Welcome back leaders!
Thank you for the great feedback from last week’s newsletter.
If you missed how to master LinkedIn interview with Alicia Teltz I highly recommend you read later today.
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This week I sat down with Andy Barr.
He has been at the centre of PR and crisis comms for the last 30 years.
Andy was one of the pioneers of digital/online PR and has many war stories to share.
As we get into in the interview, Andy and I were one time competitors and have often spoken at the same events but haven’t had chance to sit down and really break everything down. So this week, we finally did.
It’s a wide ranging conversation from how to win PR, when to work with press and journalists, how to think about modern day crisis comms and why black hat AI and agentic is going to cause many CMOs major headaches.
I highly recommend you listen or watch the whole interview but if you’re short on time right now, I’ve broken down the Q&A and the most important takeaways and my hidden gems below:
Listen
Watch
Important Timestamps:
1:30 - What Works In PR Right Now?
3:21 - How To Run Reactive Newsjacking
5:57 - How To Cut Through The PR Noise
10:38 - When To Work With Press Versus Going Direct
13:49 - When To Leverage Founder Led Channels
18:04 - When Saying Nothing Is The Best Tactic
18:19 - The Crisis Comms Playbook
22:32 - Why You Must Go And Meet Your Haters
28:40 - The Rise Of AI Misinformation & Manipulated PR
36:39 - How To Fix OpenAI’s Reputation
By Danny Denhard - Coaching marketing & growth leaders, consulting with marketplaces and challenger brands and advising business leaders
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The Current State of PR & Media Tactics
Q: What tactics are you seeing working today?
“Effective storytelling” remains the primary tactic that successfully translates across every modern platform.
High-authority tier-one media is still relevant, but Andy highlights the power of online communities like Reddit and how far it now reaches.
Reddit has “almost replaced Press Association,” and a strong placement there can drive enough traffic to “cause a client’s site to fall over”.
Q: What is going to work in PR for the next 12 months?
“Reactive newsjacking” as the absolute fastest way to build a brand from the ground up.
Andy suggests for leaders to ignore the buzz around “AI PR” or “GEO PR” as nonsense compared to the speed and effectiveness of reactive media.
Q: Are there core areas that you know are gonna work almost every time?
PR professionals should “lean into the news agenda” and align their reactive content with what is currently trending.
Incorporating high-interest topics like “TikTok,” “OpenAI,” and “ChatGPT” into reactive pitches is a quick way to gain coverage.
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Modern PR requires a combination of strategic ideation, tactical execution, and technical knowledge to get through the noise.
Q: Is there a framework people could borrow to get that cut-through with journalists?
The framework for successful reactive PR centers on “speed and quirkiness”.
Providing a “memorable quote” is essential to sticking in a journalist’s mind and building a long-term roster relationship.
Barr notes that being memorable is key: “If you’re memorable, even for being an idiot, people come back to you”.
Media Relations & Direct Communications
Q: When should people use the press?
Andy’s rule of thumb is to “use press all the time” to maintain a consistent brand presence.
He advises building relationships with the “freelance army” that now powers many major media titles.
Brands should follow a “proactive schedule of going to media every two or three weeks” with high-quality data or vibrant stories.
Q: Is there a rule of thumb for going direct via founder-led or employee-generated content?
Successful brands like Marks & Spencer demonstrate the power of “amplifying their other members of their sort of C-suite or senior leadership team”. Here is the example of M&S’s Director of Product Development Kathryn Turner we discussed
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LinkedIn is currently “really powerful for brand building” when used for consumer-facing or trade-focused executive messaging.
The modern media landscape demands “rich content,” such as video, to accompany traditional reports and findings.
If you’d like to dive into ECG further, Chris Hutchings and I went deep last year - watch on YouTube
Q: When should brands literally say nothing?
In crisis situations, “apologise without admitting liability” and then take a strategic period of time out of the media spotlight.
Going quiet helps “take the fuel out of the fire” and prevents reactive statements from generating new rounds of questioning.
Andy advocates for “letting your stakeholders and ambassadors fill that gap” in the news media instead of the brand itself.
The Future of AI & Reputation Management
Q: Are you seeing any black hat or gray hat tactics to manipulate AI models?
Andy predicts a shift into “AI skullduggery,” mirroring the early days of SEO “skullduggery” and black hat tactics.
Misinformation is a growing risk because “AI is confusing repetition with fact” and filling knowledge gaps with potentially fake data.
The next major PR battle will be countering deliberate misinformation that competitors or bad actors place into AI training sets.
Q: What would you do to help save ChatGPT’s reputation?
Andy’s primary advice was to “get some grownups in the room” who can make strong PR-led decisions at the C-suite level.
OpenAI needs to address internal conflicts, such as having “two CMOs,” and establish a unified “content strategy” that moves away from “shooting at the hip”.
Barr suggests that CEO Sam Altman should “step away from doing any comms for a bit” and focus on showcasing product expertise rather than headline-grabbing statements.
My Hidden Gems
Here are my personal gems from the interview that you will likely miss if you don’t get chance to listen or watch the interview in full:
Andy rightly points out that AI models are beginning to confuse repetition with truth. Something to leverage or address.
While everyone talks about the "shrinking media," Andy points out that the power has shifted from employed journalists to a massive, underpaid, but incredibly hungry "freelance army. This might be something you look to double down in with the mass layoffs and move to independent journalism.
Andy admits he looked like an "idiot" for his infamous Loch Ness quote right before the housing crash. But that "idiot" moment kept him on the BBC's expert roster for two decades.
Crises are often caused by stupidity, not malice - it is a key takeaway when the next time you enter the war room and remember positive intent
We point out that the OpenAI’s leaders aren't acting like CEOs; they are acting like "alpha geeks" competing for the smartest-guy-in-the-room title not for the best CEO or best company leader - well worth remembering with your boss or for your company.
👉 Please go and connect with Andy on LinkedIn and watch his great TikTok’s - he really has been there, seen it and done it.
This Week Doses: There were a few launches this week that flew under the radar, you might want to see:
Thanks for reading this week, we land in your inboxes again next week with the return of Paul Thomas with marketing has an originality problem.
Have a good weekend,
Danny Denhard & Harry Lang
