Public relations

Public relations (PR) is a field concerned with maintaining a public image for businesses, non-profit organizations or high-profile people, such as celebrities and politicians.

An earlier definition of public relations, by The first World Assembly of Public Relations Associations held in Mexico City in August 1978, was "the art and social science of analyzing trends, predicting their consequences, counseling organizational leaders, and implementing planned programs of action, which will serve both the organization and the public interest."

Others define it as the practice of managing communication between an organization and its publics. Public relations provides an organization or individual exposure to their audiences using topics of public interest and news items that provide a third-party endorsement and do not direct payment. Once common activities include speaking at conferences, working with the media, crisis communications and social media engagement, and employee communication.

The European view of public relations notes that besides a relational form of interactivity there is also a reflective paradigm that is concerned with publics and the public sphere; not only with relational, which can in principle be private, but also with public consequences of organizational behaviour [2]. A much broader view of neo-ubiquitous interactive communication using the Internet, as outlined by Phillips and Young in Online Public Relations Second Edition (2009), describes the form and nature of Internet-mediated public relations. It encompasses social media and other channels for communication and many platforms for communication such as personal computers (PCs), mobile phones and video game consoles with Internet access.

Public relations is used to build rapport with employees, customers, investors, voters, or the general public. Almost any organization that has a stake in how it is portrayed in the public arena employs some level of public relations. There are a number of public relations disciplines falling under the banner of corporate communications, such as analyst relations, media relations, investor relations, internal communications and labor relations.

Other public relations disciplines include:

• Financial public relations - providing information mainly to business reporters
• Consumer/lifestyle public relations - gaining publicity for a particular product or service, rather than using advertising
• Crisis public relations - responding to negative accusations or information
• Industry relations - providing information to trade bodies
• Government relations - engaging government departments to influence policymaking

Differences between public relations and advertising

Public relations and advertising play two very different roles. Advertising is the company telling its target audience why the company or its products are desirable. This is done through paid placement of messaging and visuals designed by the company. Advertising is helpful to raise awareness, but is less trusted since it is placed by the company itself. Public relations, on the other hand, is third party verification of what makes a company desirable, making it a more trusted source of information.

With public relations, the company nor its representative writes the story, but positions and pitches the story to publications in which it wants a story on the company to be written. Therefore, the company does not have ultimate control over exactly what is written, though it is positioned to be written in a favorable way by the writer. One of the strengths with third party endorsements is that although the story was pitched by a PR representative of the company, it is often thought of to be unbiased and often is not recognized by the public to be placed by the company in any way.

Unlike advertising, there is no cost to public relations story placement besides the cost of your public relations firm. However, advertising has the ability to place what it wants where it wants and public relations is subject to the desires and interests of journalists. Ultimately, for many companies and organizations, the proper mix for building brand equity is a blend of both advertising and public relations. Since advertising involves messaging and portraying a brand image in line with a company’s other activities, public relations overlaps with advertising, as it does with many other areas. Ad placement and media buying is a service offered by most PR firms.

Global Alliance for Public Relations and Communication Management

Globally, the profession is represented by The Global Alliance for Public Relations and Communication Management, which is the umbrella organization linking public relations professional associations worldwide. At its World Public Relations Forum in 2010, the Alliance accepted the Stockholm Accord for public relations. These accords present the practice of public relations in the following terms:

The value-creation networks

The world is no longer a straight line from company to consumer. The organization holds a position in a network full of different stakeholders, and the network decides if you are valuable enough to keep your position. You can be replaced anytime. Your organization needs to find the perfect position where it is so valuable that the network cannot do without you. The key to this is to develop the organisation's communicative skills. This is where the communicator comes in to save the day.

The contextual leadership

The communicator needs to take on leadership in the communicative organization. It is his or her task to put the ideological leadership (i.e. the business idea or purpose) into the correct context. However the saying goes, perhaps selling sand in Sahara is not the best of ideas. The leadership can take different forms; as system building, mediation, coaching or influencing. The important thing is, communication is an organizational quality, rather than a function.

