The dog's bolluks

We've had a few comments on Bad PR. Nothing like the BBC's Have Your Say, granted, but generally speaking they've been fairly balanced, well considered and rather amusing.

Back in October we ran a story about some fairly 'ambitious' commissioning. It wasn't really Bad PR, but it was pretty funny, so up it went....

Well, the subject the post wrote in, clearly he'd Google'd his own name and seen it crop up on this blog, and clearly he was not best pleased.

If you want to see the original post - it's called Bolluk's and was back at the beginning of October. It's pretty funny, but nowhere near as funny as his response.

For those of you that don't bother reading comments or digging back into the archives, here's the response.....

Tembo says

I had thought of writing a long rejoinder citing my extreme distaste for petit bourgeois ignoramuses, but I think that this implied criticism of your general attitude and world view - as exhibited in your pathetic post - will suffice. I leave you to mull over two poems, plus a reference in the Bible, which describe amply where I stand; you may be sure that I will never revisit this site:

Living is no laughing matter:

you must live with great seriousness

like a squirrel, for example-

I mean without looking for something beyond and above living,

I mean living must be your whole occupation.



Yasamak sakaya gelmez,

buyuk bir ciddiyetle yasayacaksin

bir sincap gibi mesela,

yani, yasamanin disinda ve otesinde hicbir sey beklemeden,

yani butun isin gucun yasamak olacak

The Middle Kingdom

In those days we spent our time
sitting quietly in softly lighted rooms
designed for that purpose, trying not
to let any involuntary line of thought
arrive at its logical (and, of course,
regrettable) conclusion: namely
that our days were numbered.


We were all well-fed and warmly clothed, and
experienced no misgivings on this account.
The oceans were calm and shallow,
the rivers stocked with salmon. Each spring
brilliantly coloured birds passed over
on their way to northern lakes and hills.
Poems were often penned concerning
their brief and glorious transit. When
they returned in autumn we succumbed
to appropriate feelings of mild regret.

Our figurative art gave no hint of the fact
that male animals experienced erections,
nor were children obliged to light the match
that would incinerate their families.
Similarly it was not considered necessary
to rip your opponent’s lips from his face
or force him to digest his ears.

How slow that time now seems,
how sweet, how gradual every graceful gesture!
But it is impossible to regret its passing
It was not a time of truth and realism.
The passage of migratory birds
did not accord to the facts, nor
the coming of spring, nor a man’s respect
for women, nor courtesy, friendship, honour…

Regret is impossible
(and, besides, nostalgia
is an imprisonable offense) now
that every issue is as clear as blood,
bright as tears, and we live
in understanding even as we die.

John Ash


Mark 6:11 King James version.

Goodbye forever.

Lest we forget

Today is Remembrance Day. Here is how I have variously seen it marked so far:

1. A mass brawl involving some 40 youths in school uniform outside Balham Station this morning. Several were screaming knife-based threats and one was trying to find a glass bottle to hit somebody with. Kids, eh?
2. A big traffic jam at Parliament Square because Whitehall was closed. I climbed off my bike in a huff, saying under my breath: “what the f*ck have they shut the bloody roa… Oh.”
3. An even greater volume of sanctimonious, ill thought-out old claptrap on the BBC’s ‘have your say’ section than usual.
4. A press release for a new WWII first person shoot-em-up computer game that contained the following paragraph:

The fate of the Pacific hangs in the balance. The Empire of Japan has carried out a surprise offensive on Pearl Harbor [sic] and much of the US fleet deployed in the area has been destroyed. While the US forces have successfully repelled ensuing attacks from the Japanese fleet and secured a critical victory at the Battle of Midway, the outcome of the war is far from certain. Only determination and skills will lead to ultimate victory. Relive some of the grandest and most critical naval battles of recent history and for the first time, choose to lead your fleet to a completely different ending to the war. With both strategy and action at your command truly anticipate your opponent’s every move and turn the tide of war.

