Before answering that question, let me put it in context. My colleague, Cortney Rhoads Stapleton, recently led a BlissPR team that wrote the text for the Industry Practice Group section on the website of a major professional services client. The project was complex – 16 different industry groups with two to seven leaders that had [...]
An entrepreneurial mindset is a double-edged sword. On the plus side, it gives you the courage of your convictions and the faith to plow ahead even when the path ahead seems perilous. But that same single-minded determination can also blind you to very real problems, resulting in disasters of varying dimensions. I found this out [...]
When you have been fortunate enough to run a company for 30+ years and have it recognized as one of the “best places to work” in your profession, you invariably get asked: “how did you build the culture?” I’m sure that dumb luck was responsible for a good chunk of it, but I’m equally sure [...]
In recent months I have gotten to know Josh Sommers, who runs Focus Media , a very successful Hudson Valley PR & advertising agency. Josh has an unusual background – he was a radio personality before founding his firm, so he looks at things a little differently than those of us that grew up in the agency business.
I am offended by the current ad campaign of Jackson Hewitt, a tax preparation service. I am not opposed to financial incentives, when they make sense and I should say at the outset that our PR firm has no axe to grind in this arena.
Brett Favre’s 18-year streak of never missing a game as a pro football quarterback ended last Monday night. But his place as a Green Bay Packers icon has been taking a severe beating for three years, ever since he “unretired” in 2008 to play for the New York Jets, and then “unretired” in 2009 and 2010 to lead the Minnesota Vikings, each time dragging the “drama” well into the summer.
The story of a failed restaurant reinforced some important business principles for me today. Crain’s New York Business, in its November 1 issue, ran an article on the extraordinary lengths to which legendary restaurateur Danny Meyer is going to provide a soft landing for the 90 employees and many customers of Tabla. The high-end Indian eatery closes on December 31.
Figuring that I was old enough to have learned something in founding and running a PR firm for 30+ years – but not so old that I had forgotten it all – the three Managing Directors of our firm asked me to develop a number of staff training courses dubbed Bliss University.
Thought leadership is a hot topic these days. Basically, it means showcasing your brainpower to clients and potential clients through research, articles, speeches, surveys and now blogs. We call it the “marketing of ideas.” The September 11 issue of The Economist ran an article on it and our firm has seen the concept move from professional services into financial services and medical devices.
We can’t be the only PR firm with this problem: how to maximize collaboration with sister ad agencies, specifically for business development. By way of background, our 30+ person firm was acquired in 2006 by the Dudnyk Exchange, which also owns two ad agencies and an interactive unit based in suburban Philadelphia. The ad agencies focus on healthcare, while the interactive unit has a broader clientele.
