October 15th, 2008 by Tony Sapienza
As I was prep’ing for a panel at the New Marketing Summit this week, I came up with a few points on the state of PR and social media relations. The panel (me, Chris Perkett and Bobbi Carlton of Beacon Street Girls) focused on PR 2.0 — how our profession “has been shaken” by the arrival of social media.
Sounds ominous, but in fact the tone of our panel was quite positive, focusing on the ways PR folks are adapting to this new world — and how we’re making it work for ourselves and the companies we represent. Here are some highlights:
no profession stands to benefit more from social media than PR (a rip-off of a point Paul Gillin made in his book, The New Influencers)
what’s happening in PR isn’t a radical shift, it’s a logical extension
there’s still a role from traditional media, but every PR person and company needs to accept that PR is more than just media relations — and needs to embrace social media
the mix of traditional and social media depends on the company and the industry they play in (and how their audiences are getting info)
social media specialists are good, but what we need are more teachers and advocates who can bring the entire PR professional along
social media is becoming easier to “sell” to the companies we represent
PR needs to give bloggers the same access/attention as traditional media
there’s a link between traditional and new media that PR people should understand and manage
social media is creating new crisis communications challenges for PR people (and new opportunities to address them)
in many ways, social media is a channel to present some of the same content PR deal with on more traditional terms (thought pieces, video, news releases, etc.)
There was much more covered here — and I’m sure there’ll be others reporting on this — but I thought it was valuable to do a quick recap here. A big thanks to the folks at CrossTech Media for organizing this event — and giving PR professionals a platform to address these issues.
Technorati Tags: new marketing summit, New Media Influencers, Paul Gillin, public relations, Social Media, Tony Sapienza
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October 16th, 2008 at 12:15 am
Seems to me that what we need in the PR world are new models for measuring and tracking influence — and impact. That will produce credibility and demonstrate that social media is indeed a boon to the PR world. Clip counts are so out! The question is: who really influences the prospective buyer and how? That’s the question for us to unpack now. As we do, we may see this profession experience an impressive resurgence.
Britton Manasco
Illuminating the Future
October 16th, 2008 at 10:35 am
Tony,
It was a pleasure meeting you – finally – in person! I appreciate your viewpoints and the opportunity to chat about PR 2.0, new marketing and the challenges we all face. You had some very intersting client examples – thanks for sharing.
October 17th, 2008 at 5:15 pm
Britton,
Couldn’t agree more on your point about measuring and tracking the influence and impact of social media. We touched on this briefly on the panel — merely scratched the surface. Suffice is to say, clip counts aren’t the way. Web traffic is a better indicator, but companies are still looking for real evidence of the impact social media relations is having on their business priorities. As we get closer to this, we will see even greater attention focused on the role of PR in this area.