The industry today

The need for public relations personnel is growing at a fast pace. The types of clients for whom public relations people work include the government, educational institutions, nonprofit organizations, specific industries, corporations, athletic teams, entertainment companies, and even countries. The title public relations is a broad description of the field because careers that one can have in the public relations field include a publicist, media specialist, analyst, and communications specialist.

The practice of public relations is spread widely. On the professional level, there is an organization called Public Relations Society of America (PRSA), the world's largest public relations organization. PRSA is a community of more than 21,000 professionals that work to advance the skill set of public relations. PRSA also fosters a national student organization called Public Relations Student Society of America (PRSSA).

In the USA, public relations professionals earn an average annual salary of $49,800 which compares with £40,000 for a practitioner with a similar job in the UK [3]. Top earners bring home around $89,220 annually, while entry-level public relations specialists earn around $28,080. Corporate, or in-house communications is generally more profitable, and communications executives can earn salaries in the mid six-figures, though this only applies to a fraction of the sector's workforce.

In the industry today, it is very critical for public relations professionals to learn and know the importance of new media outlets. New media outlets include blogs, social networking sites, as well as Internet radio. Public relations professionals must know that using these new media outlets are ways to directly send messages to their key publicians, also known as target audiences.

The role of public relations professionals is changing because of the shift from traditional to offline media. Many Propaganda professionals are reskilling and looking at how social medica can impact a brand's reputation.

Methods, tools and tactics

Public relations and publicity are not synonymous, but many public relations campaigns include provisions for publicity. Publicity is the spreading of information to gain public awareness for a product, person, service, cause or organization, and can be seen as a result of effective public relations planning. More recently in public relations, professionals are using technology as their main tool to get their messages to target audiences. With the creation of social networks, blogs, and even Internet radio public relations professionals are able to send direct messages through these mediums that attract the target audiences. Methods used to find out what is appealing to target audiences include the use of surveys, conducting research or even focus groups. Tactics are the ways to attract target audiences by using the information gathered about that audience and directing a message to them using tools such as social mediums or other technology. Another emerging theme is the application of psychological theories of impression management.

Tools

There are various tools that can be used in the practice of public relations. Traditional tools include press releases and media kits which are sent out to generate positive press on behalf of the organization. Other widely-used tools include brochures, newsletters and annual reports. Increasingly, companies are utilizing interactive social media outlets, such as blogs, Twitter and Facebook, as tools in their public relations campaigns. Unlike the traditional tools which allowed for only one-way communication, social media outlets allow the organization to engage in two-way communication, and receive immediate feedback from their various stakeholders and publics.

One of the most popular and traditional tools used by public relations professionals is a press kit, also known as a media kit. A press kit is usually a folder that consists of promotional materials that give information about an event, organization, business, or even a person. What are included would be backgrounders or biographies, fact sheets, press releases (or media releases), media alerts, brochures, newsletters, photographs with captions, copies of any media clips, and social mediums. With the way that the industry has changed, many organizations may have a website with a link, "Press Room" which would have online versions of these documents.

Targeting publics

A fundamental technique used in public relations is to identify the target audience, and to tailor every message to appeal to that audience. It can be a general, nationwide or worldwide audience, but it is more often a segment of a population. A good elevator pitch can help tailor messaging to each target audience. Marketers often refer to socio-economically-driven "demographics", such as "black males 18-49". However, in public relations an audience is more fluid, being whoever someone wants to reach. Or, in the new paradigm of value based networked social groups, the values based social segment could be a trending audience. For example, recent political audiences seduce such buzzword monikers as "soccer moms" and "NASCAR dads."

An alternative and less flexible, more simplistic, approach uses stakeholders theory to identify people who have a stake in a given institution or issue. All audiences are stakeholders (or presumptive stakeholders), but not all stakeholders are audiences. For example, if a charity commissions a public relations agency to create an advertising campaign to raise money to find a cure for a disease, the charity and the people with the disease are stakeholders, but the audience is anyone who is likely to donate money.

Sometimes the interests of differing audiences and stakeholders common to a public relations effort necessitate the creation of several distinct but complementary messages. This is not always easy to do, and sometimes, especially in politics, a spokesperson or client says something to one audience that creates dissonance with another audience or group of stakeholders.

