Your PR Architect

Even in the off-season, the NFL's Buffalo Bills -- perennial pro football also-rans -- can't manage their operations. Buffalo Jills, Rich Stadium (c) David Kassnoff, 2012 Last week, five cheerleaders for the Buffalo Jills sued the Buffalo Bills organization, claiming they were under-compensated for their work on and off the field. And, they may have been sexually harassed in connection with their jobs. Their management company promptly cancelled the sideline entertainers'  2014-15 schedule. (Update: read this: http://nypost.com/2014/04/27/my-life-as-a-buffalo-jill/ ) I'm not a sports columnist. But this isn't about athletic success. This is about the damage to an organization's brand and reputation. The Bills are in trouble -- maybe more than any PR pro could fix. Besides the Jills fiasco, the Bills recently agreed to pay $5 million for sending too many promo messages to fans. Their head coach had a private cancer scare -- disclosed on the team's ...

A Monkee has taught me plenty about Facebook. And how we're viewing the social media juggernaut all wrong. We use it for product publicity. Or as an online chronicle of our everyday musings. And, we're missing the point. Facebook isn't a journal. It's not about news. It's about sifting information about you and selling it to Purveyors of Other Stuff. In exchange for allowing us to post recipes or fuzzy smartphone photos, Facebook sifts and parses our comments for clues about us. As we share our opinions or lunch menus, Facebook neatly packages that information and re-sells it to marketers. Maybe Facebook is a useful mechanism for public relations professionals who want their clients' views and products shared. On its own, Facebook isn't an all-inclusive PR strategy. Those "which rock musician are you" quizzes tend to muck up the sharing process. Your posts are arbitrarily ranked by Facebook's software, meaning they may not show up in your...

We laugh or moan when we see people barely wearing their clothing. Jeans at or below one's derrière. Ultra short shorts. Or, in my region, teens wearing shorts and Chuck Taylors in 15-degree weather. By Ed Uthman from Houston, TX, USA (Rhodes 1970s D05.jpg) [CC-BY-SA-2.0  (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0)],  via Wikimedia Commons Mini-skirts, however, would send a very different message. In the 1970s, women wore them daily. But if I talked about mini-skirts today, you might think of me as a sexist pig. You'd be mistaken. When I think of the mini-skirt (which isn't often), it reminds me of some great writing advice. A former managing editor of the Olean (NY) Times-Herald taught a writing course at St. Bonaventure University. And his best writing adage used the mini-skirt as a metaphor.  "How long should a news story be?" a student asked. Prof. Stinger's response: "It should be as long as a woman's dress. Long enoug...

Like Gibbs on TV's NCIS, I have a few rules. They do not involve serving as a Marine sniper, but they'll work in most public relations circumstances. Here's my top ten: Rule No. 1: Don't lie to the media.  Rules 2-10: Don't lie to the media.  Journalists have access to a printing press. A broadcast signal. A website. Social media. And, when wronged, reporters will not hesitate a moment to use them. Especially if reporters are lied to. Nothing says this better than the article at the following link, courtesy of PR entrepreneur Peter Shankman: http://www.longislandpress.com/2014/04/02/my-squashed-interview-with-steve-madden-shoe-guru-turned-ex-convict/ Lesson: if you're a PR person and your client asks you to lie, hand him/her your phone. Ask the client to do the fibbing. Maybe his reputation can handle it. Yours can't.

One of PR's first rules: know your audience. Or, don't pitch a story about Manolo Blahnik shoes to Sports Illustrated. The NFL recently sent emails from NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell and ex-coach and current TV pitchman Bill Cowher, telling me all they're doing to address the issue of head injury and trauma among young and pro football players. Here's a link . People who play football experience head injury. No dispute there. There's a reason high schools with football teams hire a physician to attend the games. And TV news magazines have devoted airtime to stories of suicide among former NFL players whose behavior may have ties to head-to-head collisions on the field. Another of my basic PR rules: ask a reader to take one action. And here's where the NFL's e-newsletter strategy misses the uprights. First, I don't have kids, nephews or neighbors whose kids play league football. I've never coached a team. I'm not the right demograp...

Today, I'm sharing a link to a 2013 post on the Disney Parks blog, written by my friend and colleague Bernadette Davis. Bernadette is a communications manager for the Disney Parks in Florida, and often helps out in special events that take place on the property. Bernadette's post isn't a deep exploration of some industry topic, nor is it an essay on Florida tourism.  It's not an ad masquerading as a blog, either. It does share some interesting news about an event hosted by Disney that focuses on giving young people a closer look at career opportunities in sports. What makes this blog post successful? You get a small glimpse of Bernadette -- her interests, her family, and what she does -- in a brief sentence. Personalization is important in a blog post. Her blog gives exposure to a newsworthy activity that might not gain visibility if shared as a conventional news release. It shows that Disney's corporate responsibility extends well beyond Soarin' and cha...

LinkedIn wants to be the business equivalent of Facebook. Too often, however, it's the social media version of McDonalds, with no room for individual preferences of its customers. By Nan Palmero from San Antonio, TX, USA (Linkedin Chocolates   Uploaded by JohnnyMrNinja) [CC-BY-2.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0)], via Wikimedia Commons LinkedIn's frequent automated emails are triggered by minor updates to a user's profile. Many LinkedIn members tweak their profiles to reflect new skills or achievements. The site uses these minor updates to generate automated "say congrats" emails that may boost its traffic. ("Congrats" is the lazy person's way of saying "congratulations," "way to go," or some more-authentic kindness.) It's true that I've recently branded what I've been doing for more than a year as "DSK Writing and Communications." I didn't get a new job. However, you may get an...