PR is Broken

Tom Foremski, over at Silicon Valley Watcher, said it so much more eloquently -- Die! Press release! Die! Die! Die!. But to this refrain may I add, Die! PR Telemarketing! Die! Die! Die!. And to what do you owe this morning rant? Jeff Pulver's VON. HELLO VOIP COMPANIES -- STOP WASTING YOUR MONEY ON PR PEOPLE. I just got a call from a PR person representing Nero, Inc. asking if I would be interested in coming by the company's booth for a demo. I try to be nice when these calls come in (about 5-6 a day). So I said, innocently enough, "ok, what does the company do?" This is where things went downhill fast.

The PR person on the other end of the line said, breathlessly "free computer to computer phone calls!" Oh boy. That really set me off. I couldn't be nice anymore.

"That's it?" I asked. "That's your pitch to get me to meet the company?"

"Uh, yeah..." said the now worried PR flack.

"Wow! What will they think of next? Free phone calls!" I'm afraid I got a bit sarcastic...

I asked him if he actually knew anything about the company or if he was just making phone calls and he admitted that he knew nothing. And for that, poor Nero is probably paying $150 an hour!!

Here's a hint, SAVE YOUR MONEY. PR has fallen, and doesn't know how to get up.

By the way, with 5-6 calls a day coming in, I can't possibly agree to meet with anyone anyway -- especially when there is no news angle provided by the caller. "Umm, we'll be making some announcements but I can't say what..." is the typical comment from PR flacks. Well guess what, if you can't say what the news is, I can't say if I can come to a meeting.

See you at the show.