Stupid, lazy PR people, bloggers and media databases

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Tom Coates of the excellent plasticbag.org blog has quite rightly complained about the frequent incompetent pitches he gets from PR firms. Tom thinks the reason is because Stephen Davies included him in his list of the Top 100 UK Blogs.

I don’t think so and think it is more likely to be because Tom is listed in media databases. The problem isn’t that he’s listed, but that most too many PR people are stupid and lazy when it comes to using media databases. [Updated: I don't know and don't actually think it is most PR people, but it certainly is too many]

Just because the database codes somebody as writing about a particular subject, doesn’t mean they do. Doing a search in the database is just the start of creating a media list, not the end. After you’ve created your list you need to double check every single name to make sure that your pitch or news release is relevant to what that journalist or blogger covers.

The media databases make it too easy to mass spam hundreds or even thousands of journalists and bloggers. And sadly that’s what too many lazy PR people do.

Yes, it does take time to check out each name and really understand what that journalist is interested in - but your clients and employers hired you because of your PR expertise, not to conduct incompetent direct mail.

If any PR person actually took the time to read Tom Coates they would find he writes an insightful, interesting and occasionally humorous blog on an eclectic range of subjects. They’d also discover it is totally inappropriate to pitch Tom to get him to write about just about anything they are likely to be marketing.

In the media database we use my A PR Guy’s Musings blog is listed (but a lot of the information is wrong). Tom Coates is listed, but also not very accurately. Other bloggers in the database include Charlene Li, Hugh MacLeod (gapingvoid), Guy Kawasaki, Steve Rubel (Micropersuasion), Robert Scoble (Scobleizer) and Neville Hobson (in twice).

As a result of being listed I get a lot of pitches. Most of them very, very bad - but the occasional good one. What upsets me is that most are from PR companies, and that clients are paying top fees to people who quite clearly don’t know what they are doing. It’s not just the targeting that is bad, lots of them can’t even write half decent news releases.

For bloggers it’s not the database supplier’s fault as it does advise you to read the blog first and not to spam or mass email bloggers. It would be better if it gave the same advice about journalists.

Disclaimer: Don’t throw stones in glasshouses

I’m not saying that I, or Wolfstar, gets it right every time. Occasionally we’re going to get it wrong and a news release won’t be as good as it should be or we’ll send a pitch or a release to someone we shouldn’t have done. For this we sincerely apologise, but we are always trying to get it right and to improve. All I’d like to see is every other PR person doing the same.

For example I found Tom Coates sitting on one of our media lists, for a release that is yet to go out. But because we check it, he would have been removed first. Just because he is interested in PCs/Macs/Laptops; Software Applications doesn’t mean he would be interested in reviewing some new collaboration server software!

Other blogs commenting:

• Drew Benvie
• Ged Carroll
• Jemima Kiss on The Guardian Organ Grinder blog
• Ben Ayers
• Sally Whittle
• Tom Coates linking to and commenting on what others have said

XP: A PR Guy’s Musings

Is 40 old?

My fellow Wolfstar director Susie Lawrence has just upset me. In her post about Facebook Susie said “Yes I am old (40 - don’t mind admitting it…”.

Excuse me! Since when has 40 been old? I’m not 40 until next year, but I don’t feel ‘old’. I’ve got several friends who are older than me and they don’t even feel old.

Facebook might be dominated by younger people but lots of 30+, and even 40+, people I know are on it. I haven’t done a definitive analysis but of my 150 Facebook friends:

• 71 are over 30
  • 24 are 30 or over
  • 47 are 40 or over
• 19 of the over 30s are female

There are probably more, as I’ve tried to be generous and err on the side of caution when assessing peoples’ ages. The other thing is that a lot of the over 30s are genuine friends, where as most of my Facebook friends under 30 are more accurately ‘acquaintances’.

Most of my Facebook friends are also people I know professionally - clients, business contacts, journalists, politicians (or people working in politics) other PR, public affairs and marketing people.

Is 40 old? Please comment to let us know what you think?

Losing interest in Facebook

I’ve been persevering with Facebook for a couple of months now.  It was a slow start as I couldn’t find anybody I knew but then there was a flurry of activity and I thought maybe I had a chance of revolutionising my social life like the millions on there seem to be doing so well.

I’m up to 23 friends and have been going on daily like a good addict should but frankly, although these people are lovely and I’m proud to be associated with them in whatever way I am, they are not really my very best friends and the novelty is wearing off.

