Peter Hay - 05 March 2010

Who agrees with Cate Sevilla on the subject of blogger relations? How could discussion be generated to develop best practice in this area?

Kerry Gaffney - 05 March 2010

I think every journalist would agree with Cate. I don't think we need a conference on how to understand bloggers, the needs of individual bloggers are no different to the needs of individual journalists, We need an industry wide commitment to stop using bought in distribution lists, along with an individual commitment by PROS to not pitch if they haven't read. We could also include a commitment by Account Mangers and above not to make junior staff do the dreaded 'did you get my press release ring around'.

The Inconvenient PR truth campaign was a good start but it was preaching tot he converted and didn't aim high enough, perhaps we need the PRCA or CiPR to develop a pitching charter.

Peter Hay - 05 March 2010

Useful points well made Kerry.

Perhaps this is something that a representative of the PRCA or the CIPR might like to comment on?

Adam Parker - 05 March 2010

Kerry the CIPR and PRCA *are* taking forward the issues raised by in the debate around the Inconvenient PR truth campaign - details here http://www.cipr.co.uk/News/releases/2010/February/inconvenient_truth_response.html one of the issues being pitching guidelines. Obviously the CIPR/PRCA are organising the event, but my for my part it would be great to get Cate's input into this as someone who been kind enough to take the time to help get this conversation started.

Karyn Fleeting - 05 March 2010

"Charters"? "Blogger relations conferences"? YAWN. Really shouldn't be necessary - come on, people!

Will Sturgeon is right: a PRO who launches and manages his/her own blog is on a fast-track to good blogger relations.

I am speaking from experience. I run a fairly popular personal finance blog, and the dross that lands in my inbox has to be seen to be believed! So many clangers, goofs and examples of poor practice, I wouldn't know where to start... Others' bloopers have provided a valuable learning curve, however, and as a result we can be proud of what we do and achieve here at Tinderbox.

If it's any consolation, the pitches from SEO agencies, advertising agencies and web dev agencies - all of whom are going after the digital PR space - are often far worse than any PRO's effort.

James Poulter - 05 March 2010

I am a firm believer that all "Social Media / Blogger relations" is just an evolution of "traditional" media relations. So much of the same rules apply:

- Don't pitch irrelevant stories

- Know the outlets you are pitching to

- Be helpful!

To Karyn Fleeting's point - many other agencies in the digital space are going after this and therefore a few individuals are making problems for the rest of the PR fold.

We need to expand the education beyond the "digital" teams within agencies so that every PRO that picks up the phone know why they are calling a blogger and how to approach them.

There of course are some considerations to be made with bloggers who, whilst being relevant to a campaign or client, are not used to being pitched to being treated differently. However the onus is not on the blogger but on the PRO to be aware and helpful in such situations.

- Explain who you are, why you thought it was worth contacting them and explain that they aren't being SOLD to.

- If they are un responsive, don't push it.

- Remember many of these bloggers are not paid journalists and that your offer to a blogger has to be engaging if they are going to commit the time to be involved with you, as they are likely to not be recompensed by a company for their time!

Oh - and @ AdamParker - would love to help with the event ;-)

Cate Sevilla - 06 March 2010

It would be great to have a chat about the charter, Adam. I think what the CIPR and PRCA are working on sounds really interesting, and I like they're trying to get different people from different perspectives involved.

I agree that journalists/bloggers alike want to be pitched with relevant releases, etc. That should go without saying, really, but apparently it's not as obvious as we would have all thought.

An industry wide commitment to doing so would be nice, but I'm not exactly sure how we can go about initiating that, as obviously there's still a resistance from those who are stuck in the more traditional ways of doing things.

A blogger relations conference may not be the most creative or exciting idea, but it could serve as a good opportunity to have many people in the same room, talking things through, asking questions, and learning what the "other side" wants. We could even hug it out and do Trust Falls. Whatever works.

I agree with what Paul Armstrong said in the article, about helping and not hassling. I think giving honest and professional feedback is important, whether it's blogger or journalist to PR or the other way around. Ranting doesn't really get anyone anywhere.

If journalists have been talking about the same issues as discussed in the video for "the past five years", as Drew says, and still nothing has been done or changed - then I highly doubt they've been saying anything any more "valuable" than what Lisa and I brought up.

To the "converted" and those who get it, it may seem as if we're just preaching to the choir - but trust me when I say that there are so many agencies and PR folk who still do not get it. But instead of ranting about my various poor experiences with this agency or that agency - I'd rather DO something, get the conversation going - and not just amongst those who are already blog and social media savvy.

I couldn't agree more with what James said about expanding the education beyond digital teams. Why should just 3 people on a team know how to speak to bloggers and online media?

Thanks to everyone for watching the video and contributing here and on Twitter!