Now is it me, or is this some poor timing? Regardless of whether you think that war is over glamorised by the pomp and circumstance of an occasion like Remembrance Day – or whether you’re one of those who jumps to their feet in salute whenever they hear the national anthem – you’ll probably agree that wars cost lots of lives and lots of dead people is not really a good thing. Unless they’re all reality TV contestants.

So to send out a press release today for a game that enables people to re-enact actual, historical scenes of mass death, in what it is presumably an impressively realistic rendering, seems just a touch insensitive.

Don’t get me wrong, I like computer games – although I favour the more futuristic alien ones, largely because imaginary weapons are a lot more fun than 60 yr-old real ones. I’m not saying there’s anything wrong with the game per se. I just think it’s a bit stupid to send out the paragraph above because some people, like me, will actually have read it during the two minutes’ silence.

I just really hope it was accidental, and not a deliberate attempt to cash in on some form of aggressive national fervour that is thought to arise every Remembrance Day at the sight of lots of old men struggling down Whitehall who, on any other day of the year – and minus their medals, probably wouldn’t be given a seat on the tube by any commuter in London.

Give it the finger

Sometimes I feel a twang of pity for the poor PR who has the unenviable job of promoting the unpromotable. It passes quickly though, because I know they must have pitched for and won that business with the promise of targeted, innovative, marketing.

Sometimes though, when a product or service that is patently terrible comes along, maybe the PR would have been better off not pitching for that business, because the associative reputational hit that the PR takes will be a lot more damaging than the financial reward.

I know there’s an economic downturn at the moment, I know we all have to put food on the table, but really, sometimes PRs would benefit from being a bit more picky when it comes to client selection.

Take, for example, this recent pitch – the Etre Touchy glove.

Picture the scene:

Peter Jones and Duncan Bannatyne, looking smug and self-satisfied in equal measure, are sitting down in a gloomy loft space. Next to them Theo Paphitis grins manically at a small pile of bank notes to his right, Deborah Meaden sucks on a lemon in order to induce her Look Of Scorn™, while James Caan strokes his beard looking every inch the archetypal Bond villain.

A budding entrepreneur bounds up the spiral staircase.

“Good afternoon Dragons,” he says, “are you constantly frustrated that normal pairs of gloves keep your hands warm and dry, yet they aren’t compatible with modern touch-screen devices, which only respond to skin-on-screen contact?”

The Dragons look on, their early interest already morphing into bewilderment. “Do you find yourself cursing the good Lord above because their bulkiness and general lack of sensitivity also leads to “fat-fingering” misery when using the tiny keypads of other mobile devices?” our entrepreneur soldiers on.

“I’m out,” barks Bannatyne. “Me too,” shouts Paphitis.

Undaunted, the entrepreneur takes out his ‘invention’ and proceeds to place it on his hand. It’s a woolly glove, with the tip of the index finger and thumb missing. “Dragons, I give you the Etre Touchy gloves. They’re a stylish, fun and practical way to keep your hands warm and dry while using mobile phones, portable games systems, music players and other electronic devices,” he says, making no attempt whatsoever to hide the fact that he’s reading directly from a press release.

“Tell me,” starts Meadon, “do you own the patent?”

“…erm,” sputters the entrepreneur.

“I know a thing or two about technology,” says Jones interrupting the entrepreneur, “and I have to say, I’ve never seen anything quite like the Etre Touchy. I’m out.”

“Me too,” shouts Meadon.

Caan, smiling, asks: “Did you ever work as a market trader?”

“Well, like all great ideas, Etre Touchy gloves began life as a sketch on the back of a napkin over a cup of coffee…” starts the entrepreneur, visibly questioning the veracity of that last statement, he frowns and says: “They’re only £14.99. Come on, they’d make an hilariously ironic Christmas gift for that irritating gadget freak uncle of yours who owns an iPhone.”

“OK,” says Caan, “you’ve got yourself a deal.

In-house comms monkey in tale of woe shocker II – the agency strikes back

Like all sequels this story contains elements of last outing.

