Guest post by Susan Daniels

Good public relations comes down to talent and luck. The former entails a bit of imagination and willingness to challenge suppositions; for instance, recent PR graduates from online universities would prove their mettle by describing the experience as a “demonstration of preference for technology and ability to work independently.” The latter consists of taking the never-ending swirl of ongoing activity around you and harnessing it for the bettering or preservation of your brand. While not always pretty, when your brand is on the line, it’s always necessary.

Consider the recent drama in the United Kingdom over alleged phone hacks of government officials and private citizens by members of the press in collaboration with members of the government itself. For about two weeks, News International founder Rupert Murdoch found his entire media empire being scrutinized for alleged abhorrent practices. Then there was a horrendous killing spree in Norway, the economy took a turn for the worse, and violence fell hard upon the streets of London and other British towns, which consumed the news cycle putting the phone hack inquiry on the back burner.

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Whenever dealing with potential or existing customers, try to apply this simple rule: make sure you never, ever offend them. Because insults are not the best tool there is to get new business your way. Now that we’ve already remembered this simple rule, someone should really tell Ryanair! They apparently weren’t awake when this was taught…

What brought this on? A friend pointed out this intriguing story on Wired about Ryanair offending a blogger through comments. So what did the blogger do? He thought he had discovered a security leak and wrote about it. And later admitted he was too quick to expose a threat that wasn’t really there. Ryanair’s spokesperson admitted it was them spreading out the bad words. Don’t dream of an apology though, actually, here’s what they said, according to the same Wired article:

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