Understanding Dosages For Prescription Drugs - Q&A

Over the course of the last fifteen years, I've had a lot of involvement with pharmaceutical compliance and persistence programs. As a matter of fact, I had the pleasure to work with Dr. Dorothy Smith who wrote the book Understanding Prescription Drugs. But before that, as a general consumer, I always had questions like: What does four times a day really mean? Of course, such questions were much harder to have answered quickly without access to the Internet (I didn't have Internet access prior to 1994 and tools like WebMD, the Mayo Clinic Family Handbook Online, the Diabetes Pharmacist Blog, and Consumer-Health didn't exist back then). I do remember being able to chat with my local pharmacist during business hours. We were on a first name basis and he would deliver prescriptions to our door if we were too sick to walk one block to the apothocary.

Today, Joel Shpigel, the Diabetes Pharmacist, answers a number of these questions in his blog. I urge you to check it out! And when you're done, check out his online pharmacy (Focus Express Mail Pharmacy). It's nice to know there's a place to go where you actually get to speak to a friendly pharmacist, ask questions and get your prescriptions filled without the hastle of walking into a giant store only to be confronted with candy, high-calorie snacks, sodas and all the other highly-marketed carbs that contribute to obesity and diabetes!

PR for Lawyers Tip #5: Establish Your Key Messages

Key messages are thoughts, words or phrases that embody the main ideas that you and your firm would like to express to your target audiences. Key messages must be clear, concise and memorable and must also align with your business objectives. Focusing on a few key messages is vital to effective communication. Through your primary key messages, you will communicate your overall message: who you are, what you do, what your clients need from you, and what services and benefits you will deliver to them. You should also create secondary key messages that communicate the nature of underlying or derivative needs. Secondary key messages are used to communicate specific needs or wants that may arise during the course of your business practices which reinforce your primary key messages.

For the next step in your public relations planning, check back next Monday for The PR Lawyer’s Tip #6.
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Excerpt from Everyday Public Relations for Lawyers, Copyright 2007. Furia Rubel Communications, Inc. To purchase book, click here.

Save a Tree with Catalog Choice

I was sent a link today to a great resource: Catalog Choice https://www.catalogchoice.org/ The service allow you to eliminate unwanted catalogs that come in the mail. It's an excellent tool to clear the clutter and think green. I'll bet my favorite productivity expert, Neen James, and my favorite cleaning service, Harmony Clean, will love this tool - that's if they don't already know about it....

And to all those Aussie's out there, Happy Australia Day!!! I look forward to celebrating with our Aussie friends here in the U.S.A.....

Gina Furia Rubel's Book Signing - January, 23rd 2008

Furia Rubel is excited to announce Gina Furia Rubel's first official local book signing tomorrow evening at the Willow Grove Barnes & Noble (across from the Willow Grove Mall). Gina will be participating in the annual Barnes & Noble “Writers’ Night” where she will be joined by other local authors to greet guests and sign and display her newly published book, “Everyday Public Relations for Lawyers.”

We would like to extend an invitation for everyone to come out and join us for Gina's first local book signing. We hope you to see you there. For additional information on the event see details below.

Thank you in advance for your continued support.

Sincerely,
The Furia Rubel Team
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What: Writers’ Night Book Signing - Featuring Gina Furia Rubel, Esq.

When: Wednesday, January 23, 2008

Where: Barnes & Noble
102 Park Avenue - Willow Grove, Pa. 19090

Time: 7:00 pm to 9:00 pm

PR for Lawyers Tip #4: Define Your Target Audience

Out of respect for Martin Luther King Day next Monday, The PR Lawyer is sharing its weekly PR for Lawyers Tip early. Check it out.

With regard to your public relations efforts, do you know exactly who you want to influence? These people are better known as your target audiences, and they should be defined as precisely and accurately as possible. Your target audiences should be the thought leaders and decision makers who will ultimately affect your firm’s bottom line. For most law firms, target audiences include current clients, prospective clients, referring counsel and firm employees. To help you define your target audiences further see some of the following questions below:
- Where are my target audiences?
- What are the demographics of this audience?
- In what industries do my target audiences work?
- What publications do my target audiences read?

How to Create Wealth and Freedom in Your Law Practice

Thank you, Cole Silver for the wonderful accolades on my book, Everyday Public Relations for Lawyers, which by the way, is now available via direct order, PayPal or via Amazon.

Cole says, "Gina Furia Rubel, Esquire, one of the nation's most distinquished PR experts for lawyers and law firms has just written a electrifying book entitled "Everyday Public Relations for Lawyers", which is absolutely wonderful and packed full of great advice and powerful ideas to promote your firm and practice
in a highly effective and cost efficient manner. If you want to build a
brand, create the visibility you deserve, and not spend an arm and a leg on
traditional advertising...you have got to get her book, which can be found
at: http://www.furiarubel.com/

I've also had the opportunity to read Cole's book: How
to Create Wealth and Freedom in your Law Practice, 101 Powerful Client
Development & Retention Strategies for Attorneys. It's a compendium of
information that no attorney should be without.

