Into PR

Aside from the time-constraining issues of announcing a date before development has really begun, since we already know Microsoft has problems with being on time, does an announcement of the next innovative version send the wrong message?

Apple tends to base its new-product announcements around the innovation those products will bring. Can you put a time frame around innovation? Isn’t it like saying, “I think our next app-killing, industry-shocking product idea will come to us in three years”?

Apple’s rumor technique also tends to work mostly in the company’s favor.

Wouldn’t it be better to allow great ideas to come to you, and release something when you have one, rather than rush out a crappy product?

Windows 7, the future of Windows post-Vista, is slated for release in late 2009 or sometime in 2010. I don’t think I’ll hold my breath.

- from Veer.com

Something about the business world makes me cringe sometimes. It’s the way people speak, especially to clients.

It reminds me of something I read in Stephen King’s ‘On Writing’ quite a few years back. He basically said it takes real talent to write simply. Not simplistically, but simply so people can understand and you don’t sound like a dunce. I think the same is true for how you speak. To me, using cliches like those below don’t make me feel that I’m more professional or well-spoken. Instead it makes me feel like I’m trying to prove to someone that I’m articulate, professional and well-spoken. The problem is, a lot of these cliches don’t even make much sense.

So here’s a list of my favorite oldie but goodies. If you use them, it doesn’t mean you’re a bad person, just a bit lazy and perhaps in too much of a rush.

Moving forward; adj (perhaps an adverb?) - Describes the future. Usually placed at the end of a sentence that contains an “action item,” see below. Eg., “I think coverage in these regional publications will prove very useful moving forward. - Thrown in at the end there, it doesn’t seem to add much of anything to the statement does it? I’m not entirely sure I know what it means.

One Off; adj. - I’m actually not entirely sure about this terms entire meaning. It may be colloquial, as I had never even heard it until I moved to San Francisco. I even had someone try to define it for me, and she couldn’t do it. escribes an instance where something happens only once. It’s meaning seems to stretch quite far, much like the F word. Eg., “This is just a one-off benefit that happens occasionally.”

Same page; noun - One of my least favorites. I loathe this term. It refers being on the same level with someone, in a consensus or that you are thinking in the same mindset. Eg., “I just wanted to make sure we were on the same page before I make the call.”

Touch base; verb - This is the most egregious of all business speak terms. It’s the “I Just Called to Say I Love You” of business speak. Loathe is just too soft of a word for it. It should be abolished with extreme prejudice. It usually means to follow up or check in with someone on something you have already contacted him/her about. Eg., “I just wanted to call and touch base with you to see if there was anything else you needed for your article.”

Best; noun (in this instance) - A salutation. In this case it’s used at the end of an e-mail as a closing. I think, however, it not only adds absolutely nothing to your e-mail, it also shows your unconscionable and extortionate laziness. Is it so hard to put a word like “regards,” “wishes” or any of the other obligatory and perfunctory business terms at the end of your e-mail? I prefer to get more creative and basic with my e-mail closings and add, depending on the context, salutations like “kind regards,” “with gratitude,” “take care,” “all the best,” etc. This one word, a solitary adjective no less, adds nothing to your message.

Shoot; verb - Usually used with “an e-mail.” This one is far less egregious. At least it tries to be cooler than saying, “send you an e-mail.” But why not stretch that a bit further and add something more creative? “I’m going to catapult you an e-mail,” or, “I’ll flick you off an e-mail later today,” or “I’ll bazooka you an e-mail this evening” (my personal favorite). Since when did “shoot” become a standard for describing how one will send an e-mail? Saying you’re going to shoot me an e-mail makes me want to shoot you in the face with a flare gun.

Straight-forward; adj. - Describes something that is self-explanatory or uncomplicated. This one as well is not so bad. But again, we can be much more creative about it. Or a better idea, just say “simple.” Eg., “This report should be pretty straight forward.”

Attached please find; verb - Usually at the beginning of a report or e-mail. Directs the reader to refer to an attachment. This one makes my soul throw up a little bit when I read it. Not that it’s grammatically wrong, but it doesn’t make much logical sense does it? Please for the love of God and all holy just say you’ve attached something to an e-mail. No need to church up an already and wholly unimportant aspect of your e-mail. Most e-mail programs have constructed cute little pictures (usually a paperclip) to show that there is an attachment. Telling the reader there’s an attachment is just a courtesy, but it by no means needs to sound so tight-assed.

PR; verb - Please do not ever use PR as a verb. It usually replaces “promote.” Eg., “This has been a great outcome. We should PR this to management.” If you’re trying to say that you need to make your efforts known, just use promote or flag or celebrate or any other word that would fit. PR is not a verb. Ever.

If you use any of these cliches, don’t worry. I do too. But some self-correction, a little less auto-pilot and some creativity can make your e-mails, speech and writing so much more personable.

