The launch of a campaign aimed at eradicating ‘PR spam’ caused something of a stir at Eulogy! Towers last week. The offending site managed to infuriate almost the entire agency, and sparked lively discussion on what is no doubt a significant issue, and one which we don’t take lightly.
What’s most interesting to me is the suggestion that we need a ‘bill of rights’ to govern our actions and ensure best practice in the way we communicate with journalists and bloggers. I fiercely disagree with this presumption.
Good PRs will adhere to these, and other, rules of engagement, and will reap the rewards accordingly. Those with a lesser understanding of how to engage with journalists and bloggers will miss out. That’s the penance.
And ignoring the fact that the ‘extensive research’ this campaign is based on stretches to what constitutes a tiny sample (even in PR extrapolation terms), if journalists are ‘demanding’ this, what about a code of conduct for their treatment of PRs? We’re not all the same; we don’t all telephone after every press release we send; we don’t all bang out any old crap in the hope that something sticks. Yet ‘journalists’ collectively ignore phone calls and emails (even when the pitch is spot on and highly relevant), and can give little or no feedback to the ideas and content we generate, and offer to hand over on a plate. But if it’s something they want, they’ll happily be spoon fed.
Of course I’m generalising – not all journalists behave in this way. But neither do all PRs behave in the way this campaign accuses.
PRs and journalists (and to a less extent, bloggers) rely on a close working relationship – very much you scratch our back, we’ll scratch yours. In fact, continuing that theme, perhaps the best way to educate PRs on what’s acceptable and what’s not is to train them, like you’d train a dog. Reward the good behaviour, ignore the bad.
The inconvenient (or do I mean convenient) truth is that PRs and journalists form part of a wider industry, a communications microcosm. And even if PRs are the algae at the bottom of the evolutionary pool, as nature has taught us, you don’t kill off the foundation of the food chain.
