The number of #PRFail tweets on a daily basis blow my mind. It makes the entire PR industry look like a bunch of inexperienced schmucks.
One would think after the first 500 #PRFail tweets that people would double check what they’re sending to reporters to avoid becoming a hashtag themselves, but they don’t. Which makes me think they simply don’t know any better.
I’ll admit… I was once that 23-year-old PR newb blasting pitches to anyone on the auto-generated Cision list. Because that’s what I was taught. (Disclaimer: I went to j-school, not PR school, so this was on-the-job PR experience taught by PR pros more senior than I was. Not knowing any better, I did what I was told.) Like so many junior PR pros, I was taught how to pull a media list in Cision, then how to weed out the clearly irrelevant contacts and pitch the rest — fast. While I was told not to blast via BCC (thank god!), there was never any discussion about all the ways you can research a reporter to make sure they were the right fit. It was hurry up and pitch — with the same pitch, mind you — then move to the next thing. That’s how bad pitches get sent and template mistakes are made. I did this for probably three years before someone taught me the importance of researching your contacts. (Karma did get me back a few years later when I became a freelance writer. “Do PR people not research my work?!”)
As evidenced by the number of #PRFail tweets that continue years after I first saw the hashtag gain momentum, people are still doing this. Which means people are still teaching the new generation of PR pros to pitch in this utterly horrible manner.
I am here, begging for everyone to stop the madness. Even the PR pros that put in the excruciating hours of research, draft a compelling pitch geared toward one specific reporter, and do the appropriate follow-up get ignored. Because journalists are so used to receiving — excuse my language — shit pitches. We all need to change if we’re ever going to have a chance at changing the perception of our industry and building better relationships.
So I’m asking you, PR pros, are you with me? Can we all promise to do better? No, do great?
And, journalists, can we start over? Can we pretend like this was just a bad date where a lot of things went wrong, but that we want to try this relationship thing one more time? Drinks on us.
