Recently, like most Americans I have been watching the flurry of media regarding the swine flu also known as the H1N1 virus and the reference to its being a pandemic.  Fox Business recently reported http://bit.ly/gRyfQ  that officials led by U.S. Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack are waging a battle against bad public relations targeting the pig.  Continue Reading »

With all of today’s news, it was hard to decide on just one topic for today… address the latest on how Domino’s reacted to those gross videos posted online? Overdone by now. Comment on Pizza Hut’s latest announcement looking for a summer intern to run their Twitter? Yawn. Ponder how Freddie Mac will react publicly to their CEO’s suicide?  Too distressing.

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Isn’t that the old adage? The shoemakers children don’t have shoes?  That’s what I think of when I read the Feb. 10 review of “PR: A Persuasive Industry” in USA Today.

The article starts out with this…

Sleazy. Disingenuous. These are words used in U.K. newspaper coverage of the public relations industry. PR, oddly enough, doesn’t have great PR. People tend to think that PR involves being manipulative and saying whatever is in the employer’s best interests.

Gee. Allow me to keep reading.

(The authors) call PR an amoral industry, a tool for good or evil purposes. There was, alas, Hitler, Goebbels, and the Nazi propaganda machine.

More? Why make my face more red that it is right now? Stop reading!  I can’t…it’s like a traffic accident. Must…keep…reading.

I’ve not read this book, but the reviewer goes on to say that in the book the authors debate whether or not it is the role of a PR professional to tell the truth.

I am here to tell you that every journalist (both traditional and new) I’ve ever worked with would tell me where to stick it if I ever lied to them.  If a client asked us to lie (and it has happened), we immediately resign the business.

I’m also here to tell you that PR professionals live by a Code of Ethics and I’ve seen people kicked out of industry organizations for displaying anything but professionalism. So there are good and bad in every profession. Until you walk a day (or five) in our shoes, let’s leave the negativeness and bashing alone.

Three years ago, Matt Leinart was at the top of his game.  Selected in the top 10 of the 2006 draft, winner of the coveted Heisman Trophy as a junior, and had acheived celebrity status.  Now, three years later, he’s going to Super Bowl XLIII.  Just not in the exact position he hoped. Continue Reading »

The United States recently experienced a historical election that captivated the entire nation.  Barak Obama was elected as our next commander and chief.  It was hard not to get swept into the candidate debates, the many news stories and various opinions.  Both sides spoke passionately of their plans for the current ailing economy and I personally was undecided to the bitter end. 

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Dan Abrams, the former general manager of MSNBC, is launching a media-strategy firm, according to today’s Wall Street Journal.  His advantage is using a panel of journalists if your company faces a difficult public relations isssue to “weigh in on how media outlets would likely respond to different PR strategies.”

One of Abrams’s investors believes “big companies will be attracted to its ‘expert network’ and it’s pay-per-use model.”

Isn’t this a conflict of interest?  Since when do journalists moonlight as business consultants?  Isn’t our industry trying to stay away from this type of model, citing ethics?

What do you think?

A spin spotter?  Come on.  First of all it’s one thing to push blame of spin on PR people but how lazy do we think newspapers are that they need spinoculars?

Apparently, there is a new program for journalists to download and it catches any bias or spin in their pieces.  As Katherine asks the question herself “do you think this product is performing a task that editors and newspapers should be doing themselves?”  Continue Reading »

   Until recently I wasn’t familiar with Kiehl’s products.  Because of Brad Pitt, I now know that Kiehl’s is a beauty and cosmetics maker known for its old-school, natural formulas and minimalistic packaging.  Read full article:  http://thecycle.prweekblogs.com/2008/08/19/kiehls-taps-pitt-for-cause-marketing-effort/. Continue Reading »

With new design comes new opportunities!  We found out just this morning that your one-and-only spinsucks.com is nominated for best marketing blog by the Blogger’s Choice Awards!  And by somebody we don’t even know.  So thank you “lamsemjaza”, we appreciate the readership and the love for the nomination.

    So, if you hate spin and love FADS, vote here! 

Blog written by Courtney Lawrence

While out of the country last week I refused to check my email or voicemail — however, I did feel a little out of touch by not really knowing much of what was going on back home.  I figured it was time to catch up on the daily headlines by Friday. 

This was the morning following the Iowa Caucus, and I was really interested to hear who had secured a victory for each party.  Pulling up the news on a blackberry, the first two stories caught my eye:  “Obama and Huckabee” and “Spears in Standoff with Police.”  At that same moment, I heard on a Mexican radio station, understanding very little Spanish, (more or less) “Brittney Spears es loco.”

I couldn’t decide which was worse, the top headlines in our country is who won the Iowa Caucus and a fallen pop-star is crazy, something that is front page daily, or that a radio station in Puerto Vallarta was gossiping about the previous nights “stand-off” as well. 

Have people in the United States become so involved with worthless news (don’t get me wrong, I read the blogs, I’m one of them) or are we trying to focus on other people, in order to not  think about how bad things really are?

Have most become so disengaged with what’s going on that they would rather hear about Brittney Spears then the economy, housing market, political candidates, and jobs?  Or, do we just talk about it because it isn’t our family or our problems?  The media is covering these topics daily, and with blogs, hourly, and they are doing so because people would rather read about Ms. Spears then President Bush.  ¿Es los Estados Unidos loco tambien?