you’ll make mistakes, like not checking to see how a blogger, professional or entrepreneur prefers to be contacted, or spamming a bit as your frustration and impatience wear thin when you don’t get a response.
The sad thing, of course, is that some people forget how hard it was in the beginning after they’ve passed through that part of the Dip and become intolerant of the “noob”. Or maybe their impatience of the successful person is genuine when they feel that they aren’t being listened to. Nonetheless, there may be a hint of hypocricy in the behaviour of the journalist, professional, or entrepreneur who erects barriers to communication and, worse still, publicly flogs someone who screws up.
# # #
Geoff, I think you are quite correct that a relationship has to start somewhere and that some people will build barriers to starting those relationships. However, do you also think it’s possible that the start point might not be with that particular relationship? Just like in social media, would it not make sense to try to build contacts among the more accessible bloggers and journalists instead of trying to go directly to the Trapanis and Andersons of the world? In fairness to them, why would they want to talk to new sources if they’ve already built a somewhat trusted network of contacts, especially if the new source doesn’t respect the rules of engagement (although I agree with you, Geoff, that a single incident from a single person may unfairly tarnish an entire firm’s reputation; however, we don’t know if that’s the first infraction either)
I think you are being reasonable in insisting that the blogger/journalist in question should attempt to report their problems back to the managing partners or executives of PR firms when one of their employees crosses the line.
Then again, Dell Hell and the AOL customer service issue kind of gave the blogger implicit permission to wade in with all guns blazing when pissed off. Or did it?
Aaron, I wasn’t “going down that road” – I was not at all suggesting that there was anything unethical going on. My only point was that successful bloggers probably need to resign themselves to take the bad with the good.
@Aaron and Todd: I agree with Todd in that success breeds attention. People want to influence you, unwelcome or not. It’s just the way it is. I get the same thing now, and just grin and bear it.
@Peter Is it PR people issuing crap news or is it the company? How many releases have I put out, and then never even bothered sending it to a reporter or blogger, instead providing a custom pitch.
I think it’s too easy to shoot the PR practitioner and not look at the bigger picture. The news isn’t news, the company talks at people instead of with them, and the end result sucks all around.
@Mark: What a fantastic comment. I think every kvetching reporter and blogger would be well served walking a mile in a PR person’s shoes. A lot of this complaining would dissipate very quickly.
As to your question, sometimes that person isn’t worth pursuing. When there is a different competing pub/blog or another beat reporter who may be suitable, we give up and pursue them.
But sometimes you really do need that specific person. For example, a wireless telecom beat reporter at the WSJ. In those cases, you need to get very creative. FedEx, find them at events, etc. Some how, some way.
@Geoff – we should all walk a mile in each other’s shoes. :)
Fair enough – sometimes there is a single “go to” person that you need for a situation. Risk/reward at its best, I guess.
I realize no one is saying that *I* am the offender here. That’s not my point. Blanket statements about “media sites” and “personal bloggers” are being made and that’s kind of disrespectful. Chris Brogan is a personal blogger and you wouldn’t (I hope) pitch him with the “spitball” method.
What I’m saying here is, yes, PR professionals need to make a living. I don’t think anyone is denying that. However, bloggers, at the risk of sounding sappy and cliché, are people too. And we need to be treated with the same respect that PR people are demanding for themselves.
I welcome a blacklist of bloggers. See who carries your water bucket then. Please put me at the top of that list. If it keeps the scum away then great. People like Brian Solis, Geoff, Doug Haslam and the multitude of others who have figured out how to talk to us can continue talking to us without the blacklist. It’s not needed for them. They’ve got open doors, something that should be a holy grail for any PR professional looking to work with bloggers at all.
Is that arrogant? Most likely. Oh well.
This conversation has been an interesting one to watch/listen to since it cropped up yesterday.
The relationship between those reporting/blogging/creating the media and PR is symbiotic. Without one, the other starves.
But like any symbiotic relationship, it can sometimes get out of balance. Reporters might see themselves as more important than the message and thereby abuse the PR messengers to the point where no more information flows their way as Geoff described above. PR folks might see the reporters as simply resources or conduits to getting their message out, forgetting that ill-treatment has the opposite effect.
I think Gina’s list crossed a line, because it tarred & feathered many who were not even engaged with her along with her targets.
Additionally, pushing back too hard will lose the good-will of the bloggers toward PR professionals.
Hopefully, the outcome of all of this will be a real examination at the way PR and non-mainstream media can interact so that everyone comes away from the experience with a positive view rather than feeling as though they were being disrespected.
Aaron’s point about creating a voluntary feedback channel is important for serious PR people to hear. Geoff’s point that reporters/bloggers ill-treating the PR folk will prove true in and of itself. This is new media, it doesn’t take all that long for word to get around.
Neither profession is more important than the other, frankly… but neither should be treated poorly by the other either.
