PR is not Dead

True public relations is a fundamental and helpful part of the communications mix. The issue I have with the question is that it usually comes from the marketing side - those people who have been pushing messaging at us in the first place. Raise your hand if you did PR the spammy way; in that case you need to reinvent yourself and your relevance to the business community.

For the rest of us - we are and have been on the value side of the conversations for a long time.

If you're familiar with junk science, you know that it usually leverages false syllogism to get you to believe certain points as facts when instead they are the construct of the group determined to stir you in a different direction. Personally, I've never been keen of personal agendas - they tend to have the lie built in the question. 

Having said all that. I still get plenty of press release and pitches from practitioners who target me blindly. Do take a moment to ask yourself - is a blanket email worth getting tagged as spam for the duration? Today every professional has the tools to listen to online conversations, why not use them?
Knowing what you're listening for and what to do with your new knowledge can make a difference.

Practicing public relations can lead to a very successful thought leadership program, for example. John Bell at Ogilvy Digital PR jotted down a few ideas for the skills a public relations pro will need in the future. Interesting that one year ago a commenter would push back on digital - more and more people consume their information online. Also, the reason why traditional or mainstream media is still on everyone's radar is that it reaches larger numbers - it scales better, for now.

However, we should not think either/or. Can we stop debating that already? It's both. A couple of weeks ago, I posted about the skills I felt a PR candidate would need. How would such a candidate demonstrate value to the organization?

• don't be afraid to draw a direct line of correlation between PR activities and leads - in digital environments this is possible and a must. Knowledge of search engine optimization techniques is also key - mind you, this means you tag your content truthfully, to be found more easily for what you indeed offer
• educate the organization on the value of speaking with its publics - this is especially helpful in the event of a crisis, which online may happen more frequently and need a faster response
• facilitate conversations with subject matter experts and influencers - whether those be mainstream media or another group
• monitor, listen to, and know what to listen for in conversations - helping insert valuable content at the appropriate time with honesty and transparency
• train and educate technical experts and spokespeople on the importance of being available as resources (John also mentioned it)

The PR industry needs to get with the new reality of conversation - but so does its marketing sibling, and in a big way. I sat in the front row for Brian Halligan's catchy statement at the Inbound Marketing Summit. Good on Brian for elaborating further with the post. I still don't buy the premise. Also see Todd Defren's reaction.

While I have plenty more ideas, I'd like to hear from you. What else do you see in the future of PR?

[image of listening post by Mark Hansen and Ben Rubin]

© 2006-2009 Valeria Maltoni. All rights reserved.

Comments

[Tom Gable]

PR is definitely not dead. It is becoming more important in building long-term reputations as a part of institutional and corporate strategy. What does an organization stand for? What are its core values? Telling the long-term story requires more than news releases and pitching and using a multiplicity of tools and tactics as you suggest, which are all good. It means fundamentally aligning an organization to perform and deliver on the promise over time (walk the talk!) to achieve major objectives. That’s the essence of long-term strategic PR, which is growing in importance in this era of uber-hype and social media babble.

Tom Gable
APR, PRSA Fellow

[Harriet Meth]

It's time to rephrase the question and focus not on whether PR is or is not dead but, rather, how PR practitioners will engage with other teams, technologies and tools to get company stories told and heard.

Valeria, you have outlined some core competencies that will most certainly be a key part of the equation. But I truly believe that, if there is any certainty into how this will all play out, it is that job roles and communication boundaries between marketing, advertising and PR will continue to morph and at times overlap. That's scary stuff for a lot of folks. Of course the other way to look at is it's open territory with lots of potential and upside for those who dare to throw off the blinders.

[Aysel Vandeventer]

I believe the future of all communications positions is ever changing, including PR. Online resources are expanding beyond belief and this leads lots of smaller or medium sized companies to "do PR and marketing on their own." This means we have a lot of people with various backgrounds trying to figure out how to do PR while injecting their opinions and knowledge into the mixture.This could be potentially interesting for the future of PR or it could lead to something more chaotic.

[Valeria Maltoni]

@Tom - you expose that well. I do wonder if organizations have the discipline - and patience - to get there in world for long term continues to be sacrificed to today's results.

@Harriet - it is a period of opportunity and a good thing for the storytellers among us. However, the more programmatic colleagues continue to prevail...

@Aysel - many organizations small and big have folks in marketing who do not understand or have practiced marketing and communications but follow the recipe provided by analysts... That's even more dangerous. I say embrace the storyteller. Story draws people in. Attraction is much more powerful than rational thought.

[Claire Thompson]

Ironically I see us going backwards to a time when PR meant public relations not press release.

(There are still places where press releases are useful background, and in big listed companies a necessity for stock market disclosure purposes, so not kissed goodbye totally - yet.)

But PR practitioners are going to have to become more specialist at reaching out to (targetting, in old speak) specific audiences in different ways through the media selected by the audience(s), be that print, social media, mobile, events, experience.

Because they have more choice than ever we will need to be specialists in industries/audiences rather than in media relations, social media etc - becoming more immersed in our 'markets'.

So sorry, social media experts, that means you may be superceded (but in a nice way, of course!) by social media users as the PR industry ups its game.

Claire Thompson
@claireatwaves