This isn’t just me trying to sound as if I’m more popular than I am.  I really do have more friends (honest) and I’ve tried to encourage them to join facebook by sending them invites and even sitting with them to search for their friends and get them to join.  But of course they can’t find most of the people they know either so they decline politely.

Yes I am old (40 - don’t mind admitting it.  Like my inability to recognise that I have no mates I can also fool myself that I look and act younger) and I’ve read other people blogging about how it’s mainly a younger phenomenon.  But some of the people who have found me or me them via facebook are nearly as old as me, in fact I think a couple may be older!  So it can’t just be that.

The people who I’d describe as my best friends are reasonably well-educated, technology-literate people.  They are sociable and funny. There is absolutely no chance they will be reading this but if they are they should be very flattered by my description of them and join facebook straight away to make it more interesting for me…

"Some athletes throw balls, but cheerleaders throw athletes!"

I just couldn’t resist blogging about this article in the Daily Mail (mainly because it kinda made my blood boil)

Tanya Gold tells the story of her visit to the ‘international cheerleading championships’. The article was in fact quite entertaining, particularly because about 90% of it was completely wrong and actually focuses on the dance section of the competition rather than the actually cheerleading competition (even the picture was of a dance team).

I thought I would give you guys a couple of facts about how things really are, and how this article reinforces the negative stereotype that real, athletic cheerleaders are fighting so hard to break.

1. I had to post these videos as they speak for themselves. If anyone can say that cheerleading is not a sport, athletic or extremely hard this should shut them up.

NCA Highlights - Highlights of the ‘All-star’ teams (they don’t cheer for sports teams either) from 2006 National Cheerleading Association in Texas.

A skills tape from collegiate team, North Carolina State. (Count the guys!!!)

2. Cheerleading compromises gymnastics, dance and stunting. All these three disciplines are extremely hard in themselves. Cheerleaders have to be good at all three. Trust me it’s tough. I want to cheerlead because I love all three of these sports, not because I secretly want to be American.

3. I bet Tanya doesn’t realise that we train around four/five times a week for three hours each time to be even slightly good at the sport.

4. The competition she saw was the cheerleading equivalent of a local pub football team when compared to the world’s best.

5. British, male cheerleading is growing. One of my squads has 11 guys on it, most of which are the strongest, most athletic guys I know. 50% of collegiate cheerleaders in the US are male. How many guys do you know that can single handedly hold two 21 year old girls above their heads?

6. My mum doesn’t come to any cheerleading competitions. She would actually prefer if I didn’t cheerlead as she regularly thinks that I may kill myself in the process.

7. Competitive cheer routines rarely, if ever, use pompoms.

Music part II

Continuing with my musical contribution, I’m highly recommending Resident Advisor (RA) to all lovers of electronic musical culture. Started by a group of Aussies in 2000, they’ve certainly realised the market potential and totally capitalized on it. Now in 2007, they are showcasing some of the finest musical journalism kicking about.

Rolphus’s latest comment on a review by The Guardian’s Charlie Brooker on club culture is a classic example of an RA user speaking their mind and in doing so, contributing what’s ultimately on the mind of most music lovers. This form of expression and knowledge of the industry is standard throughout the whole site and probably why it gets over 280,000 hits a month.

The site itself allows you to create a profile, enter competitions for massive events, read reviews, join forums and yes… free, quality, honest podcasts are available for download on a regular basis. Even if a particular act isn’t to your normal taste, give it a go – the mixes don’t ever disappoint.

Mixing with the stars

Yesterday Stuart and I met with the ‘mystery third director’.  He claims to have been rubbing shoulders with Bono and George Clooney at the weekend in Monte Carlo.  This very glamorous impression should throw anyone off the scent of his real identity!  Meanwhile here on our building site in Horsforth I get to hob nob with Sebastian and Beth today.  Talking of which the new office is actually pretty flash and we may be moving in this month!

I’m still struggling to know what to blog about.  There’s so much going on setting up Wolfstar, looking after clients, pitching for new business and recruiting new staff to service them once they’re on-board, that if I emptied my head here - which is tempting - it would go on and on and on. 

Or I could moan what’s going on more personally like my embarrassing incident with an opening toilet door on a Virgin train last week or the fact that Sainsburys Energy have been stealing from our household to the tune of nearly £550!  Will blogging about my issues with these companies preclude us from ever working with them?  I’m not very worried at the minute - I’ve got enough to do!

