For the holidays Yahoo! decided to pull a little PR stunt.  They sent some of their employees to the San Francisco and San Jose airports to pay for various customers baggage fees.

The idea is on of greatness.  It would be a surprise to everyone who received and something they would certainly remember and talk about.  The stunt also directly relates back to Yahoo! which is always good.  A search engine is meant to make it easier to explore the world wide web, paying for baggage makes it easier to explore the world.  A smart and well thought out move for sure… or was it?

There is one problem with the whole ordeal that keeps it from going all the way to greatness.  Why on such a small scale?  Yahoo! has the money to send people to more than one airport.  I understand that they wanted their people to be at the airport to make it more personal… but only two?  It’s still good PR but it could have been great if it were more widespread.  When you have a good idea you have to trust it and go in full force.  Better luck next time Yahoo!

Another blast from the not so distant past right here.

It’s a pretty simple article discussing some of our past exploits in marketing  but a good piece.  As stated previously, the more places your name appears, the better.  Adding a friendly picture in the mix is a nice touch.

We took that picture (and a few others) right in our conference room.  We were going for something that would show our team for what we are.  A little silly, but we get stuff done.

We have the original drawing for our design of  the Rittenhouse pop-up book next to the finished item.  This is a good showing of how our ideas come to reality.  It’s a bit hard to make out the drawing in the image, but you get the point.  We have great ideas and we have the ability to make those ideas happen.  That’s what the image and the article are all about.

We recently found some pictures from last year when Carl was attending the MBA program at Rutgers University.  Besides the education he gained he also built some good relationships and even managed a bit of PR for BeSeen.

Those are pictures of the MBA program’s booklet where Carl got the opportunity to appear.

Carl also got to judge Advertising and Promotion Plans for an undergraduate class due to the relationship he was able to build with his professor.

There is a picture from the event with Carl, on the left,  looking dapper as always.

These events just go to show that there are always opportunities for PR if you keep yourself aware.  Even when you are not at work you have to be thinking of your brand.  Whether the opportunity be small or large never pass up an opportunity for PR.  Sometimes the opportunities fall into your lap while others you have to go looking.  The more places your brand can appear the better.

In day-to-day office lexicon, PR is a commonly used and misused acronym. Pervasive phrases such as good PR and bad PR are used to describe everything from positive stories in the newspaper, to an unkempt lobby area. So if we cannot exactly recognize what PR is, can we at least determine what I does for us?

In the most practical business sense, public relations should serve to not only build and maintain relationships, but also make your brand or corporate image credible. This element of credibility that effective PR fosters differentiates it from marketing and advertising, both of which provide positive first-person accounts. For example, from a media relations perspective, perhaps the most common subdivision of the public relations spectrum a positive third person account, conveyed through a journalist’s words, establishes more credibility than an advertisement written by a company staff member, or a promotional email construed by the office marketing professional. In short, when someone reads an advertisement, they gather the information, evaluate the promises offered, but remain skeptical because they know the ad has been paid for.

Ideally, public relations should be integrated into the overall business plan, along with promotion and advertising a term known as Integrated Marketing. To successfully position your brand, the messaging needs to be consistent across all three, with advertising and marketing to raise awareness and deliver the message while effective public relations adds credibility to that message.

Welcome to BeSeen Communications’ PR-oriented blog. Here you will find ideas on effective campaigns and the companies who would benefit from them, written by out top PR professionals.

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