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February 28, 2000 Issue of PRWeek

Annual reports cited as most credible source of corporate info

NEW YORK: TheStreet.com and CBS Marketwatch may have become household names, but a new study has revealed that an old standby - the trusty annual report - ...

Corporate PR gaining in stature and budget

NEW YORK: After years of downsizing and outsourcing, new evidence suggests that the in-house PR team is gaining respect within the executive boardrooms of corporate America, with ...

Image issues loom large for GOP hopefuls

WASHINGTON, DC: In the wake of the message sent by voters in Michigan and Arizona - not so fast, Dubya - Republican presidential favorite George W. Bush ...

Giuliani chooses press secretary

NEW YORK: New York City mayor Rudy Giuliani isn’t officially running for Senate just yet. But he made his intentions even more crystal clear last week - ...

NEWS BRIEFS

CHICAGO: Joe Dragonette, a well-respected leader in the Chicago business community, died February 18 at the age of 63 from complications related to multiple sclerosis. After 20 ...

Rhodes leaves Daily News to make run for Congress

NEW YORK: Newspaper PR woman Adrienne Rhodes is leaving the profession to make a run for political office.

Nissan selects Fair to fill Vines’ position

CARSON, CA: Nissan North America moved quickly to fill its top PR spot following the departure of Jason Vines to Ford, promoting Debra Sanchez Fair to VP ...

USC loses top PR talent to dot-com

LOS ANGELES: First it was the PR agencies, then corporate America. Now, even academia is being raided by the dot-com world for top PR talent.

Walker, PSB unite to do rep analysis

NEW YORK: Walker Information and Padilla Speer Beardsley have teamed up to focus their attention on reputation management, the companies announced last week.

Fore! First Strategy.com has been hired

FORT WORTH: Fore! First Strategy.com has been hired to help former pro golfer Eben Dennis tee off a new syndicated radio program. Agency president Larry Shannon locked ...

PR revenue drives WPP Group profits

LONDON: Ogilvy and Hill & Knowlton were star performers in the latest annual results of global communications group WPP, with PR revenues up 33% from 1998 and ...

Most CEOs still only pay lip service to reputation issue

NEW YORK: Despite a growing awareness of the link between corporate reputation and the bottom line, most companies are still only paying lip service to it.

Ziegaus parts company with SZ&M

SAN DIEGO: Stoorza Ziegaus & Metzger has lost one of its longtime leaders.

Microsoft launches PR push for MSN

REDMOND, WA: In a move that deflected attention from the unveiling of the bug-laden Windows 2000, Microsoft launched a dollars 150 million ad campaign for its MSN ...

Internet Wire nets dollars 17m VC windfall

LOS ANGELES: Ripe with an infusion of dollars 17.5 million in venture capital funding, online news distributor Internet Wire is hoping to make further inroads into the ...

Arthur Page seeks full-time leader

NEW YORK: The Arthur Page Society, one of the profession’s most respected if not most influential groups, is looking for a full-time leader.

Snyder snagged for dollars 2.1b by Havas

BETHESDA, MD: Snyder Communications, the parent company of Arnold PR, has been acquired by French ad agency Havas for approximately dollars 2.1 billion - a number some ...

Phillips Petroleum names new voice

BARTLESVILLE, OK: As part of an in-house shakeup, Phillips Petroleum has hired a top voice away from pharmaceutical giant G.D. Searle and cut two high-level communications posts.

MCI WorldCom to unite PR functions

LONDON: In anticipation of a European Commission investigation into its proposed mega-merger with Sprint, MCI WorldCom is overhauling its pan-European PR operations.

Countrywide Porter Novelli reaps CropGen biz bounty

LONDON: Countrywide Porter Novelli (CPN) has been handed a high-six-figure account to handle all communications for CropGen, a new UK initiative which aims to promote a more ...

Bickham announces departure from H&K

LONDON: Hill & Knowlton suffered a major loss last week, as Edward Bickham, deputy chairman and MD of its public affairs and corporate policy practice, announced his ...

Commission eyes new PR for Jersey

ISLE OF JERSEY: The Jersey Financial Services Commission is reviewing its PR and public affairs business after a seven-year association with Shandwick.

PN partners with Russian PR group

MOSCOW: Porter Novelli has moved into the fairly uncharted territory of Russian PR, signing a deal last week to affiliate with the country’s largest PR firm, Triangle ...

Causey crosses the street to H&K

WASHINGTON, DC: Former Powell Tate telecom expert Michael Causey continued his working tour of DC shops last week, skipping from Strat@comm to Hill & Knowlton.

Following heated debate, PRSA accepts CFO Bullock

LOS ANGELES: The saga of Cerrell Associates CFO and would-be PRSA member Steve Bullock seems to have come to a close, with the society’s Los Angeles chapter ...

Pros crowded out of DC video facilities

WASHINGTON, DC: The political primaries are creating a bonanza for video production facilities in the DC area - and that’s bad news for local PR pros.

