Book Review: The Fall of Advertising & the Rise of PR

At PlayhouseSquare, my colleagues in the marketing department and I handle both advertising and publicity. I spend more of my time on publicity, so my curiosity piqued when I came across the book The Fall of Advertising & The Rise of PR, written by Al and Laura Ries and published in 2002.

Unfortunately, this book was a chore to slog through. The tone of the authors is so bitter that I suspect that one of them was humiliated by a termination from an advertising agency, or perhaps suffered a concussion at the hand of a Clio Award-wielding ex-lover.

Some of the references are so dated that I'm only familiar with the topics through anecdotes told by my parents. I can't imagine a recent college grad relating to this book. How many 20-somethings know what a Yugo is?

And then there's the litany of suggestions rejected by their clients with the not-so-subtle assertion that these clients were stupid for not listening to them.

Further, it's hard trust the assertions of authors whose foresight has proven to be less than reliable. For example, they asserted that 3G phones and Amazon would prove to be failures.

This book's coup de grace came when I was adding it to my list on goodreads.com. I mistakenly typed in "the rise of advertising" and to my surprise, up came a listing for a book entitled The Rise of Advertising & the Fall of PR, published in 2009 with a forward by Al Ries.

All this said, I did agree with some of the points made by the authors. I do believe that using PR to build a brand and advertising to maintain a brand can be the right strategy to use in many cases. But with today's fragmented communications channels, I do not believe there is a one-size-fits-all answer.

Nor do I believe that either PR or advertising is falling or rising - both are changing.

PR Lessons from "The Decision"

I'm not a basketball fan. Before last week, I'd never heard of Dwyane Wade or Chris Bosh. I followed the LeBron James announcement as a Clevelander, but mostly as a communications professional, looking to see if there were any PR lessons to learn.

Boy, were there:

1. Know your audience.
As a general rule, we Americans want our sports heroes to be confident yet humble. And though they'll get the ring, the trophy, and the glory, we want them to win for us. James made it clear that he wants to win for himself, and that just doesn't sit well.

Imagine that a company held a press conference to announce, "We're introducing the new iGadget/Wonder Drug/Clean-As-New Laundry Detergent/whatever so we can make more money." Ridiculous, right? We all know companies are in business to make money, but that's not the way to position a new product launch to consumers.

You have to know your audience, tailor your message accordingly and...

2. Choose the right medium for the message.
The one-hour ESPN special only would have worked well if James had announced his decision to stay in Cleveland. It would have further cemented his status as a hometown hero and commitment to overcome the curse on Cleveland sports. Instead, he came across as selfish.

Appropriate ways to announce his decision to leave: issue a statement or, possibly, hold a press conference in Cleveland, all the while expressing gratitude for the support of the Cavaliers fans and the opportunity given to him by the Cavaliers organization. Either of these could have been followed up with media interviews.

It's important to think carefully about how you are going to deliver your message. Does it merit a press conference? A video statement? A Facebook status update? Is it wiser to start a little smaller and follow up with something wider reaching if needed?

Consider the content and the audience you want to reach with it.

3. Protect the brand.
Up until last week, the LeBron James brand was extraordinarily talented athlete, hometown hero and classy guy. Cavs fans that I spoke with told me they felt duped; they had believed he was respectable. Over and over they repeated that it wasn't the fact that he was leaving, it was how he chose to announce his decision that cost him their respect.

Make sure each and every message is consistent with the brand.

4. Don't stoop to their level.
The way LeBron James announced his decision to go to Miami hurt all Northeast Ohioans in way that we haven't been hurt before, with the possible exception of Art Modell's removal of the Cleveland Browns to Baltimore. As much as it may feel justified, retaliation isn't the way to win in PR. Dan Gilbert's impassioned letter to Cavaliers fans and area residents would have been the perfect response minus the digs at James.

In PR, as in life, it's always better to be the bigger person.

5. Take full advantage of your opportunities.
I may be biased because I work for a not-for-profit organization, but I find myself most disappointed by the unrealized opportunity for the Boys & Girls Clubs of America. Sure, they got some money and some national airtime, but James could have given them so much more.

Imagine if he had started his ESPN special like this: "Before I announce my decision, I'd like to take this opportunity to tell you about an organization that had a tremendous influence on me while I was growing up: the Boys & Girls Clubs of America. Specifics about his experience. I would not be where I am today without the Boys & Girls Clubs of America, so I am making a donation to the Clubs in each of the six cities I met with during the past few weeks, and also to the Boys & Girls Club of Akron, my hometown. I encourage everyone watching to learn more about the Boys & Girls Clubs of America by visiting bgca.org."

Maybe, just maybe, that would have softened the response to the mishandling of "The Decision" announcement.

When you have the stage, take full advantage of the opportunity to say what's most important.

Bonus quickie lessons:
Don't refer to yourself in the third person.
Don't announce your break-up in public until after you've told your significant other, your employer, your business partner, etc.
And please, don't use comic sans unless you are writing a letter to a child.

What a Communications Manager Does for a Living

I am writing this post mainly for my family. I love them dearly, but I am tired of trying to explain what I do for a living. Like other people who work in an office, I attend many meetings, but I do so much more than that.

To start, I am the communications manager for a large performing arts organization. I am a member of the marketing department, which has 10 total employees and two interns. My areas of focus are our educational and fundraising programs...and other duties as assigned. My title is communications manager, but what I do can also be described as public relations and marketing.

I maintain the media list
A tedious, but important, part of public relations is maintaining a good list of media contacts. I maintain the list for our entire department, which is comprised of contacts at print publications, at radio stations, at television stations, bloggers and online outlets. I update our list with new email addresses for current contacts, add new contacts and delete those that, for one reason or another, no longer belong on our list.

I cultivate and maintain relationships with members of the media
It is much easier to obtain coverage for something when you have good relationships with the media. I meet with key contacts occasionally to determine their interests and update them on what I have coming up.

I write, distribute and track press releases
Press releases are documents that have all the pertinent information relating to an event, program, award or other type of announcement for which we want to obtain media coverage. The first thing I do when getting ready to issue a release is schedule it. I work with seven other people who issue press releases. As a rule, we allow only one to go out from our organization each day. After I have my release scheduled, I write it and distribute it internally as appropriate for fact-checking. Then I email it to our media list. I call or email key media contacts to make sure they've received it and to suggest ("pitch") ideas ("angles") for stories or interviews. Through Google Alerts and our clipping service, I check to see where we received media coverage.

I schedule media appearances and interviews
As a public relations professional, my job is not to get on the news. My job is to get our key spokespeople on the news. So, I will make arrangements for our key people to be interviewed on camera, on the radio or by a reporter for a print publication when appropriate. If that interview is to take place at a radio or television studio, I will accompany that person to the studio. Occasionally, one of our key people is not available and in those instances, I may do the interview myself as I did here: http://www.wkyc.com/life/programming/shows/goodcompany/gc_article.aspx?storyid=110107.

I write copy
Copy, NOT text or verbiage. I write copy for ads, brochures, catalogs, email blasts, signs, newsletters, playbills, postcards, websites, and probably other things that I can't think of right now.

I art direct
I work with graphic artists and our web manager to create the visual look of ads, collateral materials (brochures, catalogs, etc.) and signs. Everything I create has to align with our organization's brand standards.

This post is already getting quite lengthy, and I still have more to say! I'll save it for another post though. For now, I'll close by saying that, as you can see, there's never a dull moment in my job. Every day is different, and I love just about every minute of it!