I just attended a webinar on Using Social Media to grow your business. They discussed Meatball Sundae, and PR, and how the millennials ought to make us change the way we communicate with them.

Seth spoke of how people often think of PR in terms of ‘managing your company’ and it’s image, or straightforward ‘publicity.’ It just doesn’t work that way, he said because of the way social media works. Beating up on journalists won’t get you the media you want. Case in point the iPhone launch. Everyone seemed to think of it as a hyped up event, Seth pointed out. But the truth is, Apple’s PR people did not go after the media. They made a product so good that it had a story to tell.

Lesson for PR folks. Don’t be afraid to tell your boss or your marketing department that no, you won’t promote the product unless it has something newsworthy. I guess the lesson for organizations trying to massage the media with PR is this.  Don’t create press releases out of non-stories.

The other speaker that drew me to the event was Jeremiah Owyang, an analyst at Forrester Research.