I had decided that I could use some P.R. help with my new Blues CD and called Rainmaker P.R., which has a featured ad with Tunecore.
After extensive questioning of the proprieter of Rainmaker (Rhonda), She gave her guarantee that this would be elementary for her. She claimed access to all of the national magazines that I needed to be in and told me, very confidently, to prepare to sell a lot of CDs.
My investment was roughly $2900.00 for a six month campaign, but after delivering payment, I was instructed not to call again but keep my correspondence limited to email. I accepted this as meaning she was busy and on the project. Within a few weeks, she informed me that she didn't like the way the Blues magazines did business and refused to deal with them. I am a Blues musician and this became the beginning of our problem. (she never would pin down a start and end date for the campaign).
I made the initial payment to her on January 15, 2008. By May, I was more than wondering what she was going to do. A few reviews of my CD started to trickle in but they were all placed in rock music based computer blogs that do not reach Blues fans and zero printed paper magazines, as promised. These reviews were also, obviously, written by people with zero understanding of the Blues genre(even if the review was positive). I called Rhonda to ask her if she couldn't do better than this and she hung up on me after saying "you sound upset".
Needless to say, after being hung up on, I was very upset. She blocked my phone number so that I couldn't call her again. After sended a few emails to her, she finally replied by email, that she was suspending my ad campaign and refunding $800.00 for work not done (that's $2100.00 I lose).
Just today, Oct., 27, 2008, I see a new review for my CD that our label didn't solicit(it's the only way to get a review)with an e-zine named the Slug(see what I mean about irrelavent press) that rips my CD and me personally (reviews are NEVER personal towards the artist) apart. I vey much suspect that this has been submitted by Rhonda, possibly as a final jab.
There are many legitamate P.R. companies out there and I recommend taking your time in finding an honest and legitimate public relations agent.
www.glennpatrik.com