Brad Marley

At some point in your career (if you haven't done it already) you will send an e-mail to a colleague or client that will cause spontaneous swearing to emanate from your cubical while you frantically click 'Recall', hoping in vain that you were quick enough to stop the e-mail in question from leaving your inbox.

Unfortunately the Web is merciless when it comes to retrieving inadvertent e-mail.  I mean, do we really believe it when we're told an e-mail has been successfully recalled?  I didn't think so.  

In public relations, a profession that tends to "live in the inbox," realizing too late that we sent a reporter the wrong e-mail is what keeps us up at night; it's why I compulsively re-read my e-mail ten times before I click 'Send.'  And that doesn't take into account the constant clicking of the spell check button. 

The relationship with the home & garden blogger at the Joplin Globe that you worked so hard to establish can be wiped out with one e-mail that describes the lurid details of your best friend's bachelor party, when you really meant to send a fact sheet on the different types of backyard fountains to accent bird feeders.

Whoops.

But what happens when the tables are turned?  What do you do when the reporter sends you the wrong e-mail?  You can't turn down that relationship.

I once had a reporter send me an e-mail in response to my pitch that was clearly meant to go to his editor.  In it, he begged and pleaded with his tongue firmly planted in his cheek not to be forced to attend the event.

After a discussion with my boss about how to handle this unique opportunity, I replied to the reporter's response, indicating that I must have been mistaken in thinking his beat matched the focus of the event.

Even though I did not get a story out of him, he did reply to say it sounded like a great event.

Sympathy points, I guess.

Regardless, I could have left that e-mail in my inbox.  But with the proper guidance from my superiors, I took a chance and, without directly saying it, let the reporter know that I knew he didn't mean to send me the e-mail.

And maybe, just maybe, the next time he saw an e-mail from me, he'd throw me a bone.

At the very least, he would remember my name.

In public relations, that's half the battle.