How to tell if your PR person is ‘doin da dance’
March 11th, 2010
I had coffee with a fairly new client today. We had a great talk that included his experiences with a previous PR firm. Although he spent thousands of dollars he didn’t get his expectations met. And so at the end of the contract he was discouraged and the PR firm had a dent in their reputation. Now it’s up to me to redeem his belief in our industry. You know what? I may not do that much differently from the old firm except that I refuse to ‘do the dance.’ Here’s what I mean.
PR is a squishy, unpredictable business. You can make a quick phone call one day and land a huge fish or you can spend three months sending elegant pitches, following up on time, and get nothing. Most business owners know that but you can’t help worrying when those placements aren’t coming in…after all it’s your money. Here’s where the problem starts. Many PR firms decide what they need to do at this point is make you feel good. They come in with some great charts, reports on the flurry of activity that’s going on, hints at big things that may happen….you know…it’s THE DANCE. You feel really good after the meeting but then a week later nothing’s changed and you worry again. And worse, you start to feel like a nag for asking all the time.
I’m telling you, trust your gut. This isn’t rocket science and it’s really easy to see if things aren’t going well. If your PR person is good, they’ll be knocking at your door looking for new angles or trying to expand the media list, or even trying new channels. If things aren’t working, they’ll tell you and ask for your help to find more interesting hooks.
If they’re not so good, or a traditional firm that’s just interested in adding up retainers each month they’ll do the dance. So when your meetings start to look something like this…
it’s probably time to look elsewhere.
