@Journalist Did you get my press release?
{ Tags: journalists, online pr, pr, twitter \ Jan7 }The last few weeks I’ve started noticing some PR people I follow on Twitter give a heads up to twittering journalists about a press release they’ve sent them. It usually goes something like “@journalist Just sent you a release. Let me know what you think.”
Now, not going to name names because that’s not the point of this post, and besides no one’s saying this is bad etiquette. However, it does smack a little of old school PR tactics. This is what I tweeted:
Responses from PR people:
Responses from journalists:
Updated by @jimboeth
From this small sample you can see journalists are relatively for the approach. That said, just like in social media, you’re dealing with different views and preferences and no one-size-fits-all approach will work. This doesn’t mean that all journalists on Twitter want to be @followedupped. You still run a risk of being blocked. Also, as @charlesarthur and @jimboeth say, an @followup should be instead of a follow-up call and not as well as.
The responses from PR people are on the whole against such such tactics. If this is a true representation of PR people on Twitter then it’s certainly a good thing as it shows that we’re being more cautious when networking online. Maybe too cautious judging by the journalist’s responses?
Considerations when @followupping journalists about news releases:
- Make sure they’ve clearly stated that they don’t mind @followups
- Make the choice: @followup? Or follow-up call? (personally @followups seem better)
- Understand that you could be blocked from said journalists and ridiculed online for all to see
- PR’s competitive - understand that your competitors can see what you’re up to (if they’re Twitter savvy that is)
Stephen is managing director of 3W PR, a UK based online PR consultancy. You can connect with him on Twitter or check out his LinkedIn profile. | Email Stephen
Mark
Might be more useful/efficient to have “@journo Have posted an announcement at (link) which relates to (journo’s known area of interest)”
At the end of the day if it’s irrelevant you’ll get blocked, which might quikcly start acting as a decent quality control filter for PRs.
Stephen
Good point. The cream rises to the top. Or, in this case, the useful PRs don’t get blocked.
Dan
Great post Ste! Interesting how PRs and journos seem to have different ideas about best practice. Personally, I’d be for @followups. After all, the journo will only follow the PR in the first place if they think they have something interesting to offer them.
A great example of the usefulness of Twitter, and how it’s streamlining communications in busy — and noisy — times.
Enjoying the new blog layout by the way! Especially the embedded Twitter-feed-image-thingy
Dan
P.S. Any ideas on how I can get rid of that avatar? It’s camp as Butlins
Daryl Willcox
Twitter promises to be a really dynamic medium for communications, but just like anything else it is exposed to the same kind of old-school PR tactics that can get up journo noses. Whatever the communication technology - phone, email, Response Source, Twitter or whatever - PR professionals need to exercise judgement in the way they use it.
Ilissa Miller
Unbelievable practice for sure! Twitter is a way to shout it out and hope that the right people hear, especially if they choose to follow you. To DM or DR about an e-mail or separate correspondence doesn’t quite ‘fit.’ As a PR pro, I agree with the journalists that they should stop following - Announcements shouldn’t be ’shoved down a journo’s throat’ rather floated and communicated effectively to reach the target audience and you have to trust that anyone (and everyone) is doing their job as effectively as you.
Chris Edwards
The problem with sending d or @ messages with Twitter is that it’s easy to automate. Good PR won’t. Bad PRs will. Guess which ones will cause the complaints.
Charles is right in that, if it stops a useless phone call then it’s better. However, are we then expected to @reply to each heads-up? What happens if those @replys don’t come – is it then time for the phone call?
I’ve toyed with the idea of putting an autoresponder onto an email address used only for releases – “Yes I’ve got it, will be in touch if it needs a follow-up” or similar. The one thing that stopped me doing it was the question over how effective it would be in practice as the replies probably would never get collated before the intern picks up the phone for a day’s worth of checking at the agencies who are the worst offenders. It didn’t seem worth spamming everyone with something that might get mistaken for an out-of-office message just to prevent the additional phone calls.
ChrissMari
I have to say that’s what annoys those of us not that are not hacks or flacks about twitter.
Adrian Bridgwater
I’m fairly relaxed about it at the moment. Twitter is still finding it’s natural level with regard to things like this to some extent. It’s easy enough to ignore and all but the greenest PR people would still do this.
