A Tale of Two Press Kits

The synchronicity of this business never ceases to amaze me!

On the same day I heard a wonderful teleseminar about the value of electronic press kits from Michelle Tennant at Wasabi Public Relations as she introduced her new www.PressKit247.com site to host electronic press kits for the media, I received a startling email from a client who told me he won’t post his press kit online!

Why not?

Emanuel Errico III, president of STFB Inc. an accounting software company explains:
“When I went to do my press kit, I wanted to find a bunch of examples from other companies so I can make sure that I was doing the right thing, or, even to use as a template. What I found out is that no one in my industry publishes their press kit publicly anymore. I went to Inacct, NetLedger, and a few others, and while some of them had on-line press rooms with press releases and maybe a company summary, they did not disclose much information at all, and definitely not as much information as I have in my press kit.

“I can offer up some reasons for this. Maybe you have noticed testimonials and references disappearing from websites recently? I mean of course you can find them but they are not as prevalent as they used to be. Well the reason for this is that (and this happened to us by the way) other companies were contacting those people on the testimonial and reference list and using it as a “ready-made” prospecting list.

“If you take this one step further, a competitor can take a press kit and get a lot of good information from it, even use it to prepare a business plan (I have heard of this happening firsthand as well), and also find the reference information that has already been removed from websites (for prospecting). Yes, this industry is getting very ugly as it matures.”

Errico is not a voice in the wilderness.

For many years, I’ve spoken at conferences about web marketing and business people have told me that headhunters scour their sites and try to recruit their sales people. So they don’t list sales people on their websites. Others tell of poaching client lists of retailers from the section entitled “where to buy” our merchandise.

There’s no easy answer to this question, I tell them. “There’s always a balance between disappointing the thousands of prospects (and reporters) who visit you site looking for information that isn’t there, vs. the snooping eyes of a handful of competitors who want to eat your lunch.”

Where’s the balance?

It depends on who you are, what you do and how safe you feel.

Remember first, that you don’t have to put anything and everything on your website. Save that for the IRS audit (bad joke, sorry).

I figure that the competitors will find the information anyway, no matter what you try to do to stop them. Of course, you don’t have to make it easy for them, but I’d bet any company can hire any bona fide researcher to find out more than you know about your own company. Very little info is private, or can’t be gotten from someone in your supply chain or network of contacts who deals with both companies and has much to gain by sharing info about each company.

So the downside risk is there.

But if reporters can’t find info they need, you’ll probably never get written about.

I spoke to the National Football League about this issue several years ago and they said they had a “media only” area on their site that was by admission only. They didn’t want fans to clog up the network. The NFL can get away with this tactic since they have a ready supply of bona fide reporters who can be credentialed and will be thankful that restrictions are in place so they can do their jobs effectively.

However, for the company struggling to get every inch of coverage it can muster, hiding information behind password protected sites can limit their coverage opportunities at best and hurt them in the court of public opinion in case of a crisis situation, at worst.

As I said, no easy answers. You have to decide what benefits your company and what hurts it. The answers will vary by your own circumstances.

Dan Janal
Your Fearless PR LEADER
PR LEADS
www.prleads.com

Happy Bastille Day to everyone!

Yeah, yeah, yeah, I know it is politically incorrect to say anything nice about France, but let’s look at the facts and see what it means to you in terms of public relations. Yes, there is a point:

France gave us the Statue of Liberty, one of the truly great symbols and tourist attractions in the world.

France sold us Louisiana and lots of other land in what can only be called the second best land deal since the Native Americans sold Manhattan to the Dutch for $24 in beads.

France didn’t object when we falsely branded them with French Toast or French Fries. The gastronomic gods probably heaved a sigh of relief when conservatives renamed the foods Freedom Toast and Freedom Fries.

France gave us money to fight wars for American independence from the British, without which, we’d be spelling color and honor with “u”s.

We’ve never been at war with the French. We’ve been at war with England, Germany, Italy, Russia, Mexico, and Japan. We’ve been at war against crime, poverty, and even obesity.

France is just about the only thing we haven’t been at war with!

So what does this have to do with you?

France has a 200-year history of supporting the US but they did one thing to tick off people — they didn’t support the War in Iraq.

That one act wiped out 200 years of good feeling.

Now imagine your poor customer. You bend over backwards for years to give them every kind of service and benefit imaginable. But you mess up on one thing and what do they do? They cancel the service!

Sure, some customers have built a reserve bank of good will from which they deduct your faux pas. But others have short fuses and will run away from you.

Today’s message: you’re only as good as your last at bat. Don’t blow it. You have less credit in the favor bank than you think.

Dan Janal
Your Fearless PR LEADER
PR LEADS Experts Resource Network
www.prleads.com

Want to find articles about yourself or your company on Google?

You’ve probably done the obvious — type your name!

Here’s the real tip, from Bette Price, author of numerous books on management and leadership and a member of PR LEADS since virtually day one:

Type your name and the word “article” like

Bette Price article

It helps Google to deliver a more targeted search.

I’ve also found that authors can find articles easier when they search for the name of their books. Just type the title, not your name. This is really great for people with fairly common names. Instead of seeing links to people with similar appearing names and other junk, you get the references to your book in seconds!

I hope this help you find your articles faster!

Dan Janal
Your Fearless PR LEADER
PR LEADS Expert Resource Network
www.prleads.com

A little humility goes a long way.

How’s this for a bio, from Robin Getman:

“Robin has not written best-selling books, nor appeared on Oprah, nor presented to five thousand audiences on six continents. What Robin has done is help front-line service teams and managers create impact and influence with service that sells, communication that connects and humor that helps. Robin created and coaches a three-point hospitality challenge that takes a minute to learn and a lifetime to master: Laugh from your toes… lead from your soul… serve from your heart.”

Robin was recently awarded the Certified Speaking Profession designation from the National Speakers Association, which means she’s a real pro.

Dan Janal
Your Fearless PR LEADER
PR LEADS Expert Resource Network
www.prleads.com

Reporters love statistics. If you can give reporters numbers to round out their stories, you’ll be quoted!

That’s the tip publishing guru Dan Poynter shared with me at the National Speakers Association today. It must work. He was quoted in an article in USA TODAY about parachute safety, another topic he is an expert on.

“Statistic Banks are media magnets. Consider publishing one on your key industry. Just make Google searches for associations and other keepers of the numbers,” he said.

Here are links to two pages with stats:

http://www.parapub.com/statistics
http://www.parapub.com/parachute/statistics