Barbara French from Tekrati was in touch to tell me about a very interesting new research report they’ve released looking at the alternatives to Gartner, post their META Group acquisition.
The report interviews representatives from Forrester, IDC, AMR Research, Burton Group, Info-Tech Research, The 451 Group and The Advisory Council.
They are also welcoming comments and debate on the report on their weblog.
It’s been a little quiet here over the past few days due to pressures at work, normal service will be resumed shortly.
Has anyone else noticed a major surge in spam volume? My business e-mail account, along with my personal e-mail accounts are under constant barrage these days – not to mention to volume of comment and trackback spam I’m getting on the blog…
On a housekeeping issue, a couple of people have been moaning about the use of the term “PR Miscellany” for my usual link round-ups as it’s non-descriptive. Some have suggested I try and summarize the content in headline… I’m thinking about it. 🙂
Finally, I was talking with a tech PR agency (West coast) recently and they estimate 50% of their agency clients are somewhat engaged in blogging – it’s interesting, though I imagine that 50% is disproportionately high.
Quiet enough out here today…
Q: How else has Cisco’s reputation for corporate citizenship aided shareholders?
A: It has had a huge impact on our brand. We have one of the top 20 brands in the world, right up there with names like Coca Cola that spend a huge amount more than we do on advertising. Part of that is that people like to be in business with people they respect and trust.
After an incredible amount of hard work by a whole range of people , the program for the second Global PR Blog Week has been released.
This year’s event will take place on the 19th to the 23rd of September, 2005 and it’s highly recommended as a unique collection of free PR content, advice and opinions.
I believe special thanks should go to Constantin Basturea who, as always, has invested a lot of personal time in getting the program up and running.
ZDNet journalist David Berlind poses a number of interesting questions in a recent posting. In particular he tackles the spectrum of journalists and bloggers and their willingness (or not) to publish and be damned (i.e. don’t let the facts get in the way of a good story). He also asks can PR people adapt to shorter news cycles, and in particular the instant deadlines imposed by blogs.
These are interesting questions, particularly for anyone involved in communications on behalf of individuals or organizations.
First and foremost, I believe that, for the most part, journalists and bloggers who take the time to check their facts will, over time, attract a wider audience than those just willing to post any unsubstantiated rubbish online. Credibility is important in any communications medium and the Internet, and faster turnaround, does not change that. There are exceptions. The Internet provides the perfect medium for connecting like minded individuals. As a result if “Group A” find an unsubstantiated rumor that attacks “Group B”, then many of the participants in Group A will be happy to publish, read and discuss that rumor regardless of its basis in fact. But for the majority, credibility is not a commodity.
On the question of PR people meeting the needs on online publishing, there is no question we can do a better job turning around queries. However, there needs to be a sense of realism here. There are limited resources available, executives have busy schedules and sometimes there are valid reasons why certain information takes longer to produce. So while PR people need to raise the bar, I also believe that there needs to be some agreed rules of engagement around what is an acceptable turnaround time for an incoming request. I’m sure we’ve all been victim to an incoming request for comment at 5.45pm for a deadline of 6pm which has been specifically delayed to try and get a rushed response or worse an “unavailable for comment”.
There are going to be speedbumps as we evolve into new publishing cycles, however it will only work if we agree some standard rules of engagement for the behavior of both parties.
More on David’s post from Andy Lark and Jeremy Pepper.
I am having RSS-induced guilt. All this unread PR content… maybe I should just stop taking vacation….
In the latest installment of “new PR business development” advice, here’s another little nugget.
If you’re sending out a newsletter promoting your PR expertise to prospects, it’s probably a worthwhile exercise to clean your mailing list before you send it, to show you have a little “mail merge expertise”.
Sending seven unsolicited copies of the same e-mail over a period of two hours, probably isn’t the best showcase of your “expertise” – regardless of how good your content, skills, experience and track record are.
Murphy's Law 