If you have some stinky business-speak cliches, feel free to share them.

**Update** - For more great cliches to abolish immediately, check out Tom Mangan’s blog here.

- from Veer.com

It’s my first week with LEWIS. The acclimation is going well. For many semesters of school I heard alumni that visited my school tell me how different the working world is from school. After one week (almost) of working, I’ve determined all those alumni were telling the truth.

One week in and I’m already wondering when Spring Break is coming.

My first week into San Francisco was quite an adventure. I moved here homeless. I brought clothes and nothing else. Luckily I have a friend kind enough to lend me his couch, so I had a place to sleep. Money, on the other hand, was a different situation. San Francisco is an expensive city. Unbelievably expensive. All the funds I had saved, including graduation money, went to moving myself out here.

I literally have $6 in my pocket, and that is all the money I have until I get paid at the end of the month. Life is rough when you don’t have a place of your own to sleep and you can’t even feed yourself.

Luckily, I work with good people and San Francisco is pretty to look at. I definitely wouldn’t kick it out of bed. And not all is bad. I have a bright future, a good job, work in a great city and I even found a great place to live. Yerba Buena island is a lesser known area of the city (because it’s an island), so it’s actually cheap to live and I have an amazing view of the city. There’s even parking, which is like searching for the holy grail in the city.

Since it’s my first week, it’s been a huge learning process. So here are the top three things I’ve learned after my first week in the city:

1. You’re no longer individual - Since where I went to school is a smaller town, it was easy to make a name for yourself. But as Tyler Durden once superciliously droned through a megaphone, “you are not a beautiful or unique snowflake.” Of course your mother would tell you differently, as she would me. However, in the city there’s at least 100 other people on any given street just like you, dressed like you, with jobs just like you, carrying Starbucks coffee just like you. And they probably even make more money than you.

2. Remember your fundamentals- Getting acclimated to school was easy. The assimilation process was very slow and step-laden. However, in the professional world everyone expects you to be caught up, competent and willing to produce. And fast. Though it’s nice for people to explain to you what you need to write, pitch, read or understand in vague, quickly defined terms, it’s also very hard to retain and understand every directive given. You need to be on your toes at all times and not forget the fundamentals like editing, clean writing, etc.

3. PR is NOT dead- Though many would probably disagree with me, those people are most likely talking about small startups or ventures that have not yet received mainstream attention. In the large economy, companies still need PR help, and journalists don’t mind working with PR reps (some of them anyway). No my friends, PR is alive and well. Of course the scope of the industry is changing completely, but the business is still there.

I’ll have a lot more advice for everyone soon I’m sure. But for now, I’m just trying to keep up.

If I were to search for apartment roommates for any length of time beyond June, I would definitely make this a weekly or monthly post.

Meantime, I’ll settle for just this one.

Looking for roommates is an interesting process. I come across some of the quirkiest, humorous and downright bizarre descriptions of apartments and living conditions.

Below are some of the best descriptions I’ve come across; hopefully you’ll like them as much as I did:

# 10. “The neighbors are, for the most part, gay households, complete with Mom, Dad and a pooch, so the building impersonates a library by day and a cemetery at night.”

# 9. “My home is my sanctuary; I don’t allow shoes to be worn in the house.”

# 8. “$800 Mid Size Room with cool peeps”

# 7. “I am not looking to become best friends, just people sharing expenses living under the same roof ”

# 6. “There is a hallway that leads down a hall.”

# 5. “Additional closet that is yours, put stuff in it. ”

# 4. “You: Girl [is] preferred, should like adult swim.”

# 3. “There is no kitchen use but a microwave or hot plate is OK.”

# 2. “Cat, his name is Drake. He is pretty quiet doesn’t make much noise however he does make a beeping sound. He eats a few times a day and occasionally likes to party but nothing to serious.”

# 1. “We also have a 3-legged cat so please no more pets:( “

Once again I’ll be piggybacking on Copyblogger for this week’s Weekly Grammaticalness.

I find it important, because we all use analogies, metaphors and similes every day. Most of them are small, and we likely don’t even think about them when we use them. However, they can be a very useful tool when trying to explain something to a reader, client or customer.

Copyblogger does an excellent job of explaining the differences between analogies, metaphors and similes. Check out the post.

A similar device Copyblogger left out was the allegory. Allegorical tales are less popular and not used very often. However, they are used in comedy quite frequently.

An allegory is a one-to-one comparison or substitution of something figuritve for something literal. While this is extremely similar to a metaphor, allegories are usually more subtle and a lot more involved, taking up entire books and pieces of art.

Perhaps the most famous allegorical tales are in literature, Sir Walter Raleigh’s Faerie Queen and Orwell’s Animal Farm are two famous examples I can think of.

