PR that is NOT worth a dime

Recently I've become aware of third parties selling PR services - often via social media - that are categorically NOT worth paying for.

You know the ones? On social media they like to call themselves an "entrepreneur" or "coach" and they're going to turn you into a DIY "PR rockstar" and then they rattle off some facts and figures designed to impress you.

As with most online offerings, it's a freemium funnel, and the charismatic salesperson in the video (or course or webinar) pushes you through it pretty efficiently. Before you know it, you're paying $hundreds for the entry level or $thousands for the premium levels and you genuinely believe you are getting value.

Sadly, you're getting fleeced.

Dud One: Pitch your story to the media - just hack your own PR!        

The first kind of dud is the "pitch your story to the media" course, webinar or workshop. It basically says you can DIY your own PR. And you can - technically this is true - there's no licence or qualification that you need to hold before approaching a journalist. But do you have the time and the skill?

According to these folks I see on my social media feeds, you can pitch your story to the media with ease! Apparently, you just need a snazzy press release using their template (which they will sell you) and you shoot it off to the list of emails for journalists (which they will sell you). If you make it far enough down the funnel, they'll even tell you what to put in the Subject line of your email pitch to guarantee the journalist will open your email!

Reality check: it's not that easy.

That's not to say you can't be lucky, but most journalists say no to most "stories" because they're not actually "stories." Journalists are interested in news, narrative, comment and opinion. They are not interested in doing your marketing for you. A cold email from an unknown person is probably not even going to be read. Journalists are busy and subject to the demands of the news cycle and their editors.

Over time, PR professionals like myself build up trusted relationships with journalists. If you want to put in that time and effort, you can too. But it's probably a better use of your time to focus on your business and spend the right amount of money with a proper PR service to get the right value. I've seen DIY PR offerings cost more than I would charge for several hours of personalised attention! That's just nuts!

In their defence, the vendors of these services would say that you are paying for an investment in a new skill that is yours forever. But as with most skills, if you don't use them every day, they get rusty and information goes out of date pretty quickly (in fact these vendors know this too ... that's why they sell you a monthly or annual subscription model!)

The other advantage we have as PR professionals is the knack of knowing what makes a good story and how to pitch it. Some journalists like a chat on the phone. Others like an email with bullet points. Some are happy to receive a first draft. Very few (if any!) demand a press release! (So why would you pay someone to write one for you ....? Nice segueway!)

Dud Two: Pay us to write a press release for you!        

Feature stories (not related to the news cycle) are normally negotiated between a PR pro and a journalist (and often also their editor). The PR pro selects and sequences the correct way to make the approach bearing in mind that the preferred journalist may say no or may be away that week. Also bearing in mind that journalists like novelty and exclusivity.

Journalists don't all want to write the same story, which is why a press release is almost never required, and the "spray and pray" email blast model is a waste of time and money.

There is a variation of this dud which is that you "pay us to write a press release for you and we guarantee to get you into the press."

I've seen these services start at a few hundred dollars and go up to a few thousand, which just makes my eyes water!

Moreover, they get you to do all the heavy lifting by filling in their template, then they get a junior (or a VA or AI) to turn that into this revered "press release" and then they send that to a low-rent (and random) media channel they're paying to take this stuff via a "special access" arrangement.

Usually, they stroke your ego along the way by telling you they have journalists (not VAs, or juniors or AI) who write the press releases and that they will position you as the "go-to expert" in your niche. They will suggest you will now get picked up as a feature article in "syndicated" news sites. Using the authority of this media, you can now get more amazing opportunities to speak at events and on podcasts and get in front of more clients.

So, I guess all you have to do to become that "go-to expert" and a "thought leader" is to go through the backdoor and pay for it!

Lastly, they will want you to make referrals for them, i.e. to work for them for free, to feed their funnel.

Dud Three: Rockstar firms with exorbitant rates but sadly no RoI        

Rockstar PR firms (with big name aspirational clients) charge anywhere from $10,000 per month to start, and often what you get is a series of quick media sugar hits.

Then you hit a quiet patch because they've used up all their tricks.

Note that most rockstar PR firms have a so-called "media blast list." As part of your $10k/month service all they simply do is put together a boilerplate press release each week and "blast" it to their contact list of "schedulers" at various media outlets.

Journalists get hundreds of these a day and most are ignored.

For emerging brands, and even the majority of mature firms in most industries, this kind of monthly retainer for pure media relations (a specific subset of full service PR) is a waste of money. It's not going to build your reputation. And there are only so many times a month you can be in the newspaper for the right reasons!

There's a commonly held perception that getting in the media will result in customers beating a red hot path to your door. Now in the case of some B2C products, that just might work after the right media exposure, for example, breakfast television is amazing. But for B2B and B2E, it's not likely to happen.

Sugar hits can provide a traffic "bump" for your website and social media followers but without an appropriate amplification strategy, an article in the newspaper is not going to lead to any meaningful conversion of readers to revenue. The halo effect wears off pretty quickly, and it may not even happen if the article is behind a paywall.

Disappointingly, you may find that this media exposure has become a double-edged sword as it becomes increasingly difficult to get into the media again unless you have something very different to say.

So you've paid $10k+ for website window shopping, a few newsletter sign-ups and vanity metrics?

In any event, PR is so much more than media; it's a process of reputation building via lots of little wins and the occasional big win. Its output is trust and influence. Not column inches, website visits or followers.

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Jennifer Harrison is a Director at Reputation Edge, a full-service public relations firm based in Sydney. She is a specialist in PR for startups, especially in fintech, proptech and legaltech.