Easy money

19th April 2008

posted in Administrative |

I have come to the conclusion that it takes no skill whatsoever to label yourself a public relations firm and begin collecting money in exchange for shoddy service and poorly-written articles.

I encounter PR folks regularly as a journalist. I get press releases about subjects that have absolutely nothing to do with what I cover or even the areas in which my paper circulates. Many of the press releases that are pertinent require massive rewriting and not just to fit with ours or AP style. I’m talking a lack of basic grammar, spelling errors, and a general lack of intelligible sentence structures. Keep in mind: Companies pay for people to write and submit such appalling pieces.

As The-F-Word becomes more popular, I’ve began getting press releases from numerous companies to shill their mostly diet-related products. The Lipton and Snapple folk were real professional about it, even after I explained to them that I don’t endorse commercial products here. In fact, Lipton’s PR company, Ogilvy, actually has a code of ethics they follow when doing blogger outreach wherein they pledge to actually check out the blog and it’s about and contact pages before sending offers.

Other PR companies… well, not so professional.

I’ve received numerous offers to shill weight-loss products on my “diet and fitness” blog. And it isn’t as if robots can simply spider my site and collect my email address; someone has to actually go to my site to get my email address whereby they seem to skip over the whole “eating disorders awareness and body size acceptance” theme of the site. Here’s the latest offer I’ve received from a site sporting male body builders with biceps larger than my thighs:

Hi Rachel,

My name is Kelli, and I’m helping Body Building Company spread the word about their new video. It’s a short clip about the funny characters you probably see everyday at the gym, and I think your readers will really enjoy it. Link deleted.

The video is part of a campaign to promote Body Building Company’s Fat Burning Product. You can find out more about Fat Burning Product at the Body Building Company website If you’re interested in trying out Fat Burning Product, we’d be happy to send you a complimentary bottle.

When you have a moment, please confirm receipt of this email, and feel free to contact me with any questions or comments you may have. Thank you for your time, and I look forward to hearing from you.

Sincerely,

Kelli Andrews
Outreach Account Manager
Guerilla PR, Inc.
85 Bolinas Road, Suite 17
Fairfax, CA 94930
phone: 415.460.6695
email: Kelli@guerillapr.com
website: www.guerillapr.com

Oh, I confirmed receipt of the email, along with a few choice comments, with not so surprisingly no apology or even reply from Kelli. I post this email in its entirety because I feel shilling weight loss products to an admitted recovering anorexic/bulimic who now runs an eating disorders awareness and education site shows an appalling lack of professionalism and integrity. This from a seemingly professional company, boasting a clientele ranging from Coca Cola, Sony, Jim Beam and Yahoo!. Maybe I should start a Hall of Shame for marketers section on the site.

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This entry was posted on Saturday, April 19th, 2008 at 11:52 am and is filed under Administrative. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

1 On April 19th, 2008, Meowser

said:

That is just bizarre. I mean, spammers are one thing; they hit everyone with Viagra ads, for example, without even making sure the e-recipient even has a penis, never mind has actually demonstrated any interest in the product. But you expect an individual in public relations — not a BOT, an actual PERSON — to take the time to make sure their target is even halfway appropriate. And offering to send someone like you DIET PRODUCTS is pretty much the very definition of bad aim. It’s not just bad writing that’s the problem here, it’s bad everything.

posted on April 19th, 2008 at 1:54 pm

2 On April 19th, 2008, Cyn

“And it isn’t as if robots can simply spider my site and collect my email address; someone has to actually go to my site to get my email address whereby they seem to skip over the whole “eating disorders awareness and body size acceptance” theme of the site.”

To me it sounds like trolls are getting more sophisticated in their bullying. They probably want to go beyond “YOUR SO FAT LOLZ”. It’s like when a mean girl is dumped by her boyfriend and she subscribes his mailing list somewhere so he gets loads of “grow your penis” commercial spam. Making you get all those emails may be the indirect way to keep bullying “teh fattiez” and to keep trying to “prove” us being fat is wrong. And ugly.

Poor little bastards with so much time in their hands. I bet they don’t have friends. You must lead a miserable life if everyone you know ignores you because you’re an arsehole, kids.

