Project Clarity

There’s an old joke that goes something like this:

“Why are Southern women less promiscuous than others?” [Don’t think too much here; it’s a set-up line]

“I don’t know. Why?” [Now you’re playing well with others.]

“Too many thank-you notes to write.” [ta daaaa]

Seth Godin hits on the “promiscuity paradox” of public relations and PR firms in a recent blog post.

In short, he writes that good PR firms achieve success for a few good clients, then find themselves pursued by the masses to achieve that same success. Then, something like this is bound to occur:

“…the people who most want to be your clients are the people you should least want to represent. As you promote the unpromotable, the permission you have to talk to the media doesn’t go up, it goes down.

“In the long run, the pickier you are, the better you do. Same thing goes for online merchants, brokers, church groups and just about anyone else who markets with permission.”

The moral of the story: even editors get tired of the same thank-you note.