What gets you excited about PR? If you’re like us, it’s being in the middle of the action, working with innovative leaders and their companies, and watching your hard work make its mark on the future of technology, our economy, and society. The RH Strategic team has some new, exciting opportunities for just the right…
The pitch usually goes like this: “Hi. I’m a producer with [insert celebrity name]. We are producing a show on [insert your client’s market] and we came across your company and it seems like you could be a good fit for our program. It airs on CNBC and Bloomberg. Call me back as soon as…
The federal government is in the midst of a fundamental shift in the way it does business—driven by technologies like cloud and big data, and by the need to secure agencies against cyber threats. Companies that want to win in this market need to do more than respond to RFPs – they have to be…
Public relations is a big industry. As such, it has its fair share of cringe-worthy moments. Like the one last week, when a PR rep contacted reporters and offered to pay them money to write favorable blogs about their client. This is an elementary-level no-no that is taught in journalism and public relations schools throughout…
Selling to government agencies is all about the RFP. And winning an RFP is a battle that starts way before the RFP is ever written. It is also a process that includes influencers and decision makers comingled from agency purchasers to political leaders, sometimes even the White House. The key is using the integrated approach…
During a recent interview I was asked to identify the top attributes or skills we seek in our future employees. The easy answer is, “it depends.” But one thing is for certain – while basic public relations skills like media relations, writing, pitching and project management are absolute musts, they don’t come close to capturing…
We can only wonder whether a faster release of critical information about the actual path of the missing Malaysian Airlines flight would alter the outcome, such as a rescue of passengers, a discovery of wreckage, or the quick pursuit of leads in a criminal investigation before they dried up. Instead we are witnessing a communications…
The pace of change in public relations is so fast and furious that it’s easy to get blinded by the latest shiny new object in the communications workshop, and lose sight of why a corporate executive risks six figures of their company’s precious resources to hire a PR agency. Oftentimes tactical-minded PR pros are like…
The problems with Healthcare.gov will no doubt eventually be repaired by IT pros, but the damage to reputations will sting for years to come. The challenge for the contractors involved is that the standard crisis communications playbook simply doesn’t apply in these situations. This playbook says that in a typical crisis where a corporate reputation is…
PR pros pride themselves on mastering the art of the written word, but it’s time to get into a new mindset. Pounding out prose to populate press releases, fact sheets and talking points can be all consuming, client-pleasing and often mentally rewarding (“I nailed that lead”). No matter how perfectly fashioned, words on paper sometimes fail to…
This week the biggest advertising company merger in history was announced – between Omnicom and Publicis. The combined stock market value is $35 billion and there will be 130,000 employees in the newly formed entity. Those of us in the public relations industry are familiar with the two, as they are also the holding companies for a…
Is there a future for standalone social media and digital marketing agencies? Not if you ask the next generation of marketing and communication pros, at least in Europe. According to a study of 2,000 students there, 80 percent believe these specialized agencies will disappear within 10 years. Nearly as many – 70 percent – believe marketing will be dominated…
