(image cred)

Curious to see what people's gut reaction to a brand's logo is? Check out Brand Tags.

The site's descriptor reads:

The basic idea of this site is that a brand exists entirely in people's heads. Therefore, whatever it is they say a brand is, is what it is. 1.1 million + tags and counting. Feeling feisty? Try battle mode.

Our brother blog AgencySpy checked out the service and wrote, "the system provides you with a logo for a brand and then asks you to fill in the first one or two words which come to mind."

The man behind the site, Noah Brier has also done well promoting the service, with recent stories in the Wall Street Journal, NPR, Consumerist and Advertising Age, among others.

There are always so many webinars out there, and with a busy schedule, it's hard to choose which ones to sign up for. This one from PRWeek seems well worth it.

"Interacting with Social Media to Strengthen Communication Strategies" will cover the following topics:

-The latest industry and vertical trends in brand monitoring and social media participation

-How to use social media to bolster marketing and communication strategies

-What communications benefits can be gained from engaging with online communities and customers directly

-How you can achieve ROI from social media participation

-How Dell is driving results by monitoring, tracking, and engaging in social media

The webinar will feature Jeff Zabin, research analyst, customer management practice, Aberdeen Group, Bob Pearson, VP of communities and conversations, Dell, and Blake Cahill, SVP of marketing, Visible Technologies

Free registration here.

(image: clipart.com)

Looking to brush up on your skills during the slower summer months? Check out these upcoming mediabistro PR courses, including one on social media being taught by yours truly:

Intro to Public Relations (7/24, Online)
What you need to know to get your foot in the door

Intermediate Public Relations (7/10, Online)
How to create annual PR plans, master media interviews, and analyze results

Social Media for PR Professionals (7/9, New York)
Learn how to integrate social media into your PR and marketing strategy

Any PR pro worth their salt knows that getting ahead of the next story is a key goal to any campaign, but not always that easy. Often, the first one there has a chance to frame the conversation and in turn, reap the results.

RLM PR CEO and Bad Pitch blogger Richard Laermer gives an excellent example today, via the Microsoft / Yahoo ongoing saga:

When the deal fell apart, Microsoft was smart and engaged the press early. Their PR team reached out and massaged reporters, putting the blame squarely on Yahoo.

The press painted a picture that made Microsoft seem reasonable and open to negotiations. Microsoft's flexibility was met by an unwillingness on the part of Yahoo to negotiate or cooperate. The reason the deal fell apart had nothing to do with the suddenly valiant Microsoft; it fell apart because Yahoo was unreasonable.

Certainly, Yahoo felt the heat both from the press and shareholders. This everything to do with shareholder Carl Icahn's rumored proxy fight, and the continued impression of the Yahoo board as irresponsible.

As Laermer notes, "The effect PR has goes way beyond people liking you, your product or your company. Always be the first person/company/whatever talking to the press. If it's not you it's your competition. Beat them to the punch; put your brand, your spin and your ideas out there."

How often do you hire out for a skilled writer? Sometimes? Never?

Mike Stelzner is a freelancer for CopyBlogger who makes over $300K a year writing white papers.

He has a new video that "reveals how he went from desperate to knee-deep in lucrative new business...all thanks to a single white paper."

(image via gawker)

Both AdWeek and PRWeek covered the Hunter College PR controversy yesterday, which may be have been the first time we've ever seen the trades publications both cover the same story in one day.

According to AdWeek, who first broke the news, a PR course at Hunter College in New York, "was funded by a $10,000 grant from Coach and was part of a college outreach campaign by the International AntiCounterfeiting Coalition (IACC), a trade group that includes Coach and other brands like Apple, Levi Strauss & Co., Louis Vuitton and Rolex."

This course resulted in the students creating a fake character, Heidi Cee, who "lost" her coach bag and posted fliers all over campus looking for help. Fake blogs, Myspace and Facebook pages were created for fake Heidi, drawing thousands of hits, while interspersing anti-counterfeiting messages from IACC.

Andrew Adam Newman wrote in AdWeek, "One day, Cee blogged that another student had returned the bag. A day later, she wrote that on closer inspection, the bag was a fake and she had been scammed for the reward. Outraged ("EFFING COUNTERFEIT!" she wrote), Cee blogged that she was researching the world of counterfeit goods. She discovered, she wrote, that they're linked to criminal activity, child labor and terrorism."

Wow, it's easier to get college kids to scam people on the internet than we thought.

Of course, it all comes down to money, as some faculty see this as a way to "butter up Coach's CEO, Lew Frankfort, a Hunter alumnus, who several months later [after the class] donated $1 million to the school."

One NYC agency CEO told PRNewser, "bad enough that Coach is encouraging obfuscation here, but the fact that apparently no professors or students at Hunter raised a red flag is particularly disturbing..."

Happy Monday, faithful readers. A colleague sent us this image the other day. We've also seen it on Flickr and wanted to share it with you. The image comes from Neutron LLC.

Publicist Jeremy Walker contemplates retirement and then dishes his perspective on the business of film PR, in a column on indieWIRE.

A key take away - and something many of us aren't in the position to say: don't fake it. Says Walker:

It makes sense that a person who promotes movies will probably also be a person who loves movies, but what journalist should trust a publicist who loves every movie? I've found over the years that to love a movie is not enough reason to take it on; instead I have learned to only take on movies that I love and that I can actually do something with.

We couldn't agree more, but unfortunately the choice is not always that simple.

[Hat tip: Defamer]

Earlier today, we gave you a free report on social media monitoring and measurment. Now, courtesy of Marketing Sherpa, check out a free case study posted today on how to get higher search ranking and clickthrough rates for your press releases.

It's only free until Feb. 13th, so grab it now while you can!

There are several interesting PR webinars this week. Catching Flack mentions a few:

PRWeek webinar: The Changing World of Business News
Tuesday, January 22 @ noon Eastern. Speakers will include:
-Rafat Ali, founder and editor, ContentNext Media
-Mick Weinstein, editor-in-chief, Seeking Alpha
-Chris Peacock, executive editor and vice president, CNNMoney.com
-Shawn Dainas, group manager, worldwide communications, Sun Microsystems

Dow Jones webinar: Latest Trends in Social Media: How to Listen Effectively and Engage in the Conversation, Thursday, Jan. 31, 12:30 EST. Speakers will include:
-Jeremiah Owyang, Senior Analyst at Forrester Research and former Director of Corporate Media Strategy at PodTech.net
-Glenn Fannick, Product Development Manager at Dow Jones

One more after the jump.

continued...