Real Life Example: How Not To Pitch Bloggers
The the latest episode of The New Mediology, Nathan and I discussed a PR blunder that relates to bloggers, marketing people, PR pros, and anyone interested in social media marketing in general. You can listen to the podcast (online or via iTunes) to get the full story.
The quick version is that several weeks ago the firm Brody PR pitched a large list of bloggers, podcasters, and social media/technology media outlets. The pitch itself was bad and missed the mark, but the way it was done and with a technical issue that went along with it, the whole situation made Brody PR a case study traditional PR people doing a poor job of understanding how to pitch in social media. The whole situation provided an opportunity for numerous bloggers to comment on the situation.
The bottom line is that anyone trying to reach out to people for business purposes using social media MUST understand what they’re doing or it has a high probability of blowing up in their face. Just ask Brody PR. A mere Google search of “Brody PR” brings up numerous negative posts about this situation. That’s hardly good for business but it’s the reality of business today. In the words of my childhood heroes G.I. Joe: “Now you know, and knowing is half the battle.”
Tags: bad PR, Brody PR, new rules of PR, social media marketing
September 18th, 2009 at 4:58 pm
Well, my heart just aches for Beth Brody. It’s hard to believe that email was the catalyst, although, I’m sure we all know that Beth was not the one to personally hit that send button. However, this ageny might really want to think about making refesher email training mandatory for the staff. Anyone who sends out email of any type these days has to understand the spam issue.
To be identified with Satan is about as harsh as it gets. Bill, you and Nathan really have some good advice for Beth. She should immediately get to talking about what she is learning using as much humor as she can muster up. I mean really, how can anybody take being referred to as “satan” seriously. Perhaps Brody should think about how they could make a podcast of them being visited by the angels of the Christmas story where they go into the past to review this mistake, come into the present to see their reality, then go into the future to see how lovely their agency will be once they have learned their lessons then helping others do the same. I’m giggling about that now! But I hope they don’t violate any copyright laws while making that podcast!
And, all those bloggers and tweeple know that none of us is exempt. If we get up tomorrow there’s a possiblility that we too could be called the satan of our industry because of a stupid mistake.
IMHO, Beth’s biggest mistake is being a PR agency that doesn’t have a protocol in place for what to do in case of public errors. If they have one it should have immediately been apparent. Don’t we know enough from all the big, hairy, really bad PR that these high profile people have been creating. The sooner someone says a genuine I’m sorry, the public starts to relax. And Bill, you already said it, there’s really no little guy online because information can spread like wildfire and it usually picks up all kinds of stuff along the way to help it grow bigger. So we’re all at risk of showing our weaknesses.
I happened to read this great article by a blogger that @MichaelHyatt over at Thomas Nelson Publishers suggested about recovering after a big mistake. Here’s the link - http://bit.ly/1l6bKK . Maybe we all should take notes because our day is coming. This article has a spiritual flavor, however, it’s full of adaptable nuggets.