Blog posts

The Old Ones are Always the Best

A recent article by Sir Richard Evans in PR Week ow.ly/m8EK0 looked at how Basil Clarke’s (a pioneer of British PR in the late 1920s) five principles for effective communications still hold strong today. They are: Claims in press releases should be sourced – Clarke said that all press materials issued by his public relations […]

Thursday, July 11th, 2013

Slave Labour

Apparently the Public Relations industry is one of the worst offenders for employing unpaid workers, despite the existence of the PRCA’s Intern Programme, which commits members to paying interns working for longer than a month at least the national minimum wage. A PR Week article in April stated that ten per cent of the 100 […]

Wednesday, June 12th, 2013

Master & Servant

I believe that enjoying what you do and getting on with the people you work with are the most powerful elements of a successful public relations programme. I therefore consider my clients to be part of my team and we enjoy working together (or so they tell me!). As we have an excellent relationship that […]

Tuesday, May 14th, 2013

A picture paints a thousand words

Good public relations is about more than words. Journalists are crying out for decent shots as it makes their publication/website look more compelling. However, in my world of B2B PR, there seems to be a dearth of decent images as PR people struggle to persuade their clients to invest in some photography. Photography isn’t just […]

Thursday, April 18th, 2013

Dedication’s what you need

I recently read an article in PR Week which looked at what the PR industry can do to support a struggling high street. Ed Watson, director of Public Relations for Debenhams, told PR Week that “retail brands should not just jump into action around the time of the quarterly trading statement”. The article immediately struck […]

Monday, March 18th, 2013

Once the horse has bolted…….

I have finally read through last week’s copy of PR Week and an article about the horse meat scandal caught my eye. The article reviews how Findus UK’s response to the crisis has been lambasted as ‘not fit for purpose’, describing the company as ‘a rabbit in the headlights’. One commentator said that the company […]

Thursday, February 21st, 2013

Something for Nothing?

It was about two years ago that The Times newspaper decided to make its online content paid-for subscription. At the time I said it was a bold move.

Monday, June 18th, 2012

No morning alarm – just tea, toast and the paper.

According to the media section of PR Week, printed newspapers are better suited to the slower pace of Saturdays than midweek working lives. The latest ABC survey showed that all titles (other than the Daily Star) made significantly more sales on a Saturday in April. According to PR Week, The Guardian more than doubled its […]

Wednesday, May 30th, 2012

Grocers’ Apostrophe

While I will never claim to be a writing guru, and appreciate that to ‘err is human’ (I make enough mistakes myself), I hate sloppiness! I receive a fair amount of emails from students and public relations professionals prospecting for jobs. Unfortunately, it often seems that the requirement for PR people to have basic written […]

Thursday, May 24th, 2012

Facebook facts

A recent PR Week/OnePoll has found that a significant proportion of Facebook members have doubts over privacy and the security of their data.

Monday, May 21st, 2012