Joel Don
Orange County, Calif.
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Public relations + social media pro. Developer of PC app to make time/project tracking & client reporting a simple, one-click event (in beta).
Frank, a smart post and a ton of information and links to chew on. You and other writers such as Mark Traphagen and Jeremiah Owyang have made and continue to make a rock-solid case for the merits of search and G+. Thanks for adding to my study list and referencing my oldie but goodie.
@crestodina Thanks Andy. I admire your work and bizdev strategies, plus your ideas and suggestions will be especially helpful in my new role as a CM.
Nice primer and in plain (non-geek) English. Very helpful for new businesses and always a good way to reinforce your tactics & approaches.
Interesting topic that focuses on who is the creator of an original idea or theme. I don't think that the age issue necessarily originated with Cathryn Sloan, since there have been prior posts on who is best to run your social media (education, experience, accomplishments and...age). Sloan's incendiary moment cascaded (her 15 minutes?) into a significant response. The writers who didn't choose to cite the original ember may have attempted to create the perception of an original topic choice (journalistic intent?) or simply didn't think that they needed to attribute the trending topic during its brief run (cavalier journalism?). We could push for standards of attribution, but I think common courtesy is about the best we can hope for in the Wild Wild West of our new journalism.
After I saw the movie Borat, two things crossed my mind: 1) this was a really funny movie and; 2) Sacha Baron Cohen can't make a Borat 2. Sacha's version of an R-rated Candid Camera is a one trick pony. Now that we now all know who Ryan Holiday is (never heard of him until now) and what he is not (a public relations person), the PR/marketing profession can be assured that Ryan won't be interviewed by the New York Times anytime soon as an expert on neutrino particle degradation or cited in a National Geographic post on best digital camera choices for an Antarctica expedition.
Perhaps the most amusing part of Ryan's quest for his 15 minutes of page views was his interview by George Knapp on the national Coast to Coast AM radio show on July 22. In that interview, Ryan referred to HARO, the service he scammed, as: 1) "a secret service"; 2) "a secret social network" and; 3) "a secret backroom" for journalists and sources. Really? A secret? Ryan, if you checked some sources you'd find the "secret" phase of the PR business existed before you skipped out of college at 19, when companies and clients mostly had to rely on public relations pros to connect with media. Peter Shankman disrupted that business model with HARO, creating a free tool to enable anybody to directly pitch story sources or expertise to media, without the need for PR intermediaries/gatekeepers. And by anybody, that means, in Ryan's words to the millions of Coast to Coast listeners, "publicists and hustlers and self-promoters." Much to the dismay of some PR people who once enjoyed total control of the process, HARO is about as secret as Tucker Max's well-exercised liver or his personal struggle with social etiquette.
But enough of the Ryan Show. When this story hit the radar, the first thing I did was look at the clients and companies that have hired Ryan Holiday or engage him today for his "promotional" (not PR) services. We are often a reflection of the clients and companies that hire us for public relations and marketing counsel. And it goes both ways. The company you keep, in our brave, new transparent world, is revealing.
@ginidietrich Gini, you really find PR people resisting the linkage of PR with sales? That's ultimately what companies want to believe and know, The problem is there's always been a dotted line relationship between PR and sales; it's difficult to prove. As soon as PR makes the suggestion, the folks in the sale department usually step in and circle the wagons around their commissions, quarterly bonuses and MBO payouts. But I haven't finished your book yet, so perhaps (intentional plug) Marketing in the Round will offer some new approaches to selling PR=Sales to the C-Suite.
All the more reason for journalism students to minor in journalism and major in computer science. Based on the changes and updates at Facebook, Klout, et al, whoever writes the algorithm controls the outcomes. There will be liberal editorial algorithms, conservative editorial algorithms and algorithms that (still) won't care about your news release.
Eventually you will get to it, but you probably want to include listening, monitoring and tracking ROI against defined metrics and C-Suite objectives.
Paul's issue with billable hours (via his book) reflects the "rounding up" abuses by some agencies. The padding of hours. The absurd agency demand for account execs to turn in time sheets with a minimum 40 billed hours per week. I've billed both ways, and you can corral the billable hours tornado by establishing a monthly *budget ceiling* with each client. That effectively is a sliding retainer that cannot exceed an agreed upon total amount per month. The upside for clients is they don't pay for slow months or when assignments throttle down. The best of both worlds. You can obliterate billable hours from the PR and marketing lexicon. But you still have to account for your time. At the end of the day, you have to know whether you are making $10 per hour or $200 per hour, else you have no way to assess margins and profitability. It matters. And if the client doesn't buy into a one-size-fits-all flat monthly fee and only will pay for actual work hours completed, you're on the clock or you do business elsewhere. It's good to be flexible in this biz.
Gini, thanks for the insider view. I had read the posts by Mitch and Chris. Cool to see the full spectrum. I believe that leaves two left on the Norway list to share their secrets.
@TedWeismann I hear you. End of an era. It was a good run while it lasted and we did make a difference for companies. The market dynamic has changed, along with our business. Talk about disruption...
"...overnight, there were less opportunities to land reviews."
Ted, you can say that again. I thought I was the only one who noticed that the tech product review game fizzled shortly after the dot-com bust. For tech companies with products, that was once a very robust component of a public relations program, especially in the 1980s and 1990s. It morphed into scant opps with traditional media reviewers who became bloggers and a new crop of pseudo "review" sites that turned into bottomless pits for products that had slim chances for reviews and sometimes a tough effort to get them returned.
If public relations is a science, the Scientific Method might then apply to its practice. Where's the laboratory for developing theory, testing, replication of results and analysis?
Great post, Jay, thanks. A lot of good actionable business ideas, especially things NOT to do. Look forward to the new site. Eddie Rabbitt? I pegged you as a Boz Scaggs guy.
Thanks for the recap and interesting details on your Olso trip. I was the guest of a Danish family near Copenhagen some years back. Everyone speaks English as well. My hosts said there was no issue about that; it was a practical decision to teach English because the citizens recognized no one was going to learn Danish (outside of Denmark).
Did I miss it? You did not factor in your recurring monthly cost for Internet service which is the heart of your content streaming. Also, unless you live "in range" of a major metropolitan node, the antenna solution won't pull in HD channels for most of suburbia. And when your internet provider starts charging you by the gigabyte, Netflix streaming will not be the bargain that it is today. It's coming; see what Time-Warner is test marketing in some markets. The cable and DSL companies are not ignoring your solution. You are still using their pipe, and they already charge a premium for Internet-only customers.