Worst tech PR companies
Here's my current list of the top three worst technology PR companies. Sorry to out you guys, but you need to try harder. Plus I don't think your appearance in my list is going to affect your livelihoods too much: my powers are weak.
- Bite PR
Yes, it's the company that likes to say 'No'. Well, actually, most of the time, it doesn't want to say anything. They don't answer their emails, don't answer their phones and don't return your phone calls. They'll promise you stuff at events that they'll never provide. In short, drafting press releases seems to be all they're good for.
Silver lining: They're better than Apple UK's internal marketing guy. He actively tries to put you off writing about Apple, even to the extent of claiming particular products “aren't very good”.
- Text 100
Not quite as bad, Text PR seems to be inhabited by people who are happy to organise parties but don't want to have to stain their lily white hands organising interviews - you know, minor things like that. Phoned to chase up a request for an interview with a Novell customer they'd been working on for a week, but they hadn't actually been doing anything at all. And then, couldn't find a customer. This was despite the fact that BrainShare, the Novell user conference, was running at the same time. I have reports from journo pals that went to BrainShare that their time had effectively been wasted, thanks to Text 100.
Silver lining: They're not Bite PR. They send out press releases and will actually send you information if you ask. Unlike Bite PR.
- The Red Consultancy
For sheer uselessness, you can't really beat Red. When given the exciting task (on 7th October) to find a spokesperson for MSN Search, they reported back today (yes, three weeks or 15 working days later) that they couldn't find one, weren't exactly sure whom to ask and that it was “all a bit new to them”.
Silver lining: None that I can see, beyond entertainment value.
Check back in at regular intervals to see if there are any further entries in the “worst PR companies in Britain” competition.
Technorati Tags: Bite PR, PR, Text 100, The Red Consultancy
Updates and related entries
December 20, 2005: Nine times out of ten, the editor won't print a defence or even ask for the journo's defence; they'll just run the letter, grateful that someone's written in. The letter will hang there, uncountered, like a Blunkett accusation of intrusion into private...
December 20, 2005: He'd like to know how Bite can improve.I gave him a list of a few things the company could do and examples of when it hasn't exactly been brilliant. In return, he's promised to do his best to pull his company's socks up.Is a new dawn breaking for bele...
March 5, 2008: To a certain extent, I imagine doing Apple's PR must be a slightly cushy number. Apple are usually extremely reticent to talk about anything you want to talk about, preferring instead to drone on about what they want to...
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About me
I'm Rob Buckley, a freelance IT journalist. I've edited infoconomy.com; the XML & Web Services newsletter; and Mapping Awareness, for which I won an award.
I'm also a regular contributor to MacFormat, Computer Arts, Computer Arts Projects, LinuxUser & Developer, SC Magazine and enterprise IT magazine Information Age.
I've hands-on IT experience, having been IT manager for two companies, looking after everything from Solaris, Linux and Netware down to Windows 3.1 and Mac OS 6.
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