Last Gasp

July 31, 2008 on 7:07 am | In Blogs, Customer Retention, Customer Service, Journalism, Media, Media Relations, News, Newspapers, Social Media | 3 Comments

A couple of recent news stories have me thinking about the death of certain types of companies. First we had the story about PRNewswire vs. HARO. Briefly, HARO (Help A Reporter Out) is a new model using the power of social networks to pair sources with journalists at no cost to sources. Here’s the rub: PRNewswire has a service called ProfNet that does the same thing but sources have to pay for it. There has been a lot of talk in the blogosphere about this. PRNewswire is miffed about having competition and is making petty, inaccurate charges against HARO.

Then, we had this story about newspapers: Newspapers vs. Themselves. Print journalism is on the way out. Subscriber numbers are in freefall, longtime readers are literally dying and new ones are not replacing them. Newspapers are making some strides online but it’s too little, too late for most.

Just like carbon-based units, a company must evolve or die. And that is the upshot of my cautionary tale. PRNewswire and newspapers are cut from the same cloth. They are old school entities which are big on control and low on customer service. Cover them up and let’s call the time of death.


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  • http://www.gordmangroup.com Robert Gordman

    The death of companies has been going on for a long time. Remember Fuller Brush and Smith Corona? How about these discount chains: Ames, Bradlees, Caldor, Jamesway, Venture, White Front, Turnstyle and Grnts. The world kept changing around them, but they ignored it and kept right on doing business the way they always had–all the way into bankruptcy.

    So what’s the solution? A company will thrive over the long haul only if management is able to leverage the company strengths to create a customer-relevant position in the marketplace. Management has to create a “Super Sweet Spot” that its competitors can’t touch. A “Super Sweet Spot” turns a niche in to a impenetrable fortress by crafting every element of the business from what products to sell to advertising to run to hiring the right employees to capture the heart and minds of a specific group of customers.

  • http://www.my-creativeteam.com Harry Hoover

    Robert, I agree about leveraging company strengths. But just being customer relevant is a low bar to clear. You also need to provide customers with excellent service that is aligned with the brand.

  • http://www.gordmangroup.com Robert Gordman

    I absolutely agree with that. Right now my wife is trying to get Microsoft to respond to two problems that were created when she downloaded the Service Pack 1 for Vista. It took a customer service rep three days to respond by email to her request. Now when she tries to communicate with this person to send them requested information she gets a delivery error. I am thinking about buying a new computer and am seriously going to look at a Macintosh based on her experience and the positive feedback about Macintosh from friends.

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