Comments on: Huge PR Firm Has Bunch of Kids Digital PR Strategists

By: Gini Dietrich

Gini Dietrich — Sat, 28 Nov 2009 17:23:39 +0000

David – I’m late to the game commenting on this, but BRAVO! I blogged about this very topic and see it the very same way you do (I also love the quote Nettie pulled). But when I say there was a lot of piss and vinegar in the comments on my post on this topic, I think I’m stating it simply. If you’d like to check it out, you can go read at http://www.spinsucks.com/spin/edelman-admits-they-dont-know-social-media.

You’ll note I found you because Davina Brewer posted your link.

By: Nettie Hartsock

Nettie Hartsock — Thu, 29 Oct 2009 14:40:06 +0000

Hi David,
Interesting, riveting post! I have to chime in and say that probably the 23 year old does know much more about Facebook etc. than the Edelman regional manager, but it has less to do with the person’s age and more to do with traditional PR firms trying to keep up and not being willing to learn something new or admit to the clients that we’re all social media learners not social media experts.

Social media or Web 2.0 expertise does not define itself by gender, age, ethnicity etc, it is defined however, by someone or an entire entity (PR firm) whose willingness to learn exceeds the bounds of just hiring someone with the knowledge and then pretending you’ve learned it too, so you can as a firm (or individual) bill thousands of dollars to a client for your digital strategy insight.

Edelman by the way is also the firm that created one of the more famous flogs early on, which I covered as a journalist – the Wal-Mart Sony flog.

“Another blog much reviled after its exposure as a flog was created by Edelman, part of Daniel J. Edelman Inc., on behalf of Wal-Mart Stores. The flog posed as the travel diary of a couple, but did not disclose they were paid for their upbeat posts about Wal-Mart.”
—Stuart Elliot, “How to Lose Cadillac And Other Lessons On Madison Ave. in 2006,” The New York Times, December 18, 2006

What really speaks poorly of Edelman is that was almost three years ago and since that time they could have spent learning, truly learning about online strategy and Web 2.0, to really aid their clients. They instead spent it figuring out how to bill clients more for digital strategy with no understanding or even interest in how it really should work.

By: Tweets that mention Huge PR Firm Has Bunch of Kids as Digital PR Strategists | David Henderson - consultant, author, journalist -- Topsy.com

Wed, 28 Oct 2009 16:20:39 +0000

[...] This post was mentioned on Twitter by David Henderson, Theresa Downing. Theresa Downing said: RT @davidhenderson: Huge PR agency (Edelman) has bunch of kids as digital PR "strategists." http://bit.ly/3n5YmR [...]