Paper review: PR in control; Twitter’s big after all; scepticism about digital TV
The view that PR has taken control appears to be the consensus in The Australian and the Australian Financial Review today.
The Oz reports on research by academic Jim Macnamara that “as much as 80% of media content is derived from PR material”.
But Neil Shoebridge has clearly had an interesting week with PRs, dedicating his weekly column in the AFR to the topic under the headline “How to lose clients and annoy reporters”. Although he doesn’t name names, he observes:
“The low barriers to entry in public relations and resultant proliferation of small companies and fierce competition – coupled with staff who are poorly trained or have an inflated view of the importance of what they do – mean that media relations is awash with incompetent people.”
The editor of the AFR’s marketing section sets out his eight sins, which do rather more like a list of things he finds annoying:
- Ringing to check if the journo has received the press release
- Pitching inappropriate stories
- Pitching without knowing the outlet
- Following up when the story has already appeared
- Promising the same exclusive to more than one outlet
- Pushign a story that’s appeared somewhere else
- Using out of date contact lists
- Setting conditions on what can be covered in an interview
Meanwhile, The Oz returns to the subject of Twitter, which it declared last week was “spluttering out“. The memo doesn’t seem to have reached the paper’s media section though, as it reports that Australian Fashion Week was dominated by tweeting.
Speaking of last week, the Oz returns to the story of Today Tonight and the ACCC, with chairman Graeme Samuel warning that other outlets will be under scrutiny.
And in another piece the paper looks even further back – to a story which broke in the UK three weeks ago, examining the political scalp taken by blogger Paul Staines as a “symbol of the rising power of political bloggers“.
Looking to the future, the boss of Broadcast Australia is sounding sceptical that a switch-off of analogue TV services next year will happen, saying the timetable is “quite challenging”.
And the initiatives by Google and Yahoo Search Marketing to bring in new customers could drive up the costs for existing clients, suggests Lara Sinclair.
Meanwhile, The Oz teases its readers somewhat over last night’s Logies. The news report on page 4 invites readers to turn to page 31 for a full list of winners. Over on page 31, there are a few more winners, but still not the complete list. Instead there’s a further invitation: “see website for details”. It doesn’t say which website, but clearly it’s not its own one, as the full list isn’t there at the time of writing.
The Oz also predicts that ACP’s Grazia‘s sales are slumping, suggesting it may only be selling 40,000 copies a week.
There’s also scepticism about ACP in the Fin, with growing scepticism about whether the magazine publisher’s owner PBL intends to stick to its plans to build its own printing press. One source tells the paper:
“There is not a printing press supplier anywhere that believes they will ever sell PBL Media a press. No one it taking PBL Media’s plan seriously.”
And that might not be such a bad idea, as even super investor Warren Buffett is falling out of love with print, reports the SMH. According to the paper, he has said he would not buy newspapers “at any price”.
Linkedin
Well Neil trots out that story, or a similar attack on the PR industry, about once every year or two. He also blocks PRs from calling him when he goes on holiday – but its open door for anyone else. No doubt this ensures that he believes his content is free from spin … but it also means he may miss an opportunity or two.
This is anon because, like most in the PR world, it’s not worth getting Neil offside since he basically writes half the AFR.
User ID not verified.
Gees, no wonder Buffett is so rich – because he’s such a tight arse. He’s worth around $40billion and won’t even shell out a lousy buck to buy a newspaper. He probably picks them up off seats when he’s riding the subway home.
User ID not verified.
Before Neil Shoebridge gives PRs a lesson or two about communication, I think he should look at his own profession. Although he’s one of Australia’s highest-paid print journalists his content is so predictable – Steve Allen from Fusion Strategy is undeniably his MR rent-a-quote, while Henry Tager and Barry O’Brien are not too far behind. I would love to see him ask some of the younger industry players for their opinion – as fresh views would definately add some spark into his dull writing style.
User ID not verified.
Why can’t the two professions just get along? PR and Journalism both have a place in each other’s working lives. Obviously Shoebridge has had a bad experience that has been deeply ingrained into his self esteem and feels the need to devote significant page space to his personal rant. With an attitude like that, it’s no wonder he’s only ever had bad experiences with PR people.
User ID not verified.
I’ve worked on both sides of the fence – including for Neil. What annoys me is clients/orgs that insist their PR/Comms staff do things like follow up PRs with a phone call, pitch to outlets, when you know they are inappropriate… You make your opposition known, get overruled, have to make the phone call/pitch any way. In the process, the young PRer loses any cred you had with the journo and gets thought of as difficult by management.
Bloody annoying.
User ID not verified.
The thing about the list of things that are annoying is, I’m not sure it automatically makes them ineffective.
I probably get up to 200 emails a day (I’m scared to actually count as it would be too depressing). So on occasion I do get a call from a PR flagging up a release that I missed/ failed to spot the angle in, and it becomes a story where otherwise it wouldn’t have.
19 times out of 20, they are wasting their time, but on that one occasion in 20, they get a result for their client. That means they’re doing their job, annoying as it may seem to the journalist.
Cheers,
Tim – Mumbrella