I’m the hero, obviously…

The cast of villains is different, however, their actions – while not exactly the same as those that went before – are hauntingly familiar.

Over one month ago I met with a company that appeared to be doing something a bit different, interesting even. At the close of the meeting, I suggested that we had an opening for a contributed article.

This should be music to the ears of any right thinking PR man. It’s free publicity, where you get to write about your favourite subject.

Indeed, the PR man seemed pretty enthusiastic about the offer.

I think I left it a week and then emailed and informed them that I was serious, they really could submit something, but I’d need it by the end of the month.

They were still happy and, having been told the word count, said that they’d be handing the job over to their PR agency.

About a week before deadline, I emailed the agency to see how things were coming along. They asked for more time. Fortunately, I’d built in some slack. The original deadline had been the last Friday of the month, I gave the agency the weekend, plus a day. So Tuesday…..now well over one month after the first meeting and offer of contrib..

>> Hi Finisher: We will definitely have the article to you by Nov. 4th.
>>
>> Thanks again.
>>

Was the response of the agency. A day or two later, the PR emailed again if they could possibly reduce the word count from 1500 to 1000.

….er…so let me get this straight, you’ve had the best part of a month to write 1500 words about your client, and now a few days before the deadline you’re telling me that you can only realistically write 1000 words.

F*ck me, I could write the extra 500 words for them during my lunch hour if they bunged me a tenner. I didn’t say this of course. I said, “well, the word count is 1500 because we need to fill a page, 1000 words won’t fill a page’” – here I compromised – “how about 1250 and maybe you’ve got a nice image or two?” (…the story would genuinely benefit from a nice image or two).

Then….radio and email silence…nothing…..nothing for days…

Hmmm, maybe my insistence upon writing another 250 words over the 500 less than originally agreed word count has stumped him….maybe I was supposed to just say ‘OK send in a thousand words and we’ll whack in a SuDoku to fill the white space….’

On the afternoon of Nov 4th (the new deadline day I’d emailed the agency) – I got this response….

Hi Finisher: The Company’s Director of Marketing (copied on this email) is responsible for sending the final article to you. He understands the deadline is today.

Best regards,

Agency Bad PR

The director of marketing didn’t send me anything.

The morning of the day after deadline day I emailed the director of marketing asking for the feature…

I got nothing….no response…stitched up….now I had a big page to fill….two days after the deadline….

I scrambled around and managed to find something extra to fill the space…the designer laid it out, I proofed it and then signed it off, job done, (over the past week I have coordinated, edited, proofed and signed off 32, 1500 word features from a variety of sources….)

A day after all this, I got an email from the internal marketing guy asking for a further 24 hours to get his piece in…

So, to recap – the original meeting happened 44 days ago. In that time, they’ve been unable to cobble together 1500 words about themselves. That’s 34 words per day guys….

This post comes in at a little over 700 words and it took me about five minutes to write. Surely 44 days is long enough to write a featurette about yourself????

I am now more than slightly sceptical about the prospects of this particular company delivering on their promises of bringing some really high end, expensive and complicated technology projects in on budget or on time.

Poor photos and bad headlines, nuff said

Have a look at that chap over there on the right…He's the CEO of an obscure IT firm, I'm sure he's a lovely bloke, he's probably got his own parking spot at the business park and everything, but it's not a great photo is it?

You'd struggle to find the artistic merit in that photo. Well, you would unless you're a fan of those old-skool school photos, you know the ones? Your gran's mantelpiece is probably furnished with one of you wearing an over-sized blazer, grinning away underneath an unfortunate thatch of 1970s haircut.

Now, have a look at this headline:

Technobogey’s Producto2™ Double-Chip XYZ Solution Achieves Industry-first Milestone with WhyBother ABC Certification

I won't bother reproducing the full PR, there's no need. The headline really does say it all.

Would you run the story?

Probably not.

Assuming you were really desperate for news in briefs though and had to run the story, would you run that photo next to it?

No, neither would I.