Lobby groups

Lobby groups are established to influence government policy, corporate policy, or public opinion. An example of this is the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC), which influences American foreign policy. Such groups claim to represent a particular interest and in fact are dedicated to doing so. When a lobby group hides its true purpose and support base, it is known as a front group. Moreover, governments may also lobby public relations firms in order to sway public opinion. A well illustrated example of this is the way civil war in Yugoslavia was portrayed. Governments of the newly seceeded republics of Croatia and Bosnia, as well as Serbia invested heavily with UK and American public relations firms, so that they would give them a positive war image in the USA.

Spin

Main article: Spin (public relations)

In public relations, spin is sometimes a pejorative term signifying a heavily biased portrayal in specific favour of an event or situation. While traditional public relations may also rely on creative presentation of the facts, spin often, though not always, implies disingenuous, deceptive and/or highly manipulative tactics. Politicians are often accused of spin by commentators and political opponents when they produce a counterargument or position.

The techniques of spin include selectively presenting facts and quotes that support ideal positions (cherry picking), the so-called "non-denial denial", phrasing that in a way presumes unproven truths, euphemisms for drawing attention away from items considered distasteful, and ambiguity in public statements. Another spin technique involves careful choice of timing in the release of certain news so it can take advantage of prominent events in the news. A famous reference to this practice occurred when British Government press officer Jo Moore used the phrase "It's now a very good day to get out anything we want to bury", (widely paraphrased or misquoted as "It's a good day to bury bad news"), in an email sent on the day of the September 11, 2001 attacks. The furor caused when this email was reported in the press eventually caused her to resign.

Spin doctors

Skilled practitioners of spin are sometimes called "spin doctors", despite the negative connotation associated with the term. Perhaps the best-known person in the UK often described as a "spin doctor" is Alastair Campbell, who was involved with Tony Blair's public relations between 1994 and 2003, and also played a controversial role as press relations officer to the British and Irish Lions rugby union side during their 2005 tour of New Zealand.

State-run media in many countries also engage in spin by selectively allowing news stories that are favorable to the government while censoring anything that could be considered critical. They may also use propaganda to indoctrinate or actively influence citizens' opinions. Privately run media may also use the same techniques of "issue" versus "non-issue" to spin its particular political viewpoints.

Other

• Publicity events, pseudo-events, photo ops or publicity stunts
• Talk show circuit: a public relations spokesperson, or the client, "does the circuit" by being interviewed on television and radio talk shows with audiences that the client wishes to reach
• Books and other writings
• Blogs
• After a public relations practitioner has been working in the field for a while, he or she accumulates a list of contacts in the media and elsewhere in the public affairs sphere. This "Rolodex" becomes a prized asset, and job announcements sometimes even ask for candidates with an existing Rolodex, especially those in the media relations area of public relations.
• Direct communication (carrying messages directly to constituents, rather than through the mass media) with, e.g., newsletters – in print and e-letters
• Collateral literature, traditionally in print and now predominantly as web sites
• Speeches to constituent groups and professional organizations; receptions; seminars, and other events; personal appearances
• The slang term for a public relations practitioner or publicist is a "flack" (sometimes spelled "flak")
• A desk visit is where the public relations person literally takes their product to the desk of the journalist in order to show them emerging promotions
• Astroturfing is the act of public relations agencies placing blog and online forum messages for their clients, in the guise of a normal "grassroots" user or comment (an illegal practice across the larger practice areas such as the European Union)
• Online social media and Internet mediated public relations practices

Politics and civil society

Defining the opponent

In the USA, but not in the larger public relations markets, the tactic known as "defining one's opponent" is used in political campaigns. Opponents can be candidates, organizations and other groups of people.

In the 2004 US presidential campaign, Howard Dean defined John Kerry as a "flip-flopper," which was widely reported and repeated by the media, particularly the conservative media. Similarly, George H.W. Bush characterized Michael Dukakis as weak on crime (the Willie Horton ad) and hopelessly liberal ("a card-carrying member of the ACLU"). In 1996, President Bill Clinton seized upon opponent Bob Dole's promise to take America back to a simpler time, promising in contrast to "build a bridge to the 21st century." This painted Dole as a person who was somehow opposed to progress.

