Even If You’ll Never See the Customer Again My wife, Sue and I went to a wedding in southeastern Massachusetts last weekend where, in the space of 8 hours, we had three interactions with service providers we will probably never see again (we live far away).  Two interactions were marvelous … and one, horrendous.  It [...]

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Coming from a media relations background I’ve learned a few lessons when crafting a story or coming up with a new angle on a particular topic.  One of those golden rules of PR has been that reporters like numbers.  Surveys, statistics, or any other kind of metric you can offer based on your company’s presence [...]

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On my flight to Cleveland recently for the Worldcom PR Group Americas Region meeting, the attendant turned a routine flight procedure into a memorable experience. How? He came to our aisle and said: “Ms. Rhoads, Ms. Sosnow, what would you like to drink this afternoon?” Seeing our surprise at his request, he said “service isn’t dead in the world, people have just forgotten that it’s part of their job description.”

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When Harry Met Sally is one of my all-time favorite movies. I’m a real sucker for romantic comedies. Plus, there’s something about Meg Ryan’s and Billy Crystal’s unlikely friendship – and ultimate romance – that’s ennobling. It’s a story of growth. Two opposite temperaments learning to understand, befriend, complement and enrich each others’ lives.

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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.

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How immersed are you in the industry you publicize? In today’s world, attending industry events brings great value to public relations programs – for both agency and corporate public relations professionals. Beyond networking, events bring unique value to understanding the context of industry media coverage, and getting to know what issues keep the decision-makers up at night.

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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.

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What does Michael Scott’s trademark punch line from NBC’s hit TV show, “The Office,” have to do with B2B blogging? Quite a lot it turns out – especially for the labor and employment law firm Ford & Harrison whose associates have turned this punch line into a successful B2B blog and major source of traffic for the firm’s website. The That’s What She Said blog recaps each episode of “The Office” – looking at all of the show’s employment law mishaps and how much it would cost for Dunder Mifflin to defend itself in a real-world lawsuit.

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Are you doing PR for a B2B company that provides a service? Yes, that means you, all lawyers, consultants, financial advisors, asset managers, software developers and search firms. In fact more than half of the US GDP has come from services companies since 1982 , which is why marketing intangibles is a critical skill in our world.

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As a professional services public relations firm, client satisfaction is something we think about on a daily basis. We want to be sure we’re providing quality client service and that, as a result, our clients are “happy.” However, in his book “If Disney Ran Your Hospital,” Fred Lee raises an important point: it is customer loyalty, not mere satisfaction that binds clients to an organization and protects it against serious competition.

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