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A comment from RLM owner Richard Laermer was added to the story.
PR Junkie has learned that Help a Reporter Out (HARO), the service started by Peter Shankman to link reporters with PR pros, is no longer working with its agency of record, RLM PR.
Thom Brodeur, HARO's chief operating officer, confirmed the news on Wednesday.
“They [RLM] got us great press,” he said in an e-mail to PR Junkie. “Team did great work. We're handling our own PR now.” Brodeur would not elaborate.
Richard Laermer, owner of RLM, said HARO didn't "dump" his company. "Our original contract ended," he told PR Junkie. "RLM decided not to re-up with them. No big deal."
HARO named RLM its agency of record in August. At the time, Brodeur said HARO would work with RLM to move beyond its image as a competitor to Profnet or similar reporter/source matching service or source databases.
“The objectives are really to position with business media the success story of a social media company, because frankly I’m tired of hearing that social media companies can’t be successful—that they aren’t successful models—because there are [successful models], and we’re proof of that,” Brodeur told me in September.
RLM helped HARO score coverage in Forbes, Wired and more.
HARO has worked with two PR firms in the last several months. In June, the company said it was working with Propheta Communications. A little more than one month later HARO severed ties with Propheta and instead named RLM its agency of record.
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Good list, tho a bit US-centric. The world is full of unmitigated PR gaffes; Renault's F1 race fixing; UK PM Gordon Brow...
Comments (7)
When I was a reporter at one time interviewed (sarcastically - somewhat) a writer for Letterman and he went on to be - I think - head writer for SNL. A year or so later he used my name as the "makin' copies" guy! Ran into him at an event for NBC once and he laughed and said "We thought your name was perfectly suited." Back then, I used to get phone calls from old friends going--are you the copy guy! It was pretty funny; Rob Schneider did a good me. You're first to say anything in years. It cracked me up!
Posted by Richard | November 21, 2009 10:03 AM
Posted on November 21, 2009 10:03
Really? So what's the connection between the "real" Richard and the fictional one?
Posted by Nat Silverman | November 20, 2009 10:40 PM
Posted on November 20, 2009 22:40
Nat Silverman: The character of "Richard Lamer" on Saturday Night Live was actually named after me. No shit.
I hope you get this!
RL
Posted by Richard | November 19, 2009 1:00 PM
Posted on November 19, 2009 13:00
I thought Richard Laermer was the "Saturday Night Live" character whose desk was next to the photocopier.
Posted by Nat Silverman | November 17, 2009 12:09 AM
Posted on November 17, 2009 00:09
Not sure if there is any correlation here, but today someone started a Twitter count mocking Laermer:
http://twitter.com/EvilLaermer
Posted by John G. | November 12, 2009 2:02 PM
Posted on November 12, 2009 14:02
Agree with the point about scale. The more users, the more variables (spam), the less valuable the service.
Related to the latest firm dumping, Shankman is supposedly a friend to PR who built HARO by espousing "good karma". Going thru two firms in 6 months seems counter to his credo.
Posted by Karma Schmarma | November 12, 2009 12:10 PM
Posted on November 12, 2009 12:10
I think HARO's issue isn't one of PR, but rather one of growth and scale. As a business, it's time for HARO to take the next step for their PR professional clients. Give us some value-add, turn the queries to some sort of data that we can use, or maybe bring more valuable information on social or MSM to us as this landscape continues to shift beneath our feet.
Posted by Karen Arena | November 12, 2009 11:08 AM
Posted on November 12, 2009 11:08