hmmm

020 7269 1430

• Communication
• Legal Business
• Real Estate
• Wealth Management

Irreverent PR

June 23, 2009

Is most PR material irrelevant? It would seem so, according to this story from Hold the Front Page, itself reporting the preliminary findings of a survey on the changing nature of press releases by former newspaperman turned post-grad, Iain Fleming.

Fleming’s survey can be found here. As you can see, he’s studying for a post-graduate diploma in public relations at Queen Margaret University, Edinburgh. Hold the Front Page’s snippet on the interim results makes for worrying reading for some – though not all – in the PR sector:

Early results have shown that half the respondents consider less than 10% of the content delivered to them by the commercial PR sector is relevant and that two-thirds of them want to receive less such material.

Other findings revealed that 80% of journalists regard ‘follow-up calls’ to check if a press release has been received as attempts to pressure them into using the story.

The futility of the practice is highlighted by more than half of editorial staff admitting to telling PR callers their press release has been received, even if it has not.

Assiduous PRs, take heed. That follow-up call may do more harm than good. But flippancy aside, we bring you the results of another survey, commissioned by a leading newspaper executive and focusing on the changing nature of the media. Startingly, it found that most readers regard online surveys as a waste of time, and revealed that:

1. More than two-thirds of people who complete online surveys do so because they are either bored or need a break from their work;

2. 75% of people who complete online surveys make up their answers ‘to see what will happen’; and

3. 98% of online surveys are consigned to oblivion within three hours of their publication.

Online surveyors, beware. That survey may be less reliable than you think.

Pictured: garden shoes by giamarie. A follow up call confirmed what an online survey revealed – that the image is nice and colourful, but has no relevance to this post.