@Geekmommy That was a great comment. Thanks for providing a balanced perspective. I like how you showed the pros and cons of both sides.
@Aaron That last comment was pretty funny.
When I’ve tried contacting PR people from my personal blog, I get ignored.
And yet I’m still getting 100s of emails a day for a role I left 3 months ago, and that’s despite an auto-reply to every single one of them.
I don’t know anything about the companies, except that one person appears to think I’m going to write a front page story about something that wasn’t even connected to my previous job, let alone what I do now.
You remember that whole thing about customers being right, and the whole social media thing about listening and conversing with consumers? In this case, the journalists are PR consumers… and if something has annoyed them to the point of publicly outing an individual or company, maybe it’s worth addressing those problems, rather than lashing out at them for being nasty, nasty people.
The problem is that your involvement in social media, and the practices you outline above probably put your company in the ‘good PR’ category – so you won’t realise how lazy, irritating, and frustrating shite PR people can be.
It’ll never be possible to please all the people all of the time, but I know PR people from my journalism days who became good friends by simply being helpful, open, and honest, and respecting my role in the process. Sadly they were – and still are – an exception
Interesting conversation so far, especially as I’m now on both sides of it — I’ve got my own blog network (admittedly in its infancy at the moment) *and* I recruit filmmakers to join the Elastic Lab filmmaker network (where they can accept paying commercial/creative video projects). I’m Community Evangelist, not “officially” PR, but I still reach out to strangers in the social media space regularly.
I never, ever expect that any email I send is private. There is always the chance that I’ll approach someone the wrong way or simply reach them at a bad time. I’m perfectly willing to step up and apologize if that situation happens, and I’d hope that they would give me that opportunity before publicly calling me out. As a blogger I’ve gotten some downright stupid and obnoxious pitches that I ignored the first time and they went away. However, there was one particular PR person who ignored my three polite personal emails to stop contacting me. That’s the point where I’m tempted to blog his name, but I was upset with *him*, not the company he represents.
You wonder how PR folks can reach out to bloggers. I agree that bloggers should make their preferred contact method clearer. I love that Merlin Mann only accepts links people want him to check out via del.icio.us. However, I wouldn’t dream of emailing a video blogger without following their blog for a little while, knowing they’re looking for projects, having watched any films they do have up, etc.. It’s in everyone’s best interest for me to get to know them as a person and not as a line in my To: field.
Is this more work than a press release blast? Yes. But that’s the reality of the new medium, and I prefer it that way. You may reach out to a smaller # of people, but they’ll be much more qualified leads and your positive response rate will be higher in the end.
I don’t agree with a PR blacklist.
I get a lot of pitches, and press releases, I just ignore and delete them and move on.
It’s a business relationship and a lot of it boils down to basic manners from both parties.
Bloggers need to know what they want from PR relationships and delete the e-mail, say “no thanks” or, “here’s a better way”.
PR people need to take the time to decide if what you are pitching is relevant by actually reading the site, genuinely interacting and making a personalized approach that isn’t simply picking a random post and referencing it in the e-mail.
Learn how blogs are different from other media outlets and do your research.
The best PR (as with the best selling) looks and feels nothing like it. :-)
Ahhh, the mighty copy blogger! How true.
Great post Geoff. Thank you for the link.
Aaron; Brian Solis was one of the folks on the black list. If anyone is the poster boy for PR guys that get it its Brian.
Dan; you almost have the analogy right. Journalists are PR and news retailers. Readers are PR and news consumers. PR guys are wholesale suppliers. That is the correct analogy.
The supplier pitches the product to the retailer, the retailer filters the good from the crap and offers it to the consumer.
All the way along the chain people who are good at their job succeed and prosper and those who are bad at it fail and go out of business.
I am in no way defending bad PR people, just the general practice of PR which has worked quite well for a very long time. If you think you get a lot of spam pitches from PR agencies (that’s an improper description btw) just imagine how many press releases real news organizations receive every single day, it is in the thousands and tens of thousands.
This little blog drama has convinced me, we will definitely have a session on this at BlogWorld with an old school newsman talking about how they filter through PR pitches. Bloggers could definitely learn a few things from journalists.
I say this as someone who loves new media about as much as anyone could and am a firm believer we are at the beginning of this media revolution. That doesn’t mean every old practice has to be considered crap.
Mainstream media personnel understand fielding pitches, dealing with lobbyists, working with the source’s “people” comes with the territory. Good, bad or indifferent, they understand this occupational hazard comes with the profession. Bloggers like Gina want their cake and eat it too and, frankly, their incessant whining and me first attitude is ridiculous. Just my quick $.02..
Ditto to Busy Mom: all part of life as a serious blogger. Yes, there are good, bad and ugly ways to pitch but, as Geoff says, get over yourselves. There’s another blogger after your space on the Web.
Just saw now that you linked to my post on pitching bloggers–much appreciated, thank you!