Communications as Ikor

우리가 잘 아는 뉴욕 타임즈와는 글의 주제나 논조 및 영어 표현방식에서 많은 차이가 있습니다. 권위지와 일반지의 차이라고나 할까요.

그러나 둘다 지역을 넘어 광범위한 영향을 미친다는 데는 비슷한 점이 있습니다. 데일리 뉴스의 가장 큰 경쟁사는 뉴욕 포스트 (New York Post)입니다. 똑 같은 형식에 데일리 뉴스와 같이 정통(?) 뉴욕식 영어 표현 방식이 특이해서 뉴요커(New Yorker)들이 좋아한다고 합니다.

잠깐 곁길로 빠졌는데.. 바로 얼마 전(1/29) 이 데일리 뉴스가 닷컴 기업들과 PR 에이젼시들과의 관계에 대한 스페셜 리포트를 하나 썼습니다. 가만 읽어 보니 이게 한국에서 취재를 해간 것 같이 한국실정과 딱 맞아 떨어지더군요. 닷컴과 PR서비스 회사들의 관계와 그를 둘러 싼 환경은 저 멀리 바다 넘어 미국 뉴욕과 한국의 서울이 별반 다름이 없다는 점을 새삼 느낍니다.

닷컴이 사그라듬에 따라 PR서비스가 중단되고 서로가 서로를 그 원인 제공자로 지목하는 상쟁의 시기에 우리는 와있는 것 같습니다. 이 상황에서 우리는 누가 피해자이고 가해자인지를 지목하려 노력하기 전에, 과연 그 당시 자신은 제대로 된 역할을 했었는지를 자문해 보는 것이 바람직하다고 봅니다.

PR에이젼시는 “메뚜기도 한 철”이라는 생각을 가지고 멋대로 잠자리채를 휘두르지는 않았는지, 그 잠자리채 속에 모여든 많은 닷컴들에게 실제적으로 필요한 이상의 금액이나 이하의 금액을 요구하지는 혹시 않았는지, 일단 많은 돈을 지불하기로 약속한 클라이언트 닷컴에게 그들이 지불한 만큼의 가치를 넘는 만족을 전해 주었는지, 진정한 파트너 의식을 가지고 가슴 아파 했는지…..

닷컴 회사는 진정한 의미의PR을 원하고 있었는지, 아니면 단순한 “저렴한 마케팅” 기법으로만 PR을 원하지는 않았었는지, 에이젼시가 원하는 시스템과 지원을 해 주었었는지, 혹시 에이젼시의 AE들을 혹시 빈 모자 속에서 토끼를 꺼내는 마법사로 오해하지는 않았는지, 어떻게든 빨리 띄워 주기만을 바라며 에이젼시를 닥달하지는 않았는지, 그리고 더욱 중요한 것은 자신의 비즈니스를 사랑하고 애착을 가졌었는지 아니면 시장과 주식에만 더 애착을 가졌었는지…

미국 뉴욕의 닷컴들을 둘러 싼 PR서비스의 난맥상이라는 것도 바로 이러한 자신 스스로의 돌아봄이 없었기 때문이라고 봅니다.

많은 PR에이젼시들이 그동안 받은 스톡들을 찢어버리고, 미수금에 목이 졸리는 이 상황을 초래한 원인이 무었이겠습니까. 그 이유는 당사자들이 꼼꼼히 자신의 지난일들을 기억해 떠올리면 간단하게 답이 나오는 것 아니겠습니까.

시장이 너무 “냄비” 같다고 비난을 할 필요는 없다고 봅니다. 지금이야 말로 진정한 “닷컴”을 가리는 “조정기”라고 봅니다. 적자생존의 원칙에 의해 정기적으로 거시적 구조조정이 이루어 지지 않는다면, 그것이 더 열악한 시장환경이 아니고 무었이겠습니까.

PR에이젼시 산업이나 닷컴이나 함께 이 조정의 시기를 슬기롭게 이용하여 자신이 성장하고 그 남은 여력을 가지고 서로를 지원하는 그런 형태의 미래 서비스 구조가 되었으면 합니다. 물론 PR 에이젼시야 서비스 제공 회사인 만큼 더욱더 열심히 내실과 소위 업계에서 말하는 “내공(!)”을 다져야 한다고 생각합니다.

앞으로 많은 변화가 있겠지만….PR에이젼시가 “국내에 300개”에 이른다는 말을 들은 순간 “조금 너무한다…”하는 생각이 든 것도 아마 이유가 있겠지요…..

아래의 뉴욕 데일리 글을 한번 재미있게 읽어 보시기 바랍니다.
홍보!!

Dot-coms, PR Firms:
Mismatched Mess

By RACHEL SCHEIER
Daily News Business Writer

It was a love affair that in many ways always seemed strange: armies of dot-com hipsters in their fanny-packs and jeans wooing an industry whose image has always been stylish and blow-dried.

