Some Recent PR Disasters in the News

"Craigslist Nanny Found Dead in Trunk"
"They say Katherine Olson was last seen by friends when she went to meet someone about a nanny job posted on Craigslist.org, the Internet bulletin board.

A day later, her body was found in her car at a Minnesota nature preserve. Police declined to say how the 24-year-old was killed.

Authorities say a 19-year-old man who they believe placed the ad is being held pending charges. Authorities did not release his name but said charges could be filed as soon as today"

Lesson: Sometimes your customers can create a PR nightmare using your services.
Remedy: Be ready to deal with it by changing policies, procedures and making sure abuses happen less often, or not at all.

"GAP tops made by child slave labor"
"Tops sewn by children at a factory in India will not be sold in Gap stores, the clothing retailer has said. After a story in the British newspaper the Observer reported a Gap supplier was using children as young as 10 to make shirts, the San Francisco-based retailer, which has 200 of its 2,000 suppliers in India, issued a recall of the shirts and launched an investigation. The article stated the children were working 16 hours a day for no pay and that the workplace was a "derelict industrial unit" with an overflowing toilet."

Lesson: If you think you’re going to get away with something, think again.
Remedy: Come clean, express honest and profound regret, and CHANGE your way of doing business.

Customer service - and why it matters

Abbott Public Relations can help you deliver Excellent Service.

Whether it’s a book, a hamburger, a house or a service, delivering it to your clients with Excellent Service helps your business maintain a good reputation.

Why Excellent Service is important:

1. This is a service-based economy (80% are in service-related jobs) so service is the core of what America does. Doing it well means you’re doing business well.
2. The bad news is that service - human interaction with customers - is bad just about everywhere, so your Excellent Service will stand out.
3. If it’s worth doing, it’s worth doing right.
4. Why will you and your employees deliver Excellent Service? Because you’re the boss, and you say so.

How APR can help
Abbott Public Relations can walk you through your business, help you discover service weaknesses and offer solutions to help you address them and create a realistic Customer Service Plan.

The Plan will help you convey these improvements to your customers, potential customers, and other publics.

New Ways of "Doing" Public Relations

I recently gave a talk to the Granite State Referral Network in Manchester, NH (of which I am the current secretary) titled "New Ways to Think About “Doing” P.R." Here are a few of those "new" ways - which are more common sense than "new," but so many businesspeople have forgotten them, they just seem new:

• Be Preemptive: Don’t wait for you or your business to be “in trouble” to build a reputation, or improve it, act NOW to make good things happen.

• Be Unexpected: Doing something new, clever, interesting or (best of all) better than anyone else is the way to get noticed.

• Be Explanatory: Let people know what you’re doing - the good things, the new things, the different ways of doing things - in a clear, concise and easy-to-understand manner.

• Be Adaptable to Change: Be prepared in your business to think in a fresh way. Be ready for rapid, disorienting change. Be ready to scrap your business plan. And be ready to talk about all this, openly, with your publics - those whom you serve and with which you do business (or hope to do business in the future.)