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