Who am I? Why am I here?


Posted: May 30th, 2006 | By: Steve Mullen | Filed under: EndGame PR News | 2 Comments

Even though this blog is only a couple of weeks old, this post is probably long overdue. To quote the late Admiral James Stockdale: Who am I? Why am I here? There’s a bio for me on the EndGame PR website, but for space reasons it’s not terribly detailed. Since I have all the space in the world here on the EndGame PR Blog, I’ll expand it!

I grew up in western Loudoun County, which at the time was mostly rural. We lived in three towns there, and in each place we could see cows from one of the windows in the house. When I was a teenager, I thought it was a horribly boring place. Now I realize that was a GOOD thing. The county is now, sadly, an extension of Fairfax County, having added more than a million residents since I moved away.

I came to Richmond to go to the School of Mass Communications at Virginia Commonwealth University (VCU). After graduating from the Broadcast Journalism Track at the school, I went straight into radio news. I truly enjoyed my time as a journalist. I spent most of my time in radio, at WLEE AM , Virginia News Network, and WVNZ AM (which had an all news format at the time, and is now Spanish language.) I also worked in TV for a couple of years as a news producer at WTVR TV, Richmond’s channel 6.

After about seven years as a journalist, I’d had my fill. As I said, I truly enjoyed it and I feel I had a talent for it. However, the money isn’t very good unless you get to be the 6 or 11 p.m. anchor on TV, and that was unlikely since I worked primarily in radio. Also, the hours you work as a journalist STINK. When you get to the top of the profession in radio, you get to work morning drive time. This means you’re up at about 4 a.m. As news director and morning anchor, this is what I did at WVNZ AM. Quite a prize, eh?

So, as many journalists do when they “grow up,” I went into public relations. My first stop was in 1999 at Martin Public Relations at The Martin Agency. MPR later became SLAY Public Relations. The Martin Agency is an OUTSTANDING place to break into the world of advertising, marketing, and PR. I learned immense amounts in a short period of time from my mentors there, and have maintained good relationships with each of them.

After Martin, I went into corporate communications, working as a Senior Public Relations Representative for Circuit City Stores, Inc. My job at the Fortune 200 company was proactive and reactive PR. Essentially, I acted as a spokesperson and also proactively tried to get the reporters to say good stuff about the company and the items it sells. This was tough at times, as the company has a habit of laying people off frequently and I was the one who had to explain why. As it turned out, this was irony, because they eventually laid me off. I finished up with the company in April of 2005. Despite the difficult nature of the work at times, I did enjoy working at CC. I’m a geek at heart, so talking about the latest tech stuff was right up my alley.

When I found myself out of work due to budget cuts at Circuit City, I started hunting feverishly for just the right job. After doing this for a time, and finding that “just right” is hard to find, I decided to just do it myself. I figured if I had to go through a workforce reduction again, it would be easier to break it to myself! And so, EndGame Public Relations was launched. It’s hard to say exactly when I went out “on my own” but I guess I’ll just set the date from the time I picked the name, which was in January of 2006.

These days I work for my own clients from my home office in Mechanicsville, Virginia. Working from home is awesome. I get to see a lot of my two young children, Hannah (4 years) and Jackson (nearly 2 years) with a LOT of help from my mother-in-law and mother.

So, that’s me in a nutshell.

I don’t want to forget about the other part of EndGame PR. My wife, Jennifer, is a very talented PR professional. She also graduated from VCU’s Mass Communications department. In fact, that’s where we met! She also spent time in journalism, working as a news producer at WWBT TV, Richmond’s channel 12. She currently works in the PR office of a large state agency here in Virginia. Her role at EPR is primarily as my editor … making sure my writing makes sense. As time goes on and we grow the business, hopefully her role will expand.

If you have any questions about EndGame Public Relations or myself, please email!

Thanks for visiting!

Steve Mullen
President
EndGame Public Relations
Email: Steve@EndGamePR.com
Web: www.EndGamePR.com

SEO and PR … Becoming Close Friends


Posted: May 25th, 2006 | By: Steve Mullen | Filed under: PR Tactics, SEO PR Tactics | No Comments

One of our clients is a fantastic Search Engine Optimization (SEO) Firm, and I’m so glad for that fact. I’m a tech guy at heart. In fact, you could even call me a bit of a geek (go ahead .. my business partner does it all the time) but I’m finding that this client is teaching me so much. One thing that I’m learning is that SEO and PR are very closely related, and perhaps should be even more closely related.

One tactic that makes a world of sense is writing news releases with SEO in mind. By ensuring that news releases are optimized, companies and their PR reps can kill two birds with one stone. For PR purposes, the release should be newsworthy. For SEO purposes, it should include the proper keywords and links, and be posted on the proper newswires. When you combine the two, not only will you get old style “free” coverage from newspapers, TV and radio, but your news release will migrate around the net to countless other websites and blogsites, each linking back to your site. Each of those links back to your site tells the search engines that your site should be ranked higher.

It’s because of this new SEO PR component that I’m now recommending that my clients distribute a release via PR Newswire or and other web-based newswires at least once per month. The more newsworthy of these releases will be given the full treatment — not only being posted on the newswires, but pitched directly via telephone and email to relevant reporters. The goal is to come up with these “perfect storm release” every 30 days or so.

###

Welcome!


Posted: May 23rd, 2006 | By: Steve Mullen | Filed under: EndGame PR News | No Comments

…to the EndGame PR Blog!
In this space you’ll see articles that discuss public relations, tips on public relations tactics, and sometimes just general musings.   When you’re done taking a look, please head back to EndGame Public Relations and read more about how I can help with your PR needs. 

Sincerely,

Steve Mullen
President, EndGame PR
steve@endgamepr.com

 

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