I got a “press release” from a company called Mayo Communications. Here’s an excerpt so that you can decide whether they’re a good firm trying to rep their client, or a despicable bunch of ambulance chasers who are using a tragedy to drum up PR. I’ve redacted the client’s name to avoid giving the publicity they so avidly sought.
“Be More Alert And Report Suspicious Acts Says
Nation’s Top Counterterrorism Expert XXX
***
“Suspicious people covertly photographing metro railway and trains have been observed and reported in major cities across the nation – from Los Angeles to New York,,” said XXX, CEO, YYYY.
Los Angeles, CA (July 7, 2005) — “The typical terrorist attack is planned months to years in advance,” said XXX, CEO & Founder XXXXX, ZZZZ, reacting to four explosions that rocked the London subway and tore open a packed double-decker bus during the morning rush hour Thursday. The deadly explosive terrorists’ attacks injured more than 700 people left more than four dozen people dead.
So, these folks used the occasion of a terrorist bombing to hype their client (the “nation’s top counterterrorim expert”). Here’s what I wrote back to them:
It is difficult for me to express my distaste for your use of the London bombings as a vehicle to pimp the “expertise” of your client, the alleged “Nation’s Top Counterterrorism Expert”. Your mail makes your firm out to be sleazy opportunists of the worst sort. (As a side note, you really should run your press releases through a proofreading pass; it contains a number of grammatical and typographical errors).
I would rather eat an old shoe than use any of my publication venues to give your client free publicity– but you can bet that I will tell my readers and listeners that, within hours of the London bombings, I was contacted by a PR firm seeking commercial advantage for their client on the bodies of London’s dead.
It’s popular for people to claim that corporate bloggers like Microsoft’s Robert Scoble threaten the conventional PR industry. I can only hope that there’s some truth to that claim.
Update: I got an (unsigned) response from Mayo. It seems pretty clear that one of us doesn’t get it, and I don’t think it’s me:
Everyone has an opinion, unfortunately not everyone agrees with you! but I will remove you from our list since you biggest challenge is deleting emails.
FYI. Time Magazine along with other more important trades are running the story in Monday’s issue. hope you sugar coated your shoes, too.
Nothing like compounding an initial error by being arrogant and antagonizing the people to whom you’re evangelizing your customer. Is this representative of what other PR firms are doing for their customers? I sure hope not.
Paul's Down-Home Page 
That is amazing. Not being able to at least proofread your own arrogant rambling. I’ll confess that I don’t spell as well as I should be able to, but I also don’t send out spam that is a perfect example of self-indulgent selfishness based on tragedy and horror. Scum-suckers.
I never cease to be amazed at how people take a potshot at the media, or at an individual, not realizing the potshot will be perceived to be targeted at the media or the individual’s readers.
It’s basic public relations. Don’t give a photographer the finger, or snarl at a TV camera, unless you want everyone in the world to think that’s how you will treat them. The medium becomes invisible, but the message shines through loud and clear: arrogant, insensitive, a bit dim.
You’re not a true Cajun. Mormon. Marine, because
true LDS members do NOT personally attack people.
You more like a Cajun “JACK MORMON” Marine
who has nothing better to do than criticize people
or companies that are successful.
What you left out of your story above was the fact that Our client, Elsa Lee, 20 years of Counterterrorism, Advantage SCI, sent us messages on the day of the London explosions. Often she does thatto help other people be aware of the dangers, because the public does not take (quakes serious in Calif. or hurricanes in Fl.) until they happen. Elsa Lee consulted with the Pentagon during the Iraq War too.
We had many quality editors including Time Magazine that immediately calledElsa Lee after our above news release was distributed, which
is posted at http://www.mayocommunications.com/2005NewsReleases/NR-102-2005LondonBombingReact7-7-05.htm
because they felt it was newworthy and not taking
advantage of the situation.
I had similar situation with a reporter at the NY Times call me two weeks after 9-11 and complain just like you did ( removed them, too from our media list), that I was using a disaster to promote “A Duck Tape Wedding” story. He too failed to report the rest of the story or read the entire advisory, because he had friends who died in the Twin Towers tragedy. I told him
“sorry you feel that way” 5,000 other editors
did not complain, except you. I also told him “Maybe you’re too close to the story” and
need to back off and take a break, because you’re
traumatized. We’ll maybe you should do the same.