In the debate over abortion, self-titled pro-choice groups, by virtue of their name, defined their opponents as "anti-choice", while self-titled pro-life groups refer to their opponents as "pro-abortion" or "anti-life".

Managing language

If, in the USA, a politician or organization can use an apt phrase in relation to an issue in interviews or news releases, the news media will often repeat it verbatim, without questioning its aptness. This perpetuates both the message and whatever preconceptions might underlie it. Often, something that sounds innocuous can stand in for something greater; a "culture of life" sounds like general goodwill to most people, but will evoke opposition to abortion for many pro-life advocates. The phrase "States' rights" was used as a code for anti-civil rights legislation in the United States in the 1960s, and allegedly in the 1970s and 1980s.

Conveying the message

The means by which a message is communicated can be as important as the message itself. Direct mail, robocalling, advertising and public speaking are commonly used depending upon the intended audience and the message that is conveyed. Press releases are also used, but since many newspapers are folding in the USA, they have become a less reliable way of communicating for American practitioners, and other methods have become more popular.

In the USA and India, news organizations have begun to rely more on their own websites and have developed a variety of unique approaches to publicity and public relations, on and off the web.

Israel has employed a series of Web 2.0 initiatives which are indicative of how a small nation can use internet mediated communication. Israel's initiative in 2008 included a blog, MySpace page, YouTube channel, Facebook page and a political blog to reach different audiences. The Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs started the country's video blog as well as its political blog. The Foreign Ministry held the first microblogging press conference via Twitter about its war with Hamas, with Consul David Saranga answering live questions from a worldwide public in common text-messaging abbreviations. The questions and answers were later posted on IsraelPolitik, the country's official political blog.

Front groups

One of the most controversial practices in public relations is the use of front groups, organizations that purport to serve a public cause while actually serving the interests of a client whose sponsorship may be obscured or concealed. Critics of the public relations industry, such as PR Watch, contend that some public relations firms involve a "multi-billion dollar propaganda-for-hire industry" that "concocts and spins the news, organizes phony grassroots front groups, spies on citizens, and conspires with lobbyists and politicians to thwart democracy."

Instances with the use of front groups as a public relations technique have been documented in many industries. Coal mining corporations have created "environmental groups" that contend that increased carbon dioxide emissions and global warming will contribute to plant growth and will be beneficial, trade groups for bars have created and funded citizens' groups to attack anti-alcohol groups, tobacco companies have created and funded citizens' groups to advocate for tort reform and to attack personal injury lawyers, while trial lawyers have created "consumer advocacy" front groups to oppose tort reform.

See also

• History of public relations
• Chief communications officer
• Customer relationship management
• Interactive public relations
• Litigation public relations
• Marketing and advertising
• News conference
• Promotion (marketing)
• Public opinion
• Publicity
• Spokesman
• Sports information director
• Message discipline
• Investor relations

