The Good, The Bad, The Spin

Today’s PRSA (Sierra Nevada Chapter) seminar was fantastic. Dr. Judy Strauss, co-author of the recently released book, Radically Transparent: Monitoring and Managing Reputations Online, spoke volumes for an hour about what it means to manage reputations online.

I vehemently disagree with one line of thinking she presented. That will be the subject of my Friday morning post, which was actually written before today’s presentation. At the same time, she pretty much puts most public relations practitioners to shame with her knowledge and know-how. And she’s a marketing professor.

At the luncheon I was surprised to hear one of my posts was circulated locally, of which I had no idea. I was flattered. Then I remembered this site’s goal is not just to be critical of the news media, as this post was. I try to reserve salvos for the public relations problems seemingly ever-evident.

So here goes. (more…)

Toys-R-Us appears to take an appropriate approach to addressing the issue of product safety in light of toy recalls. The strategies outlined in the statement contain a nice mix of traditional and new media, as well as bilingual recall notices. Toys-R-Us nicely embeds its key messages into the statement. The second sentence tells us the company is “the world’s largest toy and baby products retailer.” The first sentence, last paragraph reiterates the point.

Nevertheless, Toys-R-Us gets blasted for not buying online ads announcing recalls–even though a Google search yields voluminous articles about the recalls. But a quick search for “recalls” on the Toys-R-Us site leads to the above statement and links to more information, including safety FAQs, recall information, safety tips and other links.

• At Freelance Switch, there are nice tips on writing a press release. Though geared toward individuals, the ideas are valuable for enhancing the relevance of all news releases.
• PRSA–the Public Relations Society of America–seems to just dump its new posts all on one day each week under the guise of “Tactics and The Strategist Online.” A series of posts strung together has the effect of diminishing returns; thus, perhaps it’s not an effective strategy.