PR has always been one of the least understood of the marketing disciplines. At a party my quick explanation is that advertising is me saying how great I am, and PR is getting someone else to say how great I am. How has digital changed that?
The internet created an explosion of media. Our database has six thousand journalists on it. There are now hundreds of publications, websites and blogs on every subject and in every region. Most clients still like to see their name in print, but in many sectors (such as beauty) it is online bloggers who will drive awareness and sales far more than a print article.
It is therefore more important than ever to identify and focus on the media that will have the impact needed, and evaluation of PR has always been a challenge. Twenty years ago we were happy to give clients audience and advertising equivalents as valid measurements, with perhaps some analysis of messages and positive versus negative. Today, particularly in B2B campaigns, website statistics often give a much clearer indication of how much extra interest a piece has provoked.
Social media will also tell us how much impact a PR campaign is having. There is still a lot of argument as to where social media sits in digital marketing, but for me it is clearly part of PR. Social media is a tool for allowing brands to interact with their customers directly, rather than through a middle man (the journalist) and it is often on social media that reputations are now built (and lost).
Good PR should work in harmony with SEO. Too often these two disciplines operate in very separate silos, but by understanding each other, and communicating a little better, we can dramatically increase the impact of both.
PR is still fundamentally concerned with communication and the management of reputations. Like everyone else, we have some new tools and challenges, but our end goal has not changed.
By Anne Cantelo, MD of Onyx.
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