Hot! Hot! Breaking News
The marvellous Marc Snyder has just launched a new blog, focused on the excesses and successes of this curious PR business.
Off to a strong start with a terrific post about what has to be the worst news release ever sent across the wire in the history of the known universe.
A small sample:
SANTA BARBARA, Calif.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Feb. 10, 2004--Roaming Messenger(TM) (OTCBB:RMSG - News) today reported that the company has received news coverage in publications around the world related to its beta test of the Roaming Messenger system on Motorola's(TM) XP200 SmartPhone.
WTF?
The easiest shot to take at this is to point out that their "news release" has absolutely no news value.
But it's worse than that - by pointing out the fact that they've had all this terrific coverage all over the place, you've got to figure that any editor worth their salt is probably going to respond by saying: "Oh, well I guess we won't be needing to write about you guys at any time in the near future then..."
The ticker code in their dateline makes it fairly clear that the intended 'target' for this self-stroking bucket of ordure is the investment community. The only way they could make this appeal more blatant would be to add a quote from the CEO telling us how 'undervalued' his stock is (currently ticking down from around a buck twenty, FWIW).
(Hmmm...can a bucket of ordure actually stroke, I wonder? Further: can it stroke itself? If a bucket of splosh hits the wires in the forest and nobody gives a rat's ass...)
Do you think any of RMSG's shareholders will pause to figure out what they paid for this vain and fruitless little exercise?
Let's see. If they used an agency to draft the release (and if they did: what the hell were you guys thinking?), they probably paid around $200/hour for at least 4-5 hours of work.
Then they actually sent the thing out over the wire, fercrissakes - which would have cost them an absolute minimum of US$1,000 at BusinessWire rates.
So that's nearly $2K right there, not including the hidden costs of time for any of their own people involved in writing, editing, reviewing or approving this.
I imagine they're the kind of firm where the CEO, CFO, VP Marketing, and corporate counsel all insist on signing off on any form of public communication before it goes out the door (and you just know they all think they're great writers). So factor that all in and you're probably looking at something like $4-6K just to put the release out.
And "listen closely," as Conan O'Brien's stupid dog sock puppet thing said: "Hear that? It's the sound of no one giving a #$@~&*!"
As Marc says: "Some things just make me want to cry..." Which brings me back to the point of this post, before I got lost in rant mode: welcome, Marc. The world always needs more smart flacks with blogs.
