Black Box Blog
I n telecom and OSS/BSS, a black box is a program that measures output against input in complex systems.
Written by Crawford PR‘s president and chief strategist, Jim Crawford, this Black Box is designed to help companies achieve a similar goal in PR. Black Box provides our candid input—based on several lifetimes of experience—for companies that want to measure and improve the performance of PR programs.
Branding Overkill: Has SXSW Lost its Cool?
Many moons ago in the days when Jimi Hendrix, Ginger Baker and Stevie Winwood were the virtuosos of rock I happened upon a large musical event in NYC. However, instead of flowing inside, crowds of long-haired, tie-dyed, bell-bottomed youths were streaming out the doors, humorously shouting expletives as they vacated the building. Seems they’d been lured in by the promise of a free “psychedelic” jam only to find that the event was underwritten by Budweiser. The killer: a light show interspersed with TV ads touting...
read moreTech PR: Raiders of the Lost Network
In the day when competitive local exchanges carriers (CLECs) like MFS and Teleport were hot, and prospective market entrants photocopied one another’s business plans to raise funding, I received a call from Stephanie Mehta, then with the Wall Street Journal: “Jim, I hear that one new CLEC founder breeds race horses for a living and has no telecom background — can that be true?” Fearing that said individual might be a client, I blurted out: “No way, ha ha! That’s gotta be a practical joke somebody is playing...
read moreTech PR: Is Social Media Really for You?
In his The War Against Cliché: Essays and Reviews 1971-2000, the famously pointed Martin Amis describes an author as “uniquely unqualified” to write a book. Would that we had his equal as a critic in the realm of social media. Although Amis had no way of knowing it when he penned these essays, he wrote during the declining days of the book industry, a time when editors and critics still acted as watch dogs of quality. In today’s era of social media, where anybody can write and “publish” without a gatekeeper,...
read moreMobile Hullabaloo: Nothing But Air?
This week in Barcelona the world’s leaders in cellular communications, IT, apps, and even automobile manufacturing – Ford’s chairman keynoted – convened for Mobile World Congress, one of mobility’s foremost annual conclaves. As usual, the hype on our “connected world” was hot and heavy, the air thick with forecasts about the never-ending growth of mobile data, smart devices and eager users. Perhaps fed up with being outdone by smart phones, smart apps and smart grids, every manner of vendor launched a “smart” product of some...
read moreDragnet PR: The Case of the Dead Byline
Midnight. Agency rep Flipper “Flip” DeGibbet has just turned in. Suddenly his iPhone hums and he reaches for the night stand to answer it. At first he hears scuffling, then the desperate cry of an all-too-familiar voice: client Norville Tweedie — “Help! murder!” Half-dressed, Flip stumbles down the steps of his four-story Lower East Side walk-up, hails a cab, rushes to the scene and bursts in. But it’s too late. There stands Sweden’s and every PR person’s worst nightmare, editor Angst Aarson,...
read moreCrawford on the Air: Inside Communications with Mike Bako
Crawford PR’s very own Jim Crawford joined host Mike Bako last week on Inside Communications Radio to discuss the PR ramifications of mobile data roaming charges.
read moreTelecom PR: “Over the Top” on Roaming Charges — and Bad PR
Those who follow the tech industry are familiar with the phrase “over the top” or OTT — a term that designates a new class of video services that rides the networks of telecom and cable companies, providing movies and other content on an all-you-can-eat basis. OTT services like Netflix are a huge hit. Unfortunately, as one viewer recently discovered, if you use OTT services while on international travel, your roaming charges can be over-the-top. For the offending service provider, negative publicity can go off the chart,...
read moreCurses! Foiled by Smart Devices and Fiendishly Clever Search Engines — Again!
My moment of triumph over the phone monopoly had arrived. I’d show them. Stodgy old feature phone in hand, I burst through the doors of the Verizon Wireless store and slammed the device on the counter. “The damned thing has been broken all day and I can’t call out — what can you do about it?” The youthful service rep studied my phone from a safe distance, as one would any dinosaur, then bravely picked it up and placed a test call. “Works fine,” he said, “Let me see you try.” I did. Same...
read moreTech PR: Be Your Own Wire Service
One of my longstanding principles is to be nice to almost everybody. I do this even if they work for me and I’m in a position to lord it over them and make their lives miserable. It’s not that I’m a kindly soul imbued with bonhomie or involuntarily go around spreading good cheer. Far from it. I’m nice because it’s practical, and often the safest thing to do. Through a twist of fate you can end up working for some nincompoop who was once your employee. Ask anyone who’s worked at Crawford. Most are former...
read more“What Do YOU Think?” — The Most Important Question Companies Never Ask
In the tech PR arena we deal with companies that tend to differentiate themselves based on new product or service features: voice synthesis, business intelligence, and so on. There’s a continual game of one-up-manship to develop some clever new googaw or gimcrack that will give an edge, however slight or short-lived, over the competition. Frankly, if I were a customer I’d be more impressed if a company got in touch and said, “What is your biggest business problem, and how can we help?” or even “What do you think...
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