<rant>
Pitching for a PR account via Twitter. Good idea? Bad idea? Would you do it?
Personally, I can think of little more degrading than being asked to parade myself along with dozens of other suitors in a public competition of who’s got the most Twitter wit. But that’s exactly what Aloft Hotels is doing with its current #PitchAloft initiative. The hotel chain, which I have to admit I’ve never used, is challenging PR agencies to tweet their way to a PR contract of undetermined value over a four week period by answering a series of mind-numbingly banal interview questions direct from the 1980s such as “if your agency was an ice cream flavour, which would it be?” and “if we had a middle name, what would it be?”
Aloft says on its dedicated microsite (sigh) that it’s looking for a “creative, dynamic and socially savvy agency…strategic enough to maintain the momentum behind Aloft Hotels”. Strategic? What the hell is strategic about telling you that I like rum and raisin ice cream? How on earth is that supposed to identify an agency that is capable of understanding your business and analysing what your core issue is, and one that can actually do the job required?
At my agency we decide whether or not to pitch for projects based on three things: brand, budget and brief. This initiative is lacking at least two of those. So maybe the assumption that every PR agency in the land will be willing to dance for this business is far from true. And more to the point, maybe the ones that are aren’t the ones you’d necessarily want working with you. How desperate must they be?
So yes Aloft, you may be creating a stir with this (which I’m adding to goddamit!) and yes, you may be all Twittered-up and whackety-whack for coming up with such a cool and unique way to find PR support. But you know what? You need that support if this is anything to go by. It portrays you as arrogant and as a company that values working in partnership with its agency about as much as a night in a Travelodge. Furthermore, it’s undignified and humiliating for the entire PR industry. It devalues PR and PR agencies. It shouldn’t be about ‘what can you do for us’, it should be about ‘what can we do together’. And just about the only thing worse is the frickin’ monkeys that are currently dancing for it on Twitter.
</rant>
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Hmm, seems like a company trying to appear hip while getting a bunch of agencies to offer free ideas that they can use whether they hire the agency or not. Not for me, it’ll probably find its fans.
It will, you’re right. And there are a few doing the dance. We (PR pros) are worth more than this.
Strikes me as a company trying to be hip in 2009. Lazy-thinking, that’s what it is.
I totally agree re lazy thinking. And yet they’ve gone to the trouble of thinking it through (pretty well, functionally speaking) and building a microsite. So how does that work then?
Perhaps they don’t have much of a budget, hence the “do it on Twitter” thing – one would think they’ll get a lot of youngsters who like to play games like this clamouring for the contract. I’ll be very interested in Gini’s take on this.
I don’t care about what budget they’ve got Lindsay, they should just do their research like everyone else. It costs nothing to get some recommendations and sound people out. It’s degrading.
Agree Paul, 100%. I’m just saying that the calibre/experience level of people they will attract most likely won’t be very high. If that’s what they want, then…..
Not sure how budget plays into this decision at all.
Writing a decent brief and finding the time to meet with a few agencies to assess potential fit & feel is not a mega-bucks operation.
Yes, that requires time. But one wonders how much of a distraction this silly exercise is for the hotel chain’s execs.
It takes less budget to put out an RFP than it does to have someone on Twitter for four weeks trying to be cool.
Totally agree with this post. Any agency who wins this brief should really talk sense into how they approach social media in the future! Yet again, if I ran an agency I would not not make it dance for them. Can’t think of anything more publically dodgy.
The thing is, what they’re doing from a social media sense is actually pretty good. Nice campaign, good buzz. It’s just misguided.
Actually, I love the idea of this. Blogged a few thoughts earlier: http://www.nevillehobson.com/2012/11/19/taking-the-competitive-pr-pitch-to-twitter/
This is arguably…well, certainly, a more balanced piece than mine, Neville. Although I stand by what I say for all the reasons outlined here
Paul – you and I don’t always see eye-to-eye on stuff, but on this we certainly do.
Nice job. Well done on holding back on the bile. I think I’d have struggled not to c-bomb them if I’d written on this.
A bit of disagreement and debate does no-one any harm. Provided they don’t get shouty, right?
Shouty. My favourite term ever.
On the face of it, this is a great way to spread the net a bit wider and perhaps identify an agency outside of the ‘norm’ but, overall, I’m with you.
Ultimately, I wonder if the project is really about identifying a PR agency or just creating social media buzz?
Much it gauls me, I agree with you Lynne regarding creating buzz. It’s certainly done that and I actually think it’s been executed pretty well. Doesn’t change the fact that it uses PR as its stooge though, does it?
