I'm Featured in PR Week Interview on Global PR Blog Week

PR Week's Keith O'Brien interviewed me, Steve Rubel, and Trevor Cook and Constantin Basturea, two of the organizers of Global PR Blog Week.

Completed last week, the online event brought together 28 PR industry bloggers to encourage companies to include blogs in the marketing mix.

My point of view, in the interview and during the event, is that the PR industry, in general, has a hard time grasping blogging's potential because they, and their clients, want to have total message control.

Traditional journalists are influenced by the irreverence of bloggers and often quote them in stories. Several international news stories, including the capture of Saddam Hussein, were reported first by bloggers, who've become increasingly important news sources.

As a group, bloggers tend not to allow any conversation to be off the record, and we're just as likely to make fun of a company as to promote its products. PR people fear the impact of these new, unedited, journalists, as well they should.