‘Monologue has given way to dialogue’

I’ve recently been reading the very wise words of Brian Solis, principal at Futureworks based over in Silicon Valley. His writing style regarding new media in marketing actually makes total sense of what is by all accounts a fairly tricky subject to nail.

For so many people working in marketing, I think new social media is still a massively unknown territory, particularly in terms of what can be achieved. Take Facebook. You have 267 friends, and what seems to be an ever increasing list of applications forming under your profile pic, but do you know or understand the power of this networking facility… especially in a business capacity…?

So, for all those who still have a million and one questions about new media and marketing, have a gander at this - ‘The Future of Communications – A Manifesto for Integrating Social Media into Marketing’. It’s a truly brilliant piece of literature, covering everything from social new releases, venturing into virtual worlds, and researching with the help of social bookmarking (I’ve just discovered del.icio.us, awesome tool!)

Just to give you a snippet:

“Monologue has given way to dialog.

With the injection of social tools into the mix, people now have the ability to impact and influence the decisions of their peers and also other newsmakers. Social media is not a game played from the sidelines. Those who participate will succeed – everyone else will either have to catch up or miss the game altogether.
Engage or die”

Happy reading.

First Direct and Virgin pull Facebook ads

A social media story that got a lot of coverage yesterday was about big brands such as First Direct and Virgin Mobile pulling their adverts from Facebook because they appeared on a page for a group supporting the far-right British National Party.

This highlights both one of the strengths and weaknesses of businesses and brands using and participating in new social media. The weakness is that it is so new and changing so rapidly that mistakes are inevitable, but fortune favours the brave and it is those companies that are willing to lead and experiment that will benefit most. A strength is that it is possible to react very quickly in the best way:

“First Direct also signalled likely changes towards a more sophisticated way of advertising on the internet. The banking and insurance firm’s spokesman, Rob Skinner, said: “We are obviously concerned about where our advertising appears. We have got to make sure that the places we advertise are consistent with our own values and identity.”

However, it’s also interesting that none of the brands affected appear to have talked to customers via Facebook.

XP: A PR Guy’s Musings

UPDATE: More comment on Stephen Waddington’s Tech PR Blog and John Dodds on Make Marketing History. I agree with John’s line about the danger of automated systems, but not about his fear of “losing control of your message” as that’s the perspective of an ad guy and if you’re going to have genuine conversations you’re never going to control your message.

Seven top tips for students starting work

I have now been working full-time for three weeks now. OK, so I’ve done full-time work before. Every summer holiday I would work at the local health centre to earn some much needed cash, but STUDENTS BEWARE, the thought that you will be working for the rest of your life after three years of student-dom can come as a shock! So, I thought I would put together a little list of tips to help you students out there who are soon to be facing the wonderful world of working.

1. Go to bed – EARLY. The days of partying till 3am on a student night with all your student friends are long gone I am afraid. OK, so the occasional banging head at 9am mid-week is allowed, but forget going out every day except Tuesdays like you used to! Trust me, feeling like you want to die does not a good employee make!
2. Disown all your student friends! Delete the numbers of and cut off all friends who are a) still allowed to be in bed at 11am, b) free to sunbathe in the middle of Hyde Park all day because they “don’t ‘have any lectures. Ever!” c) likely to ring you up to ask you to that fabulous party that without you, just wouldn’t be the same, d) will complain how ‘hard’ student life is.
3. Make your lunch, don’t buy it. A key money saving tip! Just because you are earning now, doesn’t mean that overdraft isn’t still there (like I try to pretend it isn’t ALL THE TIME).
4. Live for the weekends. You may not be able to be that same old party animal during the week, but boy can we still big it up at the weekend (helped by the little bit of extra cash).
5. Positive Thinking. A common thought that may pass your mind. ‘Oh my god! I have to get up at 7am for every day for the rest of my life. Noooooooooooo. Trust me, block this thought out. It can only do you harm!
6. Practice makes perfect. For the month before you work you may be tempted to sleep till 2pm to make up for all the sleep you will miss over the next 45 years. DON’T. Gradually getting up earlier during this period will make getting up at 7am a doddle.
7. Look forward to work! Go in with a positive attitude and be ready and willing to help with whatever you can.

I hope this helps any unsuspecting students out there that are soon to be starting their first jobs. Happy working!