MAYO Communications won “Best Media Placement” awards last year from Public Relations Society of
America, because of our Counterterrorism Expert
Client Elsa Lee’s news release and campaign about
“Terror on the Tracks” A Homeland Security Study,
turns out to be the only one done with Rand Corp.
after 9-11 on threats to our rail system….Well, guess what MR. PR expert, the Spain bombing happend six months later, and yes
just like the London Bombings disaster, the story was picked again in Washington DC and nationally.
If we help save one life through preventionwe’ve done our job. You and everyone reading this will be first time responders, So, why don’t do your part and quit monday morning quarterbacking with this “Yellow Journalism.”
You’re giving the Mormons a bad name.
Hey, thanks for dropping by and signing your actual name, George. Believe me, I’m not envious of your success; if the kind of work represented by this release is typical of what you do, you’re welcome to it.
As for your own personal attack: maybe I’m not a good Mormon. All I have to say is this.
I broadly agree that it is tasteless in the extreme to make publicity out of tragedy – just see the bother English civil servant Jo Moore got into by suggesting 9/11 was a ‘good day to bury bad news’.
However, if you also read the mainstream media’s coverage of any tragedy – especially ones of such huge importance as a terrorist attack and in this case, the first suicide bombing in Europe – you will find that almost all publications will seek some qualified analysis of the situation from experts.
Whether they seek it or not, giving an opinion will bring them publicity.
As a PR pro, you should be seeking to help the media (a type of client relationship) as much as your paying client. Is that best done by offering quotes ready to use, by waiting for the call or by refusing all interview requests in case it is seen as taking advantage of the dead?
Do we attack the police press offices for seeking publicity about how well the emergency services reacted too?
A good underlying point made very badly.
Good points; it’s certainly true that qualified analysis from experts is welcome in cases like this. Until I did some more digging, it wasn’t clear that the claim of “nation’s top counterterrorism expert” was justified. According to this USC CV, Ms. Lee certainly has better CT credentials than I do; too bad the PR doesn’t mention any of them.
To answer your main point: IMHO a proactive PR agent would already have put their client in touch with media outlets to build a relationship between journalist and expert. Sure, that’s not always possible (especially for general-assignment reporters), but if I were the client, I’d be wondering why my PR firm hadn’t put me in touch with the folks at major print outlets who cover terrorism and counter-terrorism.
I suppose I find myself pondering how exactly one would hope to gain any sort of professionalism from personally attacking ones religious beliefs. I definitely don’t recall reading Paul bringing up your choice of faith in his email to you about how he disagreed with your choice of the use of the terrorist attack.
I was equally struck by your response to the reporter at the NY Times …
“sorry you feel that way 5,000 other editors did not complain, except you. I also told him Maybe you’re too close to the story and need to back off and take a break, because you’re traumatized.”
Maybe I’m crazy but you got pretty pissed off that Paul didn’t agree with you, and therefore _must_ be in the wrong. However, when you disagree with someone it is open season on attacking them on a very personal level. I find myself reminded of something that my parents once told me … that I would be influenced by my peers to do drugs, and that only going along with it because the other [5,000] people were wasn’t a very logical choice … so I salute that one reporter for standing up for what he believed to be right, regardless of what the rest of the world might think of him … as I do for Paul, who has always been an example in my life as to the type of man that I would hope that I could become one day.
Once again, wtf is up “Well, guess what MR. PR expert” as it only goes to demonstrate how very juvenile you become when you feel someone doesn’t agree with you business practices.
Here we go again … “You’re giving the Mormons a bad name.” So someone expressing their distaste for your PR somehow relates to being a sub par Mormon.
I’m not sure why I even took the time to respond as I learned long ago that these types of responses only live in vain as they fall upon deaf ears … so to you George S. McQuade III I wish only the best in your quest to make the world just that much more narrow minded in the opinions of you, and only you … may the very ideals that our nation was founded on slowly die in your pursuit for the almighty dollar.
I think they are using the tragedy. robably not realizing that 100%.