Adrian Bridgwater
http://twitter.com/ABridgwater
Brownbare
Fantastic post. I think Twitter is a valuable resource to actually determine what journalists are interested in. That alone is a powerful tool. Tweeting a release link with a very brief synopsis may be a better way of gaining interest? Although I am not sure about whether that breaks an etiquette rule.
JB
Gienna Shaw
How about neither an @followup nor a follow up phone call. My response to either: Is something wrong with your e-mail system? Or do you think I’m incapable of reading a press release and deciding whether or not to act upon it?
I get literally hundreds of pitches a week. If I got a phone call or twitter about all of them, I wouldn’t have time to write any articles. I still get at least three or four “did you get my press release?” calls a week. It’s an infuriating waste of my time, it’s disruptive, and it only biases me against you. If A PR person twittered me in this manner, I would block him or her immediately unless we have a good relationship and he or she regularly pitch me stories that are directly related to my beat and not too self-promotional.
Can you tell I feel strongly about this?
Stephen
@Gienna Lol! Yes.
Patrick Evans
It is an interesting debate. I think most reporters don’t like follow-up period unless you are presenting new information or they have already expressed an interest. There are certain journalists on Twitter that I DM news releases versus sending them via e-mail, but I don’t use Twitter to follow-up and I know they like getting the information via DM versus e-mail.
Good post.
Patrick
Ruth Seeley
Conversely, there are also journalists who are awakening to the benefits of PR folks and journalists working together on Twitter to cope with tight deadlines. See these two tweets from BBC tech journalist Rory Cellan-Jones. Of course he’s been on the media on Twitter ‘list’ for more than a month now - he just doesn’t follow very many of the folks who follow him.
@ruskin147 now lying awake worrying about what we can film at CES on weds before the show opens..8 hour time diff means we must shoot weds for thurs
@ruskin147 @ prsarahevans hi - can you put me on your media on twitter list? Rory Cellan-Jones, BBC Technology Correspondent
Adam Lewis
Not that I’ve got much experience of this but…surely it depends on the journalist being targeted? As Daryl states, PR professionals need to exercise their own judgement on the journalist they’re pursuing. I’m sure some hate the idea of a follow-up phone call, some will hate the idea of a DM, some might actually like it. It’s the PR professional’s job to work out which method suits which journalist.
Craig McGill
I have moaned against the ‘did you get the release’ phone call for years (and now the tweet) but the one thing I do have to grudgingly say is that the call-round more often than not does result in an increase in pick-up for stories because a lot of times reporters - or the person manning the main news@ email address don’t read everything that comes in.
If journalists read their mails or each paper agreed on a format, then that would go a long way to sorting this situation out.
Of course there are those that always want spoken to on the phone as well before receiving an email…
Melanie Seasons
@Craig - I completely agree. I don’t like to make follow-up calls at all, but if I’m fairly confident the story is right, I will give him or her a quick ring to check (or Tweet - whatever the case may be). More often than not, it does result in a definitive ‘yes’ or ‘no’, which is essentially what all PR people are interested in.
For someone like me, new to the UK and only specialising in online PR, it’s very difficult to cultivate meaningful relationships with print journalists. I’m more than happy to do so in whatever way possible, but if a journalist absolutely refuses based on the fact that I’m in PR and that he or she doesn’t want any phone calls or public online contact, it’s fairly impossible to do so.
Humber post- grad PR student- Victoria
A post to be read by all. Thanks for doing this one Stephen. The reactions from your Twitter post were interesting. They opened the door to a whole new flock of questions we need to start to ask ourselves. Questions that will help us understand the tool we are all coming to include in our daily routine.
When it comes down to it, Twitter is a way to “connect” and keep up to date with anything you chose (to follow). That “connection” of course goes two ways. Here’s where we need to work together.
Some are saying the follow up Tweet is breaking PR Twitter etiquette. On the other hand what is the etiquette of using a tool of communication to… ummm… communicate?
As all things in life, I think the key is balance.
Social media is creeping up all over the place, it’s poking through our old ways and it’s starting to even oooze out of us. The journalists should understand the PR practitioners are using Twitter and social media to improve the communication of their messages (i.e. news releases). The PR practitioners should remember that too much of anything isn’t a good thing. If we can follow these “rules” then I think balance is achieved.
The tool is here and it’s an opportunity to make things better for everyone. I hope the simple concept of balance works out. If not then I just found myself a job straight out of school. Writer: Tweet Etiquette.