PR advice I found in ESPN The Magazine

A few weeks ago I ran across a bit of sound Public Relations advice in ESPN The Magazine that has been rattling around in my head as I've been thinking over it.

ESPN The Magazine has a regular column that starts off 7 Things You Should Know About and each issue has a short list of interesting bits of sports information on things like Running a Small-market Basketball Team or Being a Low-ranked Tennis Player or being an NHL Referee or (you get the idea.)

The Good Advice
One recent list in their 7 Things You Should Know About was on Designing Golf Equipment by By Jeff Colton, Senior Vice President of Research and Development, Callaway Golf (as told to Amanda Angel.)

Here's the one that jumped out at me:

2. WE'RE ALWAYS WATCHING. "Not only do we keep an eye on other sports, but we also study the automotive industry and architecture. In 1996, we replaced the metal head on a stainless steel fairway wood with lightweight carbon because we saw how BMW boosted the performance of its high-end coupes by replacing aluminum and steel roofs with a composite. We translate advances in different industries to our clubs." [emphasis mine]

This is really good advice for PR professionals. We need to be aware, reading, studying, analyzing, anything to keep tabs on other industries to see what is/is not working for them.

It is imperative to pay attention to advances in different industries and see what could be applied to our own even if some people in other industries don't think it's important to look at ours.