British singer Leona Lewis is (Read more…)

The application of public relations and the use of advertising are sometimes misunderstood, igniting a series of unanswered questions for companies needing to create awareness for themselves. (Read more…)

Everyone has heard about KFC’s major Oprah goof where so many people requested a free two-piece meal of the fast food company’s new grilled chicken, it simply wasn’t able to meet demand. Local news outlets aired footage of people being turned away from stores. (Read more…)

At the turn of the decade, you couldn’t open a newspaper without reading a story about some high-flying dot-com or tech company. The coverage of these companies bled from the business pages to the feature sections to the front-page. And when the dot-com bust came, the coverage faded back in the opposite direction — the downfall of a tech company went from the front-page to a small mention in the business section. Coverage of the technology sector has stabilized, but it has also shrunk. Some newspapers eliminated entire sections or supplements. The media is still a bottom-line business; fewer ads mean less editorial space. Which makes public relations for tech companies that much more difficult. (Read more…)

Whether you’re a pundit, an expert, an analyst, or a third party, it’s important to remember that you rarely know all the facts. The media does not care about this; they just want a quote and a public relations contact to attribute it to. The juicier the sound bites you offer, the better for journalists, but not necessarily for you. (Read more…)

When it was released in 2005, the Dreamworks film “Just Like Heaven” got mixed reviews but did pretty well at the box office, debuting at No. 1 with a first week haul of more than $16.4 million. Dreamworks’ budget for the movie, however, was called into question; the public relations strategy behind the movie was the reason why. (Read more…)

…but might be afraid to ask. Consider the following list a series of tips and tricks for dealing with intractable or just plain obnoxious journalists. Heeding them may make the public relations process that much easier. (Read more…)

Your press release did its job. A reporter calls and wants to talk about your business. Now what? You need to build a relationship with the reporter, and the primary way you’re going to do so is through  a media interview. (Read more…)

It took me a few months to figure out her modus operandi. For four years, she called me once a month. It was always on the last Friday of the month, and always before lunch. We would chat for a few minutes I would ask a few questions; she would skirt around the answers. She would pitch me a story or two; I would sigh and act disinterested. Maintaining relationships with journalists is critical to long-term success in public relations. The journalist/public relations relationship must be fostered with trust and then fueled with consistent communication. Here’s a case in point. (Read more…)

It’s easy for public relations firms to overestimate the impact of media coverage. Unless you land your client on the cover of Time or the front page of the New York Times, it can be disheartening to see how little impact a single piece of media coverage brings. My own history with media coverage is an example of how difficult it is to quantify the benefits of media coverage in the public relations world. (Read more…)