But it was all about eyeballs, as they used to say back in the Internet gravy-train days of 1999, and to get eyeballs to your Web site you needed PR. So, armed with dreams of fame and millions of fresh venture capital, Silicon Alley banged on the doors of the city”s flacks. Suddenly, PR firms, who were used to competing for clients, were flooded with business, courtesy of the dot-com boom.

“It started about a year and a half ago, when the dot-coms started pouring into us like the Jews escaping from Egypt,” recalled Howard Rubenstein, New York”s public relations king.
“Every day we”d get another one. They”d say, “We”ll pay you $50,000 a month to handle us.” They made up numbers,” said Rubenstein, whose firm also took on several start-ups, including some who left their bills unpaid.

Those days, needless to say, are now in the past, as are many of the warm feelings between the flacks and the Internet ingenues. Scores of start-ups that ran short of cash or closed up shop following the popping of the stock market bubble failed to pay their PR bill, to say nothing of the vanished options that many firms accepted as payment.

Their dreams of sharing the wealth dashed, many flacks said they”ve had enough of arrogant, inexperienced dot-com entrepreneurs and their unrealistic expectations.

“We were in a business meeting with a client once, and the very young CEO said, “I want to be on “David Letterman,”” said Caryn Marooney, co-founder of OutCast Communications, a PR firm that specializes in handling Internet companies. “I said, “Have you ever seen that show?” I mean, that”s just not a win-win situation.”

On the other hand, some Internet firms complain they got less than their money”s worth from their public relations experience.
Business exploded so dramatically for PR firms that some unwitting start-ups said they fell victim to incompetent or greedy flacks.

“You had a lot of unqualified PR firms charging a lot of money and overpromising services to delusional entrepreneurs,” summed up Jason McCabe Calacanis, editor of the Silicon Alley Reporter.
A few of these affairs gone sour sunk into legal disputes.
New York”s Dan Klores Associates is in bankruptcy court trying to collect $119,332 owed by former client Pseudo Programs, the hip Web TV company that collapsed last fall. Scour, the defunct video and music exchange backed by Michael Ovitz, was sued in September by its former PR firm, CarryOn Communications, claiming Scour owed $154,398 in unpaid fees.

On the other hand, Richard Metzger of Disinfo.com, an Internet clearinghouse for conspiracy theories, was so unhappy with its PR firm, RLM Public Relations, that it filed a breach of contract suit, which was settled.

RLM”s CEO, Richard Laermer also scuffled with Silicon Alley nonprofit MOUSE, which seeks to improve technology in schools. The group also refused to pay RLM, noting that a reporter once did a story about the group without ever knowing they employed a PR firm. That dispute also has been settled.

Laermer declined to comment on those matters, citing confidentiality agreements, but said he is still chasing a few other ex-Internet clients who haven”t paid up. “Some of these companies just woke up one day and said, “I think we”ll just stop paying our service vendors.” That”s kind of bad karma,” he said.

Even some PR execs conceded that, for awhile during the Internet boom, enthusiasm got out of hand. Start-ups that a few years ago would have paid about $15,000 a month for representation were forking over fees that often ranged between $30,000 and $50,000.

Firms overwhelmed by businesses desperate for media coverage; and short-staffed thanks to defections to dot-coms; besieged already cynical reporters with often sloppy and ineffective story pitches.

Fees for high-tech PR grew 30% in 1999, while the industry as a whole grew 15% to 17%, estimated Adam Leyland, editor of PRWeek. Numbers for 2000 are not yet available, but Leyland predicted they will show similar growth to “99, even though they dropped off dramatically after the April tech stock crash.
Leyland places part of the blame for the circus on journalists, who he said for a time were just as hypnotized by the so-called Internet revolution as everyone else. “For awhile, someone would say, “I”m putting tea bags on the Web, and journalists would say, “Great, what an amazing story,”” he said.

PR execs said that their desperation was often driven by the demands of novice Web execs who lacked a profitable concept but had lots of funding, and spent a lot of time dreaming up lavish parties and outlandish stunts to create “buzz.”

Normally staid public relations reps found themselves dressing employees in costumes and sending them onto the streets. “They spent all their time talking about their “killer apps” and thinking up cool names for their products, and then it would be, “Why aren”t we on the front page of The New York Times?”” complained one PR executive who requested anonymity.

Marooney said she frequently turned down business from such clients, which included an online shampoo seller and a Web site offering tips on how to pick up women.

But the days of start-ups sending champagne and roses to woo prospective PR firms are long gone. Flacks are once again competing for business, though many said they”ll be more careful before signing on start-ups.

George Simpson, a 30-year New York PR veteran who exclusively represented magazines before switching to Internet businesses a few years ago, said he”d be out of business if he hadn”t managed to get some magazine clients back.

Still, Simpson said he found working with start-ups more interesting and rewarding, and they often asked him to take a larger role, as if he was a parent of sorts.

“With magazines, it was take them to La Cote Basque and buy them dinner,” he said. “I mean, how hard can that be?”

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