By Gini Dietrich
On the fifth day of Christmas, Spin Sucks gave to you…..five PR books, four PR podcasts, three productivity tools, two Spin Sucks Crazy secrets, and the one PR tool you need for 2016.
Are you beginning to sing along? I just had to change the second day so it would fit better with the tune of the song. It still is a bit off, but who cares? This is fun!
Today we bring you the five PR books you should read. You know this one is hard for me because I read a ton and because I believe PR pros are better storytellers when they read fiction.
That said, I have narrowed it down to just five PR books to add to your must-read list.
Five PR Books Every Pro Should Read
- Spin Sucks. Duh. Can I recommend my own book? It’s my blog! I can do what I want. If you haven’t read Spin Sucks, do it. Do it now! (Though I will tell you some of it is already outdated, but I guess that’s the problem with the publishing industry, as a whole, these days.)
- The New Rules of Marketing and PR. This is probably one of the first PR books I read of the new digital age that I agreed with. So many others were (and still do) talking about how to write news releases and how to pitch media. This book talks about the importance of the evolution of PR and how digital marketing plays into the work we do.
- Eight New Practices for the PR Professional. I liked this book so much that we had Deirdre Breakenridge on Spin Sucks Pro to talk about it and describe the eight new practices. It talks through strategy, through crisis, and—most importantly—through metrics. You know I love that (and her) for the metrics section.
- Trust Me, I’m Lying. OK. I hated this PR book. Hated. It made me really angry and I wrote a scathing review about it (which prompted a phone call from the author). BUT. The more I let it settle in my brain and think about why it bothered me so much, the more I realized every PR pro needs to read it. It may make you as angry as it did me, but that’s okay because it will force you to join the vision of Spin Sucks to call for a better PR industry. So read it. Get angry. And then let’s work together to create a better industry.
- Everybody Writes. Not a PR book, per se, but because everybody does, indeed, write and PR pros come to digital marketing with that skill already learned, I’m calling it one of the best of the year. Even if you write every, single day and you’re a published author and you really know what you’re doing, you’ll glean some tidbits from this book to take back to work. Plus it’s hilarious and, in true Ann Handley style, it’s written gloriously.
Now it’s your turn. What is a PR book everyone should read?