Weber, Medialink forge partnership for tech services

CAMBRIDGE, MA: In a first for Medialink, the company announced last week that it has formed an alliance with Weber PR Worldwide to serve as the agency’s ...

Nerve.com dumps RLM, creates own agency for other start-ups

NEW YORK: Nerve.com, a site featuring what its founders call ’literate smut,’ has ditched RLM Public Relations and decided to fly solo with its PR - with ...

BrainBug joins forces with Cronin to up PR/Internet capabilities

FARMINGTON, CT: Hoping to become a one-stop shop for companies seeking both PR and Internet help, Web development specialist BrainBug has allied with integrated shop Cronin & ...

Zuma unveils DVD presentation aid

NEW YORK: Zuma Digital has launched a new product that, if the company is to be believed, will revolutionize the way PR firms and others put together ...

Manpower gives Edelman big job

MILWAUKEE: Manpower, one of the biggest temporary staffing firms in the world, has tapped Edelman as its first PR agency of record. Though annual billings aren’t yet ...

Gov’t communicators look to PR for awareness push

WASHINGTON, DC: Intent on upping both awareness and overall PR efficiency, the National Association of Government Communicators (NAGC), which represents federal, state and local government communicators, has shuffled ...

EDITORIAL: Corporate survey yields 10 insights

There is no shortage of information about PR agencies, but statistical data on the client side is hard to come by. PRWeek aims to change all that, ...

THE BIG PITCH: How can you distance your clients from their employees who get in trouble?

JAMES LAFORCE, LaForce & Stevens, New York

SPORTS PR: Putting the cowboys on ice down in Texas - Think your job is tough? Try selling bush league hockey to football-mad Texans, most of whom don’t know a puck from a donut. But as Sherri Deatherage Green discovers, the Western Professional H

Real men who brave contests of grit and brawn wear two things on their feet at the Lubbock Municipal Coliseum - spurs or hockey blades.

THINKPIECE: If corporate PR chiefs don’t take the lead as the global ethics watchdogs, reputations will suffer

New Gallup International findings for Transparency International, the anti-corruption organization, show that business leaders in emerging market countries see US firms being just as willing to pay ...

INSIDE THE BELTWAY: Bush bent over backwards to woo the Religious Right in SC. Can he straighten up by November?

Just one day away from the South Carolina GOP primary, it looks as though the big winner will be Vice President Al Gore. It’s surely no secret ...

ANALYSIS: PR Measurement - The pros play a game of inches and dollars. A new product called ClipValue.com has brought the age-old vexing issue of ad value equivalency into sharp focus. Some PR pros think AVE is an arbitrary measurement and of little value

In a world where numbers count, ad value equivalency (AVE) has been widely used to evaluate PR programs almost since the birth of PR.

ANALYSIS: Profile - PRSA Foundation puts its faith in Farinelli Jean Farinelli may have left agency life, but she’s still in high demand - just ask the president of Houlihan’s, who tracked her down in Australia to seek her counsel. Claire

When Jean Farinelli was growing up, she would chat up the customers of her parents’ hairdressing salon and ask them if they wanted the interior of their ...

WEEKLY WEB WATCH: Moves to shut down fan sites could result in PR headaches

There used to be a rather charming Web site dedicated to the teenage wizard Harry Potter, hero of the best selling Harry Potter children’s book series written ...

MEDIA: Salon.com offers controversy and opportunity - Hot dot-com Salon.com probably isn’t the first place PR pros think to pitch. But, as Claire Atkinson reports, that attitude could mean a missed opportunity

If you’re in PR and you’re not pitching Web space Salon.com, then why the hell not?

MEDIA WATCH: DoubleClick’s words of comfort aren’t comforting

Last week, Media Watch examined the increased attention given to the security of Internet sites. In a related topic this week, there has been increased debate over ...

CORPORATE SURVEY REPORT 2000: How is corporate communications valued as we enter the new millennium? PRWeek surveys America’s companies to find the answer

It’s not easy to figure out the corporate PR landscape. On the one hand, PR is widely held to be more important and is more respected ...

MARKET FOCUS: VIRGINIA - Virginia: tobacco to tech. A rural haven, just around the corner from DC, Virginia is now at the center of the Internet economy, and tech PR is hotter than ever. Steve Lilienthal reports

Not long ago the land adjoining I-66, which links Washington with Dulles Airport, was rolling farmland. Now, where horses grazed, tech workers gaze an online horizon. Virginians ...

PR TECHNIQUE: CRISIS PLANS - Putting together a crisis plan that sticks. Most companies have crisis plans, which, when the crisis hits, they ignore. Sherri Deatherage Green explores what goes into a good crisis plan - and how to develop one that people wi

Crisis-communications plans can be good examples of poet Robert Burns’ ’best laid schemes o’ mice and men.’ They often go awry, maybe because mice naturally tend to ...