“First Log-on of the Day: a Journalist on today’s Internet”
“Whew, what a night! These 3 am deadlines for RSABC.com are brutal. Here I am back at my desk already at 9, with a fresh deadline approaching this afternoon…”
With a mere 5 hours of REM sleep, our intrepid, young reporter is trying to make a name for himself by taking on the writing responsibilities for RSABC.com as well as his regular weekly column for the magazine. Despite the magazine’s great readership, falling advertising numbers has forced many on the staff to pull double duty at least those that are still around. To top it off, our feisty young reporter has gained quite a following to his blog, which he now dutifully posts to on a daily basis.
Cup of coffee number one in hand, our columnist sits down to tackle his daily communications.
“A 3 am deadline and now a 3 pm deadline…I’m going to be sure to include this stuff in my memoirs one day. Okay, let’s see…into the inbox. I only have 173 unread messages. Junk, junk, junk…my rotisserie baseball league is kicking up again with Spring Training starting…man I hope those knuckleheads will come clean about steroids…I’ll never go to another game as long as I live. Wait, here’s a response from that PR person at TopAgency. My request for a photo of the CEO has been approved for publication. Gee, isn’t that nice considering I wrote the article yesterday and needed it then. Oh well, your client didn?t make the article. You might want to just put the photos in the media room next time so I can download it when I NEED it! Oh that’s right, they don?t have a media room…oops! The rest of this stuff is unsolicited email from lots of people I don’t know. I wish I had time to read what all of these persistent flacksters have to send me about the wonderful goings on of their wonderful client, but alas I have a story to write and no time to do it. Delete, delete, delete…oh here’s one with 4 pdf attachments…double-freakin’-delete.”
Cup number two in hand, our earnest, yet overwhelmed scribe tackles some final research for his column due today about the online concierge industry. He has fleshed out his article with several industry leaders, Googling the keywords “online concierge” to initially find the companies. The first listing is for VIPDesk.com, consistently shown at the top of the search results page.
“Someone there is doing their job… good site…very clean media room…press releases current…management bios, industry news, an online demo…RSS feeds available…good stuff. Okay, I need a sound byte and a picture of the CEO…no photos in the media room…hmmm. I’ll call the PR contact and set up a phone interview and get a photo. PR person has an email link, but no phone number…bad. I’ll send her a note, but I really need a fast response to meet my deadline.”
Lunch now done and Starbucks decaf soy latte in hand, it’s back online with two hours to go until deadline.
“Okay, I have requests out to three company’s PR representatives. Here is an email from VIPDesk’s PR person with an attached JPEG of CEO Mary Naylor and a direct phone number to her office…very nice. I’ll give her a call shortly. Good…good, I have a note back from Concierge.com’s PR rep with a link to their extranet site’s image gallery. Uh-oh, I have two messages here from Mailer-Daemon that my email did not get through to press@InetNow.com or to media@InetNow I definitely don’t have the time to call these guys. Guess they’re not going to make this story. Just to be a butt, I think I’ll post on my blog about how unresponsive the company was to my requests. That’ll give the PR department something to do!”
With his column posted at 2:47 pm, and his blog updated to reflect his ire, our youthful beat writer logs off and heads to the rowing club for a little workout in the scull. The PR professionals at InetNow can sleep cluelessly ever after, never knowing the coverage opportunity they just missed.
