Thank You for Sharing . . . .

I recently used HARO and ProfNet to find sources for an article and was a wee bit surprised by a response from a West Coast "publicist." (Those are air quotes.) While telling me via e-mail why I should interview his client, he wrote:

--One humorous anecdote: One pitch I sent out re a tragic event, I received this response from a press person: "Just one word: Vulture."--

Yes, this is "humorous," but my reasons for laughing aren't the same as his. I'm laughing because he's sharing something that makes him look like a knucklehead. Or a chucklehead. Why would he share this? What was the point? We had not had any contact before this little gem arrived in my inbox, so it's not like he had any sense that we were kindred spirits. In any case, it did not endear me to him or to his client.

Please use this example as yet another warning from me to either stop being a goofball with your pitches to reporters or, if you're on the client side, to monitor what your publicist is doing on your behalf. This guy is a good fit for clients who share his value system (his point in a subsequent sentence was, essentially, "I'll do anything to get my clients in the press."), but not a good fit for others, I'm sure.