Small Business Success: Tips for the Small Entrepreneur

In a CNN video report, Small Business Tips, Jennifer Westhoven of CNN offers tips on how to grow your company and keep employees happy and loyal.

Westhoven explains that competitiveness is key to success for the small business entrepreneur…at first. As time goes on, she explains you must ease your competitive instincts to keep not only yourself sane, but also your employees.

Do you have small business tips of your own? Go to cnn.com/robin and click on the ireport icon on the right-hand side of the toolbar and share your small business tips for success and possibly be shared in future reports.

PR for Lawyers Tip #3: Handling Perception

It is essential to ask yourself what you want people to think, say or do when they hear about you, your firm or your services. How do you want to be positioned or perceived? What type of business lifestyle do you live? This is your position statement. You also need to determine how you are currently perceived. Talk to significant others, closest friends and business colleagues and compile feedback. At the end of the day, you want the most important audiences to perceive you the way you want and need to be perceived.

For the next step in your public relations planning, check back next Monday for The PR Lawyer’s Tip #4.
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Excerpt from Everyday Public Relations for Lawyers, Copyright 2007. Furia Rubel Communications, Inc. To purchase book, click here.

Hi everyone, What a...

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Philadelphia Bar's Chancellor's Reception Means Great Networking

Last night I had the pleasure to attend the Philadelphia Bar Association's Annual Chancellor's Reception in honor of A. Michael Pratt, only the third African American to serve as Chancellor in the 206-year history of the13,000 member Philadelphia Bar Association.

The event took place in the Grand Ballroom of the Park Hyatt Philadelphia at the Bellevue from 5 to 7 p.m. but it went on much longer. When I arrived at 6 p.m. the receiving line was snaked through two hallways and the hotel security were holding individuals on the first floor waiting for the line to subside. I just kept thinking, "Go Michael." It was great to see such a large and diverse turn out at such a great networking event.

Networking is the quintessential public relations tool. And what a night it was. I ran into colleagues that I haven't seen in many years - as far back as grade school!

Some of the other notables that I had the chance to see were Immediate-Past Chancellor Jane Leslie Dalton, Chancellor-Elect Sayde J. Ladov and Vice Chancellor Scott F. Cooper, Past Chancellors Carl Primavera, Abraham C. Reich, and Andrew A. Chirls, my dear friend and legal PR pro, Dan Cirucci, and my loving father Richard F. Furia, just to name a few. Needless to say, it's a must attend event!

According to a press release issued by Mark Tarasiewicz of the Philadelphia Bar Association, "The annual Chancellor's Reception has been a longstanding Philadelphia tradition. Even the city's busiest and most successful legal luminaries as well as community, city and state leaders patiently wait in a long line to wish the Chancellor good luck in the year ahead. At times, the line of nearly1,000 well-wishers will flow through the ballroom foyer, around corridors and down the escalator that leads guests to the ballroom level." How right indeed.

Bill Gates Public Relations Brilliance at It's Best: From Gina Rubel

Okay, so this morning, my husband e-mailed me a link to Bill Gates Last Day CES Clip. It's a seven minute video spoof (toast or roast -- as you will) of Bill Gate's supposed last day at Microsoft which was aired earlier this week at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas.

The video is public relations brilliance at it's best. . . and what money can buy! I can only imagine how much this video must have cost. It's star studded with Hillary Clinton, Barack Obama, Brian Williams, Matthew McConaughey, George Clooney, Bono of U-2, Steven Spielberg and Jay-Z! Wow. Now that's power to say the least.

Here's what some others are saying about the video:

Reel Pop (Steve Bryant): http://www.reelpopblog.com/2008/01/what-will-bill.html#trackback

Wired (Jose Fermoso): http://blog.wired.com/gadgets/2008/01/ces-2008-bill-g.html

e-Week (Joe Wilcox): http://www.microsoft-watch.com/content/corporate/bill_gates_last_day_at_microsoft.html

Seattle Post (Monica Guzman): http://blog.seattlepi.nwsource.com/thebigblog/archives/128984.asp?source=mypi

PR for Lawyers Tip #2: Review Business Goals

Great public relations can substantially accelerate business development cycles, increase audience awareness and help promote rapid growth. Harnessing this power can be a terrific boost—if you proceed with clear objectives and remain true to your core business goals. You therefore need to ask yourself, “Will public relations help our firm achieve the goals we have set out in our business plan?” This is a good time to review or articulate your firm’s core business goals. Understanding your business or performance goals is the first step in defining measurable objectives for a public relations program. When you measure the value of your public relations program, you need to substantiate that public relations has furthered your aspirations. So go back and ask yourself: What are my / my firm’s core business goals?

For the next step in your public relations planning, check back next Monday for The PR Lawyer’s Tip #3.
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Excerpt from Everyday Public Relations for Lawyers, Copyright 2007. Furia Rubel Communications, Inc. To purchase book, click here.

