The pitch is dead...long live the pitch
Latest ponderings from the October issue of Marketing...hyperlinked for your reading pleasure...
The latest wave seems to have started in October 2007 when Wired editor Chris Anderson blogged a PR blacklist. This not-so-exclusive club's members were "...Lazy flacks [who] send press releases to the Editor in Chief of Wired because they can't be bothered to find out who on my staff, if anyone, might actually be interested in what they're pitching."
Some felt Anderson was going too far - the "lazy flacks" were just doing their jobs (albeit poorly). The media community saw Anderson's list as a just response to years of poor quality PR efforts, reflecting the all-too-common email "pray and spray" approach to pitching and press release distribution.
They've also come to the conclusion that the PR person who actually reads and understands their publications and readers is the exception and not the rule. It's no wonder that Anderson and his peers are peeved. This ages me terribly, but those of us who started our careers cutting out news stories with scissors didn't have the luxury of email. We read. We cultivated personal relationships with media and other influencers. The skill of the pitch was constructing a story in conversation over time - not simply spamming a manicured statement to all and sundry.
But that's the past. Today we live in a world of a 24-hour news cycle. Time and resource poor journalists frequently prefer email or even Twitter pitches. But there's a fundamental tenant that seems to be increasingly rare in our game. We're not reading enough. We're not investing enough time to understand the media, and more fundamentally their readers. This last point is critical as we move into an era of dialogue-based public relations.
Fast forward 12 months from Anderson's blacklist and our profession is again under attack. Today, bloggers are questioning our value, and not pulling any punches.
Blog posts such as "Anti-PR from a poorly pitched blogger", "How To Get PR For Your Startup: Fire Your PR Company" and "The PR Roadblock On The Road To Blissful Blogging" are all too common. It appears we've simply brought with us the tactics that failed to win the hearts and minds of "old" media to the "new" media. We're not reading their posts. We're failing to develop relationships. We're spamming them with marketing gobbledegook. We're also assuming they work the same way as journalists.
And, as is the nature of bloggers, their response is to do more than publish a list. They're publishing offending emails. They're publicly naming and shaming, and (not surprisingly) they're welcoming and encouraging often painful discussion.
So... what to do?
For starters, I think we need to throw away much of the baggage that has crept into our profession. Our world is one in which email conversations, Outlook press distribution lists, and media management via database are the norm. We're also reinforcing the myth that the thud factor of a pile of clippings represents PR success.
We need to start reading. RSS feeds help us keep current with what our influential bloggers and journalists are saying. FriendFeed, Facebook, MySpace and Twitter mean we can follow discussions and gain a better than ever understanding of their interests. Today, we are better armed to engage with - and understand - these people.
But (and it's a big but), there's a fundamental that Web 2.0 technologies can't replace. PR success more than ever is about personal relationships with a range of audiences. Our ability to be part of discussions with a cross-section of influencers and constituents is invaluable. We need to help our clients tell good, hype-free stories. Our relationships with influencers - be they bloggers, journalists, academics, industry association heads, consumers... - and our ability to help our clients create personal relationships with these audiences are the key to success. We need to inspire discussion and thought - not simply bludgeon with key messages and noise.
If we get it right, the opportunities for creating real change for our clients are limitless. If we get it wrong, it's time to check the help wanted ads and pull out the sheet music...
- Jeremy