All great points, and I appreciate and respect your points of view, for sure.
From an agency “participating”…We at evok (www.evokad.com) decided to play along because we felt it was unique, was creating a buzz in the industry and we wanted to ride the wave for our own brand exposure. If we were offered the opportunity to answer the true written RFP in a few weeks, then that would be a bonus.
When we started, we weren’t not 100% sure if we knew we were the right fit for Aloft, but the last couple weeks have provided us the opportunity to delve into the brand, learn about some of their key players and have a little fun answering the tweet challenges, which in turn impacts our own employee morale, so even if we don’t continue, it was minimal effort for a little enjoyment, and sometimes isn’t that what life’s all about?
I doubt the brand will make its sole decision on the RFTweet, and I’m positive they considered how they would benefit from the buzz they created. I do wonder if they have a crisis communications plan in place to handle the negative backlash they are starting to receive from posts like this? We’ll see, and that too will help us evaluate whether we’re a good fit.
If I do have a criticism about the program it would be that in the AdAge article, it implied that Aloft would use the outreach to find some lesser-known agencies, but lately, they have been tweeting some really BIG shops, directly, inviting them to participate, which makes the smaller shops who have been participating all along, like us, feel a little used, but I think we all knew what we were getting into.
Yes, we do feel a little like dancing chickens sometimes, with this opportunity and with countless others, but the chicken dance is often one of the funnest (thanks Steve Jobs) times at a wedding.
Hey Larry – really appreciate you taking the time to drop by and give an alternative viewpoint ‘from the inside’. I can understand the motivation to gain exposure for your own brand through this and, I guess, if that’s the way you’re treating it rather than expecting (or even wanting?) to get through to the written brief stage there’s value in that and fair play to you if you’re honest with yourselves. I can also see the value in having a bit of fun in the office. Why not?!
I guess what I despise about the initiative is the arrogance it implies from Aloft. They may be the nicest and most genuine, down-to-earth bunch on the planet…but the perception from myself and from most others I’ve interacted with on this subject here and on Twitter and Facebook, is that they’ve taken an arrogant standpoint where they expect PRs to do their bidding. I find it difficult to look beyond that.
But as I say, thanks for popping by.
I agree with @DannyBrown’s original reply, to any established PR practitioner this comes off sounding like a company looking for free ideas that they can try and implement without hiring anybody for the job. I also can’t help but feel that this is the equivalent of turning PR pros into stand-up comics auditioning for a gig. Anyone can come up with a pithy one-liner, but a 140-character witty comeback isn’t necessarily the sign of a brilliant PR strategist. Overall I think it will attract a lot of young PRs just starting out or those desperate for revenue.
The word ‘desperate’ seems very apt to me too, Meg. Although from Larry’s comment above, it would seem that’s not necessarily the case…
Just wanted to also say, I do like Larry’s comment a lot: “…and have a little fun answering the tweet challenges, which in turn impacts our own employee morale, so even if we don’t continue, it was minimal effort for a little enjoyment, and sometimes isn’t that what life’s all about?” Very true Larry!
There comes a point though, in response to some of the ‘get involved / have fun’ perspectives, when a business has to stop behaving like Donkey in Shrek (“me, me, pick me, I can do that, pick me, me, me..” etc) and grow up a little.
Indulging other people’s bad ideas – no matter what your own motivation as a business or an individual – isn’t ever going to raise the bar for quality.
Nicely put, sir.
I don’t disagree with you, but I also look at it a bit differently. The big agencies are always trotted in to do dog and pony shows against their competition all the time. It costs a ton of time and money for the idea that you *might* win the business. Those kinds of pitches are not something an agency the size of mine could compete in because we just don’t have the resources. But to answer tweet questions, in 140 characters, is pretty doable. It doesn’t take my team away from client work, it doesn’t decrease their billable hours, and it shows aloft how savvy we are on social.
I’d much rather that than spend weeks putting together a proposal with our most creative ideas, only to not get the business but have the company use our ideas anyway.
It’s certainly true that the amount of time, resource and money that goes into pitches is an incredible drain, I’ll agree with that. Without the figures to hand, I think we estimate that it costs an average of between £5000 and £10,000 for a typical pitch, sometimes an awful lot more. So sure, a free ‘tweet-off’ makes sense financially.
But that doesn’t change the fact that this essentially devalues the work, the creativity and the strategic nous of PR people. As you know, Gini, the PR industry has a massive perception issue already without nonsense like this adding to it.