As a tip for the day, look for other ways to use RSS other than receiving news. In this case, an apartment search.

Searching for apartments is such a pain in my ass. Especially when it’s a place like San Francisco, which doesn’t obey the normal rules of apartment searching.

Craigslist was born in San Francisco, so everyone there uses it. It’s a helpful sight, easy to navigate, produces good results. But for someone new to The City, it can be a little daunting. I don’t know any of the neighborhoods, and I certainly don’t like the prices I’m seeing.

Luckily the site has a “room/roommate” search to find people looking for roommates. Usually results through these searches are much better than searching for actual apartments. Since San Francisco is awesome, you won’t usually find a decent place in a decent neighborhood for any less than $1200 (that’s about 600 pounds sterling for those of you across the Atlantic).

In my searches I’ve been checking more and more frequently to see what’s new. But I find I’ve been looking at so many apartments in so many locations, I don’t remember what I’ve already seen.

This is where the lovely gift of RSS comes in. Craigslist (as I’m sure other apartment searching tools as well) allows users to subscribe to searches through RSS. This way, apartments are coming to me, and I can be more efficient about searching.

Note to self about city living: Some people do without kitchens.

For those of you looking for jobs, Lewis PR is still hiring. I’m good, but I can only be in one place at a time.

If you’re at the account executive level or higher with tech experience and are looking to move to San Francisco or Boston, contact Wendy Brittain in HR. I’d also be happy to answer any questions I can.

Job descriptions can be found at lewispr.com.

Things have been silent around here lately. I’ve been crazy busy with end-of-school business. Lots of things to wrap up. Like finding a job.

So after much deliberation, and an incredibly lengthy interview process, I’ve decided to join Lewis PR’s office in San Francisco.

I’m very much excited. Lewis is a terrific company experiencing a great amount of growth. With growth comes opportunity. It’s also a young bunch, which is a good thing to me.

So after all my moaning and griping about Second Life and spelling Morgan McLintic’s name incorrectly, I’ll be working with the company that holds Second Life as one its largest clients.

Thanks are in order.

First one goes to Alex Pullin, for forwarding my resume and being such a great help along the way.

The second goes to Morgan McLintic for being a great vice president and for doing his best to convince me to take the position.

Thanks also to Ed Lee who did his best to steal me away from Lewis and get me over on the Fleishman-Hillard side.

Also, thank you so much to everyone who provided me with advice and counsel and offers for help in the last few months. Here’s a short list, and if I missed you I’m sorry. I didn’t forget about you; trust me.

Josh Morgan, Sam Wilcox (nice to finally “meet you,” BTW) , Robert French (and for your hard work keeping the blog server going. I wouldn’t have been able to make all these connections without it), Eric Tatro, Kami Huyse, John Cass, Todd Andrlik, James Barbour (though he no longer has a blog), Richard Millington, and everyone else I may have missed.

Now the question of what to do with this blog.

There are so many PR blogs out there and all of them have quite a bit to say, but also quite a bit of the same stuff to say at the same time. Does the world really need another?

My intention from the beginning was to use this blog to get a job and quit it once I had one.

So here I am. It’s been a journey. I’ve communicated with so many wonderful people over the past year (almost). I’ve learned a great deal. I’ve written quite a bit and gotten some great responses. But still, I don’t know how much value there is in me having a blog. So it’s something I’ll have to consider and wonder about in the coming weeks.

For now, I’ll keep writing.

 
Got this from Seth Godin’s blog.

It’s basically a free way of sending yourself a note from your cell phone. If you have a cell phone that sends e-mail, no problem. For those of us not quite as fancy, Jott can help you out.

Record a message from your cell phone through a toll-free number, Jott will type it up and e-mail it to you. Simple enough.  The best part of it is that it’s free. For now.

- from ironicgamer.com

I’ve always been a huge fan of TMNT. It came out when I was in the second grade, and I thought it was the coolest thing since sliced bread. Or pizza. I remember seeing a commercial countdown for it on TV and never missing a single episode once it aired.

Back in the ’90s, guy-valley talk was cool. It was funny. It was careless.

Today, not so much. That’s why this movie probably will not have near the success of its predecessors. It’s dialog and plot line are both outdated. No one says “dude” or “bro” in the valley voice anymore. That being the case, it comes off as someone trying to be hip and cool when really he has no idea what’s in style anymore. Like a middle-aged uncle just now hearing about Lil’ Bow-wow and bragging to his younger nephew about it.

Because here’s the thing: TMNT is old. But it’s not yet vintage. I feel like the Weinstein brothers would have more success with a remake of He-man than TMNT. Give TMNT another five to 10 years and let it rest for a while.

On that note, Gindhouse will be popular for just the opposite reasons. It’s vintage reborn, which is something Tarantino does best.