Where Does PR Fit With Social Media?

The advertising and marketing world has changed, no doubt about it. For proof of that, look to the PR world. What used to be a place of deep pockets, buttonholing, and populated by connected practitioners, is now an “every man for himself” world.

The thing that’s great about the Internet is how it levels the playing field. Things like; cost, reach, influence, analysis, and overhead are no longer barriers to a company’s ability to enter and use a specific market or arena.  When the Internet comes a knockin’ the rules change, the need to see things in a different light becomes paramount, and no one has an advantage.  In the past decade we’ve all seen this happen too many times to count and it always ends the same way, we’re watching it unfold right now between Uber and the Taxi/limo industry, and it’s fascinating.

The same thing is happening, albeit quietly, with the PR industry. Does anyone actually read press releases anymore? For a while blogs were being used by PR departments as a way to house/dump their releases after they pitched them to the press. This gave blogging a bad name, tarnished its image, and it took blogs a considerable amount of time to recover from that misuse.  The result however, is that the corporate blog has real marketing promise and most have gone on to become the centerpiece of their companies social media efforts leaving PR behind.  So what about PR and the time honored news release?

Rest assured, it still has a place, the ability of any company to focus on publications and talk with their editors and writers about what is going on with R&D or new product or service offers is always a good thing.  But it’s really the only thing that PR has to focus on, since most people get the info they need about a company or service from many other sources than just the tabloids and trade rags.  In a recent article by Edwin Huertas that was posted on Social Media Today called ”How Social Media Boosts PR,” he lays out what a lot of marketers have been thinking. That being “If I can go straight to a specific audience and have a two-way conversation with them, why should I use a limited tool like a press release?” Good question, in a nutshell PR needs to evolve… it needs to find a reason to exist.  Most people don’t trust marketing and  even fewer believe press releases.

When I started in the advertising world, PR was a place where true marketing was done. That’s at least what my bosses felt, they would hire individuals who had the gift of gab, these same individuals would have huge Rolodex’s (that’s an analog version of your contacts app, for those of you under 30), they’d boast about having direct access to editors of major publications, they’d talk and meet with seasoned features writers and authors, and be able to pitch story ideas and have them picked up by publications. The benefits to this were massive! Sounds familiar right? Think, viral video. The more things change the more they stay the same, and with the advent of social media sites, a small to mid-sized company can do all of that and at a fraction of the cost, and the best part?  Most publications use a companies social postings for their articles, amongst other things.  So now, rather than having to depend on one person with contacts and the ability to schmooz, or having to go through a series of gatekeepers to reach a specific audience, or have your idea ordained as worthy, we all now have those connections and influence right at our fingertips.

How do I mean?  Twitter, has the unique ability to aggregate everything a company wants to release and not have it be seen as spam. RSS Feeds distribute content that gets picked up by readers and packages the content for consumption on an hourly, daily, or weekly basis by reader.  Facebook allows access to millions of viewers in a specific audience or market segment. YouTube will take care of the distribution of cumbersome files and handle all the plugins necessary to view a multimedia piece. No more having to wait for anyone to get back to you, no more having to buy thousands of dollars worth of advertising to get a publications attention, no need to wait for the editor to “see you now”,  or sit nervously and await the printed editions to hit the streets. With the click of a submit button it’s all there, and best of all it’s connected to the sales process and it’s quantifiable.

So PR still has its place, but its not at the front of the line, third or fourth but not first.

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