Is there a way you can mark those mails as spam or bulk automatically?

posted on April 19th, 2008 at 6:41 pm

3 On April 19th, 2008, Sherie Sanders

Interesting that you mention that Lipton is professional. I believe they are owned by Unilever who owns Dove and Ben and Jerry’s. As well as Ultra Slim fast!

posted on April 19th, 2008 at 7:07 pm

4 On April 19th, 2008, Rachel

By professional I mean that their PR liasons weren’t necessarily trying to get me to advertise; they wanted me to try and review their product. The Ogilvy PR company’s code of ethics in particular really impressed me.

posted on April 19th, 2008 at 7:28 pm

5 On April 19th, 2008, Charlotte

I like the idea of a Hall of Shame.

posted on April 19th, 2008 at 8:11 pm

6 On April 20th, 2008, Ashley

I like the idea of a Hall of Shame as well and I think this dummy and Mimi Roth shopuld be at the very top of the list.

posted on April 20th, 2008 at 1:05 am

7 On April 20th, 2008, Fat Girl

I don’t even have a popular blog and I get the same freaking things. One that really got me was skinny songs (my blog post about it can be found here: http://fatgirlspeaksout.blogspot.com/2008/02/product-review-skinny-songs.html ) I let them send me a free CD and… well, I thought it’d be funny. It was horrible.

posted on April 20th, 2008 at 9:39 am

8 On April 20th, 2008, Rachel

FG: I took them up on their offer, too. I just haven’t had time to write the scathing review of it. Lyrics aside, my husband the musician says the music is awful.

posted on April 20th, 2008 at 2:10 pm

9 On April 20th, 2008, Brett

Do not assume that the person who collected your email address actually read your web site. In my experience, that’s not the way it works.

Someone probably typed some terms into a search engine, then copied the email address of the administrator on every web site that came up in that search. The person who created the mailing list wants to collect as many email addresses as possible. If they spend time reading each web site it just slows them down.

It’s not that the person misunderstood your web site. They didn’t read it all.

posted on April 20th, 2008 at 9:38 pm

10 On April 22nd, 2008, Rachel

Brett - I know all about robots and spidering of sites, etc… But the particular way I have phrased my email address precludes both of these measures. Someone had to go to my site and collect my email address. Whether that person was the above mentioned emailer, I don’t know. But neither has she responded to my reply email clarifying what my site is or isn’t. A simple apology would be appropriate here.

Whether or not she read or did not read my blog or mission statement is a moot point. If she didn’t read the site, her email is all the more reckless.

I know some here don’t feel posting her personal information is appropriate, but this isn’t super-secret information, either. Go to their website and you can find the same. I think we need to start holding companies accountable for their actions. If a gun company representative went to the blog of a person who is openly and clearly suicidal and offered them a free gun to “try” and “review,” would we be as sympathetic to the gun company rep? Doubtful. Anorexia is a serious, life-threatening illness. It’s not something you can ever recover from; you can learn to manage it, but it’s always, always there. Offering a recovering anorexic a diet pill or weight loss product is like handing a loaded gun to a six-year-old. It’s unprofessional, dangerous and morally reprehensible. Until we begin holding companies and individuals accountable for their actions, this kind of behavior will persist.

posted on April 22nd, 2008 at 9:17 am

11 On April 22nd, 2008, Rachel

Another update: I forwarded the message to the company’s outreach director, Cory. He was very apologetic. He said that the company requires its employees to “pre-qualify each site to ensure that it is a proper target” for its outreach, but that the “process failed this time.”

Mistakes happen. All I wanted was a reply email acknowledging the error and an indication that they will be more aware and considerate in sending these kinds of offers in the future. I’m completely satisfied with the company’s response.

posted on April 22nd, 2008 at 9:55 am

12 On April 22nd, 2008, Brett

I am glad you got an apology from them. You wrote:

“Someone had to go to my site and collect my email address.”

I’m not denying that. Someone did *look* at your site, but he/she didn’t read it. That’s the difference. If the person stopped to read each site, the process would take too long.

posted on April 22nd, 2008 at 1:46 pm

13 On April 25th, 2008, Brigitte

I’ve been reading your site for the past few months - and I happen to be a PR person. I think you’re completely acting within your rights to post the PR person’s name. I blogged on a similar issue (http://spinsucks.com/2008/01/08/too-lazy-to-seek-the-truth.aspx), because I’m tired of lazy practitioners making our industry look bad. Unfortunately, often poorly trained interns are tasked with making our outreach lists, and it takes a conscientious person to check every single entry. Too often the discovery phase simply doesn’t happen.

posted on April 25th, 2008 at 7:46 pm