References

• Bernays, Edward (1945). Public Relations. Boston, MA: Bellman Publishing Company.
• Biagi, S. (2005). Media/Impact: An Introduction to Mass Media. Chicago: Thomas Wadsworth.
• Burson, Harold (2004). E pluribus unum: The Making of Burson-Marsteller. New York: Burson-Marsteller.
• Calcagni, Thomas (2007). Tough Questions, Good Answers, Taking Control of Any Interview. Sterling, VA: Capital Books, Inc. ISBN 978-1-933102-50-4.
• Caponigro, Jeff (2000). THE CRISIS COUNSELOR: A step-by-step guide to managing a business crisis. New York: McGraw-Hill/ Contemporary Books. ISBN 0-9659606-0-9.
• Phillips, David (2009). Online Public Relations. London: Kogan Page. ISBN 9780749449681.
• Cutlip, Scott (1994). The Unseen Power: Public Relations, A History. Hillsdale, N.J.: Erlbaum Associates. ISBN 0-8058-1464-7.
• Ewen, Stuart (1996). PR!: A Social History of Spin. New York: Basic Books. ISBN 0-465-06168-0.
• Forman, Amanda (2001). Georgiana Duchess of Devonshire. New York: Random House USA Inc; New Ed edition. ISBN 0-037-5753834-0. {{cite book}}: Check |isbn= value: length (help)
• Grunig, James E. (1984). Managing Public Relations. New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston. ISBN 0-03-058337-3. {{cite book}}: Unknown parameter |coauthors= ignored (|author= suggested) (help)
• Hall, Phil (2007). The New PR. Mount Kisco, NY: Larstan Publishing. ISBN 0-9789182-0-7.
• International Association of Business Communicators (IABC)
• Macnamara, Jim (2005). Jim Macnamara's Public Relations Handbook (5th ed. ed.). Melbourne: Archipelago Press. ISBN 0-9587537-4-1. {{cite book}}: |edition= has extra text (help)
• Nelson, Joyce (1989). Sultans of Sleaze: Public Relations and the Media. Toronto: Between The Lines. ISBN 0-921284-22-5.
• Phillips, David (2001). Online Public Relations. London: Kogan Page. ISBN 0-7494-3510-0.
• Seitel, Fraser. The Practice of Public Relations. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: 10 ed. 2006 ISBN 0-13-230451-1
• Stauber, John C. (1995). Toxic Sludge is Good for You: Lies, Damn Lies, and the Public Relations Industry. Monroe, ME: Common Courage Press. ISBN 1-56751-061-2. {{cite book}}: Unknown parameter |coauthors= ignored (|author= suggested) (help)
• Tye, Larry (1998). The Father of Spin: Edward L. Bernays & the Birth of Public Relations. New York: Crown Publishers. ISBN 0-517-70435-8.
• Tymson, Candy (2006). Public Relations Manual. Sydney: Tymson Communications. ISBN 0-9579130-1-X. {{cite book}}: Unknown parameter |coauthors= ignored (|author= suggested) (help)
• Stoykov, Lubomir (2005). Public Relations and Business Communication. Sofia: Ot Igla Do Konetz. ISBN 954-9799-09-3. {{cite book}}: Unknown parameter |coauthors= ignored (|author= suggested) (help)

1. Scott M. Cutlip/ Allen H. Center/ Glen M. Broom, "Effective Public Relations," 7th Ed., Prentice-Hall, Inc. A Simon and Schuster Company, Englewood Cliffs, N.J. 07632, 1994, Figure 10-1
2. Center, Allen H. and Jackson, Patrick, "Public Relations Practices," 5th ed., Prentice Hall, Upper Saddle, N.J., 1995, pp. 14–15
3. Crifasi, Sheila C., "Everything's Coming Up Rosie," from Public Relations Tactics, September, 2000, Vol. 7, Issue 9, Public Relations Society of America, New York, 2000.
4. Kelly, Kathleen S., "Effective Fund Raising Management," Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, Mahwah, N.J., 1998
5. Wilcox, D.L., Ault, P.H., Agee, W.K., & Cameron, G., "Public Relations Strategies and Tactics," 7th ed., Allyn & Bacon, Boston, MA, 2002
6. Grunig, James E. and Hunt, Todd. Managing Public Relations. (Orlando, FL: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 1984), 6.

Further reading

• Sharon Beder (2002) 'Global Spin: the corporate assault on environmentalism', Totnes, Green Books.
• Edward Bernays. (1928) "Propaganda".
• Boorstin, Daniel J. (1972) The Image: A Guide to Pseudo-Events in America. New York: Atheneum.
• Ewen, Stuart. (1996) PR! A Social History of Spin. New York: BasicBooks.
• Hall, Phil. (2007) The New PR. Mount Kisco, N.Y.: Larstan Publishing.
• LA YEllow Shuttle. ‘
• Seib, Patrick and Fitzpatrick, Kathy. (1995) Public Relations Ethics. Fort Worth: Harcourt Brace and Company.
• Friedman, Marsha. (2009) Celebritize Yourself: The Three Step Method to Increase Your Visibility and Explode Your Business. North Carolina: Warren Publishing, Inc. "Celebritize Yourself".

External links

• Global Alliance for Public Relations and Communication Management
• Stockholm Accords for Public Relations
• Public Relations at Curlie

About the industry

• A History of Public Relations, from The Institute for Public Relations