Unlocking the Mystery of PR
Digitalization of the media has shaken the whole PR industry and turned some parts of it upside down. Deep integration of social media in everyday communication destroyed old and created new stereotypes about PR profession.
PR has been seen as a media relations industry, where PR professionals are often considered as press release distributors and the mainstream media as their target audience. Due to its public-facing nature, social media became part of PR and this fact clarified that PR is more about finding and developing the RIGHT channel to deliver a CUSTOMIZED message to the RIGHT recipients. Media relations is just one of the many areas that PR works with and the mainstream media became just another channel among many others and not always the RIGHT one.
Being a relatively new communication channel, social media has been useful as a source of news delivered directly from a brand or company. Such companies like Sony PlayStation and Logitech use social media as a big part of their PR activity. Sony Playstation US Facebook page has 31M followers and it’s a perfect and effective way to communicate news directly to customers. A few weeks ago Sony PlayStation Europe launched a social media campaign, where creative gamers are asked to bring to life one of their own unique multi-player moments. It’s another way to bring new customers and engage with existing ones. Another perfect example of social media integration is Southwest Airlines. In January 2011 the company organized an internal social media conference (BlogCon) to train employee contributors on social media and content. E.g., KLM handled a crisis during the eruption of Icelandic volcano Eyjafjallajökull in 2010 with social media extremely well.
For a long time PR has been viewed as a tool to manipulate public or polish the truth. Since social media channels have become a public complaint line I am not sure who manipulates whom. You may have seen stories how customers approach companies through Twitter or Facebook to complain. I would slightly change a definition of PR by PRSA, which says: "Public relations helps an organization and its publics adapt mutually to each other." I would say that PR helps an organization and its public adapt and use (in any connotation) each other.
One more stereotype created recently about PR professionals is that they are old-fashion, conservative and very slow to move forward from traditional channels. It’s because PR professionals know better than anyone else that reputation is a very fragile phenomenon and drastic jumps may only have negative consequences. PR professionals learn quickly how to apply classic PR principles to a new reality. I saw an interesting metamorphosis and move towards social media in Wells Fargo. It’s difficult to find such a challenging combination as financial corporation using social media as a communication tool. In my opinion, Wells Fargo’s PR team is doing a very good job by utilizing blogs, social networks, microblogging like Twitter, podcasts, and collaborative software.
Popularity of certain social media channels resulted in a common mistake made by a lot of organizations. They create social media profiles and hire unnecessary social media teams without understanding their actual needs in social media. One of the reasons is transparency, which scares companies and manipulates them. Social media is not necessarily the best solution for being transparent. Transparency is more about being honest and open to customers and internal staff, who are brand’s ambassadors as well. Transparency is about consistent communication and delivering the truth even if it’s ugly. The best way to communicate depends on the particular case. Sometimes old fashion channels work better, sometimes it should a mix with new ones, and sometimes completely innovative.
PR is more flexible. Boarders have been opened by engaging with other marketing areas like customer support, customer acquisition, community development, relations, and etc. Digitalization has given an old tool a new functionality to get new customers, engage with existing ones, and return those who left.
