PR Snafu Outs LG Phone Before Its Time

Cross-Pacific communication can be a pain in the rear. Especially when coordinating product announcements. Unfortunately for Alltel and LG USA, corporate LG in Korea announced a new phone before LG USA and Alltel were prepared. The news (about a fancy new touch-screen phone) caught them off-guard. Bloggers -- ever at the ready -- took the opportunity and ran.Attention PR managers. If you think bloggers aren't paying attention to the news that happens in other countries, don't kid yourself. That's exactly what happened in the case of the LG Glimmer.

Sometime in the wee hours of the night, Telecoms Korea, an English-language Korean telecom site, published a small news item about the LG Glimmer. The phone, which is a slider that has a 2.8-inch touch screen, 2-megapixel camera, Bluetooth, and a microSD slot, is set to be released on Alltel. The site even had a picture of the phone with Alltel branding on it. The news had reached Telecoms Korea via the LG corporate PR team over in South Korea. Too bad they didn't inform LG USA and Alltel about the announcement.

I saw the news item in my feeds, and called Alltel about it. They were like, "Uh, that phone hasn't been announce yet." Well, in fact, it had. Just not in the United States. By 11 a.m., just about every mobile blog had run the item.

It just goes to prove the power of the Web, and the blogosphere, to dig up even the smallest news items from overseas and put them to good use.

As for the phone, it's similar in respect to the Venus, which was released on Verizon Wireless in November. This time around, more than just the navigation cluster is touch-enabled. The entire display is a touch screen. But for those not willing to give up a regular numeric keypad, the screen slides up and reveals the keypad underneath.

No word on how much it will cost and when it goes on sale, but I am sure LG USA and Alltel will figure that all out at some point and let us know.