Are you hiring a Brave Public Relations firm? Seven questions to ask.

I cannot count the number of companies who have told me that they wasted their money on PR. That there was a lot of activity in the beginning and then it dropped off. Or that they did not get what they were promised. Bad PR people give us a all a Bad Name.

Bravery in the PR field is in short supply. Success for most PR people is to keep the client happy and tell them what they want to hear. Often hiring starts with a search - firms come in and they tell the potential client that they know so and so at the NY Times and so and so at the Wall Street Journal and so and so at whatever media they want to be in. They list big name clients on their website as examples of how amazing their work is. They bring in the founder and a couple of senior managers who talk a great game. What they don't tell you is that the client list dates back to when they started in business. That you will only speak to the people in the room again if something goes very wrong.

Here are some questions you can ask and actions you can take to insure you are getting what you pay for.

1. What is your approach to message development and can you provide an example of how you worked with a client to create a successful messaging strategy and implemented it? Please refer to a campaign less than five years old.

2. Which clients on your list are currently active with your firm and can we have the names of a couple of clients for references?

3. Can you give us examples of a few recent stories that you placed for these clients and how you placed them?

4. Are the people in this room the people who will work on my business? If not, who will and can we meet them?

5. Can you give us a couple of examples of how you think - for example, a public relations strategy that ran into problems and how you addressed it with the client and fixed it?

6. What is your annual client retention rate and can we see data on this?

7. How do you use analytic measurements to help guide your PR strategy and how often will I receive these?

8. If I come to you with a pitch that I love such as X,Y, Z how will you implement it? (This is a trick question because a PR firm worth its salt will come to you with ideas and adjust pitches depending on feedback from the media).

9. Can you give us a couple of recent examples of how your social and traditional media strategies were maximized for greater impact?