PR and PR practitioners were on my mind a lot lately.
First we have the ongoing discussion about how to do PR as a start-up with good arguments by Brian Solis, Robert Scoble, Marc Canter and Loic Le Meur.
Public relations is a very difficult discipline by definition. Who is relation to whom? Who is representing what? Furthermore, the discussion seems to be focussed on PR for Web 2.0 companies which is much different from PR 1.0.
I disagree with Loic: You should measure traffic from PR, but you should not weigh the success of your campaign solely based on traffic. The effect comes through connecting with the right people.
Agree with Marc: A strong, communicating CEO does not only help but goes a long way.
Agree with everybody: The tone is important, but it also helps to know, how to get hold of a person best. E.g. I only twice exchanged emails with Scoble, would he read more? Twitter DMs may not go through. And his cell phone number is gone from the new blog. A file is too much, but some knowledge key, having met in person (e.g. like Brian Solis) definitely is a key to building a relationship.
However: Key to successful PR in the way that we consider PR for Seesmic successful is a good product, a point none of the above addressed. If Seesmic were not worth talking about and were not a powerful medium as such, even Loic, despite being ultra-connected would have problems selling it.
The second issue was the discussion about advertising/sponsorship on (PR-)podcasts For immediate release and Jaffe Juice over on Eric Eggertson’s Common Sense PR blog. I have to say I was taken a bit aback by Joseph’s comments, Joseph being someone I hold in high regards as a thinker and communicator AND certainly interruptor. Consider me interrupted, but more in the sense that the public relation to the figure Joseph Jaffe (unfortunately we have never met) feels a bit tainted now. I wonder why he was so aggressive those two days and if I am the only one who was surprised by that? Sure, I enjoy a good flame war but would never have guessed it coming from Joseph’s direction.
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3 Comments
Joseph Jaffe
I don’t know either. Maybe I was overtired. Maybe crabby. Maybe just irritated that someone whom I’ve never met feels the need to be so presumptive and critical (when they haven’t even listened to the entire series)
I wasn’t trying to ignite a flame war at all. I just felt the need to speak up.
I thought about whether I should publish this or not. But in the end, it’s how I felt and I wanted to be true to my own emotions.
Sebastian
Thanks for taking the time to respond. I understand. However, I didn’t read Eric’s post as an attack at all, he was just juxtaposing the two approaches. Granted, he didn’t like your approach but that is the beauty of RSS, he had the power to unsubscribe. And you have the power to do what you do, surely Eric was not the first person to criticise you. Well, I just felt I had to point out my reaction.
Joseph Jaffe
Understood. I guess it was less about Eric and me…I thought our first exchange was civil, but rather about the mindless mob comments from certain tired and predictable saps that made me so cranky.
Oh well.
Live and let live.