Money Can't Buy You Love...

If you didn't know I serve on the staff at Beachpoint Church in Fountain Valley, CA. Lately, we have started to develop a communications team to help our church communicate better both internally and externally. Here are a few things I'd love to share with you today. The first is from a blog entry by Brian McConnell. The second is a video from youtube that Brian references in his entry. Check it out. This blew me away. A few questions that you should keep in the back of your mind when reading this blog entry is, "How does this relate to my situation?" or "Wow, What's my next step?"



PR is Useless
by Brian McConnell

... When actions create the real story.

Karen Hughes spent $900 million of Americans' money to convince the Muslim world that our elected leaders in Washington aren't insane. Worldwide opinion polls say otherwise.

Walmart has probably spent close to the same amount of money trying to convince us it isn't the greediest company in the world. But its actions tell us the real story. Today, it's how Walmart is trying to avoid paying state taxes.

Comcast can say it's "comcastic" all it wants, but when its technicians fall asleep on customers' couches, or grandmothers with a heart condition get so frustrated by the company's inattention they smash up a local office, then no amount of professional PR can mask its dreadful operations.

Hundreds of smaller businesses pay PR firms to spam bloggers with meaningless press releases. That's because they don't know how to tell their own stories with actions, not words. They don't understand that real word of mouth, real PR, is generated at the root levels.

The root levels are the clerks, the sales people, the support staff, the receptionist, the call center people, the on-site technicians and consultants, or the police officers, the clerks at the government offices, or the nurses who take your temperature and blood at the hospital. It's their work that generates real PR.

The best PR comes from the smallest of actions by the root-level people. They smile when they first meet you. They call you by your name. They compliment competitors. They don't blame you for their system's misgivings. When forced to make a decision, they always, always, always do the right thing, even if it's not in the economic or political interests of their employer. They break the rules when it's obvious they must.

That's real PR. It's the total sum of stories people tell about you.