Posted by Ryan  11/7/2007

Last night I had a telephonic epiphany. I was home alone and wanted to talk to a few friends I had not spoken to in a little while. So I called one friend, no answer. Called another, no answer. By the third friend not answering I am starting to think I am either a dork sitting at home on a Tuesday night or I am being heavily screened. Finally by the fourth call I get through and catch up with a friend from high school that now lives in Boston. While we are catching up I received three other phone calls, all from the people I had previously called. This is where the epiphany comes in. When you really want to talk to someone they are hardly ever available, when you can’t talk they are more than ready and finally if the thing you hate most to do in life is leave messages (it ranks in the top ten on my list) you will be forced to leave them over and over in rapid succession. Which brings me to my workday. Calling editors is part of being in PR; moreover talking to people is part of PR. Get me on the phone with the right person and it is magic. However put me in contact with voicemail and then a longer than average beep to signify that there are more than a few messages in said persons voice mailbox and I start to get flustered. What is the solution to this problem you ask? I have come up with one of my own. First, never leave messages for friends, ever. Second, when you have to leave a message keep it extremely brief and finally if you have a list of people to call expect no one to answer and when you finally get to talk to someone it will be a little bit of a coupe. After all catching up with friends is great but finding out that an editor is in desperate need of a product I represent is worth leaving a few hundred messages.