Marketing

"We don't tell them not to write" about bad experiences, "but most want to only write positive things," said Stacy Becker of Coyne Public Relations.

To promote its state insurance program, Oklahoma is paying $3.1 million over three years to local media company Griffin Communications. Griffin's bid for the state contract touted its "built-in network of companies to deliver the message," including television stations KWTV in Oklahoma City and KOTV and KQCW in Tulsa, and the 34 stations of the Radio Oklahoma Network. The Insure Oklahoma campaign spokesperson is former KWTV reporter Angela Buckelew, who "appears during news programming" on KWTV, KOTV and KQCW.

Two years ago, CBS Sports anchor Greg Gumbel "signed a 5-year contract with Paul Doug Scott's EncoreTV to appear as host for, what turned out to be, a Florida infomercial company," reports Rhonda Roland Shearer. Gumbel's agent told her, "It wasn't supposed to be an infomercial.

The narrow election win of Mauricio Funes as President of El Salvador has spurred extensive media coverage on the political success of the Farabundo Marti National Liberation Front, a center-left party that has its roots in the guerilla movement of the 1980s. However, none of the media coverage mentions the role of the Washington D.C.-headquartered political consulting firm Greenberg Quinlan Rosner.