Public Relations Basics: Avoiding Press Leaks and Fixing Mistakes
In the world of public relations, press leaks can be damaging affairs. Sensitive internal information being sent to journalists can wreck a company’s reputation, cost it customers or clients, or even land it in legal hot water. But how can public relations consultants prevent press leaks, or at l… Read more
Preparing for a Television Interview
Recently I appeared live on national television. (Well, it was actually cable, but that’s national now.) Using my experience as an example, this installment of PR Fuel discusses the pros and cons of television-based public relations. Hopefully you’ll be able to take away some tips about h… Read more
Blurring the Line Between Public Relations and Customer Service
My friends think I’m strange when I tell them that the best way to solve a problem is to call someone who works in public relations. As a consumer, I’ve learned that PR people usually take their company’s customer service seriously. When traditional dispute resolution fails, a call or … Read more
Setting Public Relations Objectives
A successful public relations strategy depends on well-planned objectives. However, it takes more than just good public relations skills to plan good objectives. Here are some tips for setting effective public relations and marketing objectives.
1.) Be specific.
Perhaps the biggest mistake made by … Read more
The PR Fuel Mailbag: Employee Blackmail, Public Relations Disasters, and More Fun
It’s time for another dip into the PR Fuel mailbag. This time we answer some questions from PR Fuel readers, including public relations professionals, who are dealing with some serious issues: a threatening ex-employee, a shaky merger, a recalcitrant journalist, and a strange resume request. A… Read more
Optimizing Your Web Site for the Blind
Online assistive technologies for the blind continue to evolve. Where people with low vision use screen magnification software to aid them in using web sites, the blind use screen readers. One of the most common-and free-screen readers is called JAWS. This software introduces each page to the listener … Read more
Washington Monument Strategy: Political PR Tool or Crass Manipulation?
I read an article about local government using the threat of budget shortfalls to close a popular and much-needed public service. The writer referred to it as a Washington Monument Strategy. I had never heard that phrase before but a Google search showed it along with the phrase Washington Monument Syndr… Read more
Five Reasons to Use Blogs as Public Relations Tools
A post on Kevin Dugan’s Strategic Public Relations blog (http://prblog.typepad.com) recently caught my eye. Dugan discussed an article longtime online marketing genius B.L Ochman highlighting ten “examples of sites, campaigns, and companies that are crying out for blogs.” Th… Read more
Public Relations Basics: How to Respond to Critics
No matter the size of your business or organization, there will always be critics. How you respond to these critics — publicly and privately — is very important. Writing a correction letter to a newspaper or magazine is often the easiest (and cheapest) public relations strategy when respon… Read more
Branding – How to Recognize Your Brand Values and Protect Them
What is a brand, anyway? It seems like it is a mysterious “something-or-other” that isn’t marketing, isn’t PR, isn’t advertising. So if we know what it isn’t, shouldn’t we also know what a brand is?
As the branding theorist Jacques Chevron has commented, a … Read more