Remember my post last month about the PR agency that wanted to “partner” with my blog, to increase awareness of their client’s event among parent bloggers?
After spending a good chunk of time on the phone and me saying I didn't think their idea would work, and suggesting an alternative campaign idea and title, they confirmed they wanted to partner with me, and asked me to come down to London to talk in more detail. Then I asked about their budget and they told me “We’re looking for this to be content-focused rather than something we have budget for. Is that okay?”
When I politely said that as a blogger I would look at content they wanted to send me, but I couldn’t devote time and travel to creating that content for them, for free, the PR rather snippily said that was fine, they’d come up with their own ideas. A few minutes later, I accidentally received an email from that PR with the words “complete waste of time” on them. Apparently, though, it was sent to me completely by accident and wasn’t related to me in any way whatsoever.
Then today, I see the campaign I proposed to the PR agency has been launched. EXACTLY the campaign I suggested. Right down to the title.
Now, I’ve been a freelancer long enough to know there’s no copyright on ideas and the agency isn’t doing anything WRONG as such. But I'm still feeling cranky about it. Wouldn't it have been polite to at least email me and say, "It was a great idea, hope you don't mind but we're going to run with that?" Gits.
