Archive for June, 2006



The Irish PR industry have been slow to adopt instant messaging. To be honest, I’ve only recently discovered its benefits for media relations. I would have thought that it could prove to be a distraction, but in fact it’s really efficient in terms of liaising with the press.
For example, one of my […]

One of the hardest thing to explain to people about journalists is that they work to very tight deadlines. When you actively start to engage with the press, you have to be prepared to make time at short notice to speak to a journalist as part of an interview for an article because they’re […]

I’d better start this post with a disclaimer. I’m good friends with Ed Byrne, the Marketing Director in Hosting365, and I’m also on their free blog hosting plan.
I have to highlight Hosting365 though for their enthusiasm which seems to ooze from everything they do these days. Here’s an email I got from them […]

Watch this

Guy Kawasaki’s “Art of the Start” presentation. It’s aimed at entrepreneurs, but relevant to everyone.

People should be forced to watch this in my opinion.

Technorati Tags: Guy Kawasaki, Piaras Kelly, Entrepreneurship

iReach is an Irish research firm that publishes really interesting insights about IT and consumer behaviour on a regular basis. I’m always left scracthing my head because some tech companies in the country obviously haven’t done a simple situation analysis since it’s plain to see that they haven’t read this freely available information.
Here’s a […]

One of the most frustrating things about reading PR blogs is that most commentators talk about how the profession has changed overnight, rather than pointing out that it is evolving like other industries. It is claimed that if we don’t adapt and embrace new trends like word-of-mouthing marketing in its various guises such as […]

I had an article in this weekend’s Sunday Business Post in the Marketing section. As time permits I’m going to submit more articles to the press in the future. This article is about the evolution in viral marketing thanks to Youtube et al. Here’s the article for those of you who don’t […]

Jay Z, one of the world’s leading rap musicians, has called for a boycott on Cristal champagne after one of the company’s executives, when asked if the association between Cristal and the “bling lifestyle” could be detrimental, said “What can we do? We can’t forbid people from buying it.” Leading by example, Jay-Z has […]

There’s been lots of talk recently about how consumers are now controlling brands. John Wagner recently posted some interesting commentary on the subject. Here’s the best bits:
Brands are about image and experience, emotion and passion, logic and abandon. And those attributes are carefully crafted and nurtured by the way wise companies position, sell […]

I don’t normally simply link to a new website I have begun to read, but in this instance I think mediaforum.ie deserves to be highlighted. Anyone involved in the communications industry in Ireland or that is interested in the Irish media should visit this website.
It was created as a space for balanced debate about […]

I love a good quote. Why try think of the words to express yourself, when someone has said it better? More importantly from a communications perspective, a good quote can often encapsulate what you are trying to say in a few words, thus conveying your message more efficiently.
So I was delighted when I […]

World Cup madness

Everyone has gone World Cup crazy at the moment with column inches, airwaves and marketing dollars all being dedicated to this summer’s soccer competition. Unless of course if you are living in the United States, where John Wagner seems to be one of the sport’s only fans.
One of the most fascinating aspects of the […]

The Sunday Times reports that the Irish Labour party has hired Zack Exley to help them with their online strategy ahead of the upcoming Irish election. Damien Mulley gives more in-depth coverage on the story, pointing out that “Exley worked on the Howard Dean Campaign, the John Kerry Campaign and recently worked for the […]

Hype is starting to build already around what is likely to be one of next year’s biggest summer blockbusters, The Transformers. The movie will be a live action film based on the popular cartoon series.
One of the interesting rumours I’ve heard about the movie is that an Xbox 360, an iPod and a plasma […]

A couple of months ago I wrote about the online media restrictions FIFA, the governing soccer organisation, were putting in place ahead of this year’s World Cup. Since then FIFA have seen sense and recinded on the amount of restrictions they had put in place.
In the warm-up to the World Cup though, I cannot […]

When anyone ever mentions the future of Public Relations, the ensuing conversation typically revolves around the Internet and how it will affect our industry. In Ireland, the Internet might not immediately spring to mind, but words like blog and Bebo are slowly becoming part of our vocabulary.
The main challenge facing the Irish PR industry […]

Forgot to mention this after attending the IIA conference last week. The IIA (Irish Internet Association) has launched a quarterly newsletter with AMAS which will detail online activity in Ireland. It’s quite useful given that the statistics that are usually quoted at us are from the UK.
The statistics show that we’re pretty much […]