Dick Polman Remembers Judge Lisa Richette - A Perfect Tribute

Dick Polman, a national political colomnist for The Philadelphia Inquirer tells the most brilliant story of the life of Judge Lisa Richette in Obit Magazine. He tells the story of Judge Richette who was a trailblazer for women, attorneys, jurists, Italian-Americans, Philadelphia Justinians, children and the homeless! She was truly one of the most brilliant and yet extremely flamboyant women I've had the pleasure to know. She embraced life and law.

I remember a particular homicide case more that a decade ago when I worked for the Philadelphia Court of Common Pleas. Jude Conroy was the Philadelphia prosecutor. The case was against a couple who left their disabled young child in a crib inside their house - only heated by kerosene - to go out and sell crack and induldge themselves. The house caught on fire and by the time the child was rescued, he was burned over a large percentage of his body. The child lived for months (perhaps seven if my memory is right) in severe pain and then died. It was a bench trial (no jury) and the judge found the couple guilty of homicide. I remember crying in the back of the room for the child and knowing that the judge did the right thing. She came down so hard on those parents - her words stung deep - but she was right - she was brilliant - she was passionate - and she followed the letter of the law.

Judge Richette was the first woman judge in Philadelphia and an active member of The Justinian Society. As stated so nicely by Rudolph Garcia, Chancellor of The Justinian Society:

"Judge Richette epitomized the ideals of The Justinian Society and was an inspiration to all of us. In 1994, we selected her as the first recipient of the Beccaria Award. Since then, the award has been presented annually by the Justinian Society and the Criminal Justice Section of the Philadelphia Bar Association to a legal jurist, scholar or practitioner for outstanding contributions to the cause of justice and the advancement of legal education. Judge Richette also was the first recipient of The Justinian Society’s Outstanding Women in the Law Award, in June 2000."

Thank you to Dick Polman for remembering Judge Richette. She truly deserves the accolades.

Improving Your Pitches: E-Mail Etiquette

Here is an article on pitching etiquette our team came across that can be a helpful guide for recognizing important aspects of pitching a story to a reporter or responding to a query through e-mail. This article, Tip of the Month: Improving Your E-mail Pitches from Top to Bottom is written by Aliza Sherman, a freelance reporter from Entrepreneur Magazine. In this article, Sherman provides tips on how to improve your chances on getting your client’s story published. The topics include:

1. Focusing Your Subject Line
2. Directly Addressing A Query
3. Creating An Interesting Client Bio
4. Avoiding Clichés
5. Placing Press Releases In An E-Mail
6. Making Follow-Ups Clear And Concise
7. Attaching Files To Reporters

For more information, go to the article Tip of the Month: Improving Your E-mail Pitches from Top to Bottom.

Planning Your Communications Before Choosing Your Tacticians

Earlier this week, Kevin O'Keefe notes in a post that Law firm Internet marketing to grow in 2008 : Warning to large law marketing & PR heads. He says:

"In 2008, it'll be up to you employed in large firms and PR agencies advising large law to assess whether you really know what you are doing when marketing via social networking. If not, it's time to get some help rather than dismissing marketing mediums you don't understand. Dismissing innovation only hurts the law firm and is ultimately going to cost you your job."

Kevin makes a good point. It is so important to work with experts who know what they're doing in every area of marketing whether it's direct marketing, social media, public relations or trade advertising. But first, law firms need to assess their communications plans and make sure their plans have solid and measurable goals and objectives. Once they know what they want to accomplish, then, and only then, should they determine which tactics will be best to reach their target audiences effectively and efficiently.

PR for Lawyers Tip # 1: Understand Public Relations

Public relations is the art and science of proactive advocacy on the part of acompany, individual or brand. It requires strategic management of your positionstatement and key messages in order to reach your target audiences, andthrough various tactics, establish good will and a mutual understanding. In short, effective use of public relations tools allows us to shape public opinion, attitudes and beliefs. Utilizing public relations is much like crafting an openingstatement for a jury trial: you will painstakingly strategize about which facts youshould initially reveal to the jury, which heartstrings (if any) you want to tug,the tempo and timing of your delivery, and the information you deliver last inorder to achieve a long-term impact.

In the big scheme of legal communications, “marketing” is the overall umbrella term under which many forms of communications fall. The “marketing” of a law firm often entails:

-Advertising

-Business Development

-Client Services

-Marketing (brochures, Web sites, direct mail, etc.)

-Sponsorships

-Public Relations

The public relations portion of your firm’s marketing must be a strategic part of a carefully considered marketing plan so that it complements the branding,advertising, business development, client services, sponsorships and othercommunication initiatives. The role of public relations is to help build thefirm’s brand equity by delivering key messages to target audiences to elicit aparticular response and thus shape public opinion, attitudes and beliefs. Inother words, PR is the method by which we communicate messages about ourselves, our firms, and our understanding of the law and the cases we handle onan everyday basis.

The practice of public relations differs from marketing andadvertising. PR promotes and builds awareness and acceptance; the immediategoal is often based in the positioning of the firm; you have less control over themedia placements; and the messages tend to be viewed as more credible.
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Excerpt from Everyday Public Relations for Lawyers, Copyright 2007. Furia Rubel Communications, Inc. To purchase book, click here.