Is this the way things are going? 

I expect you’ve heard journalists – not least me – go on about the dangers of the chasing email before. There’s little more likely to grind our gears than a barrage of follow-ups and circle-backs. Generally, if a subject is of interest, we do respond (well most of us do); although I think I’ve also pointed out that if it’s PR I know and they have a good instinct for what usually floats my boat, a nudge or two is actually useful.

Which all leads me to a recent email from an agency I didn’t know, about a subject I can sometimes be interested in… chocolate. However since it was about the “world’s most expensive” and was very limited – I’d have to ask for a sample on request – I didn’t think it was right to follow up. 

I got a chase email on Saturday (in fact I was in the office on that day thanks to the way we rota senior staff these days) and it made me wonder why the PR needed a response – so I read it more closely and there were plenty of references to content creation, unboxing videos and named influencers. I looked closer at the agency and they’re SEO specialists, rather than what I’d call straight PR. They use data and search to get quantifiable results for products – which is very different to the old days of clippings and mentions.

Is this the way things are going? They name several editorial outlets that have covered the brand. I’m interested to find out more and look forward to a catch-up with the experts at and via Roxhill.