PR Studies

Face to face or Facebook?

Does our cornucopia of communications channels lead to restricted personal relationships?

We're all on email, most use Facebook, many have blogs, and some are merrily twittering away. So the temptation is to communicate through screen-and-keyboard. I'm worse than most at this, being something of a social media maven and a natural introvert.

I was impressed by two students who knocked at my door yesterday. I know them both and had noted how they prefer face-to-face contact and are both quick to pick up the phone if they can't speak to me in person. I'm searching for a pattern in this, but since one of these students is Greek and male, and the other is British and female, I don't have enough data to go on.

But I do know that personal is best and that everyone must have preferred channels for personal communications. Mine would go something like this:

1. Face-to-face
2. Hand-written card or letter
3. Phone
4. Text message
5. Blog comment (though not for private conversations)
6. Facebook message
7. Personal email
8. Work email

I'm guilty of not doing enough personal communicating myself (I don't look forward to writing Christmas cards). But I do recognise its value. And I'm looking forward to meeting two 'friends' for the first time at next week's Don't Panic Guide to Social Media in Manchester. I've known of Tom Murphy since 2002 when we both started blogging about PR, but we've never met in the flesh. And I've been impressed enough with Simon Wakeman to entrust him with the technical aspects of Behind the Spin magazine, again without ever having shaken hands.

Andy Green, who I have met at several public forums over the years, has written a book on this: Effective Communication Skills for Public Relations.

The power of the personal

That was interesting: something of a small scale PR and social media experiment.

I've been blogging here for five years: 702 posts attracting 1093 comments to date (or about 1.5 comments per post). If I'd followed best practice I could have doubled my comment count by studiously commenting in response to others' comments. But I'm a bit old fashioned, and tend to feel that I get enough of a say on my own blog, and should leave the comment space for others. Not best practice, I know (this form encourages conversations).

The last post was a one line entry with a link to a news story on another site. Despite the opportunity to comment on my news over at Behind the Spin, 14 of you had your say back here (a vastly higher comment count than I'm used to).

Sarah has put her finger on it. It's a rather shameless piece of attention seeking (my blog, me me me) - but it clearly works. I suppose if you're reading this, it might suggest some level of interest in who's writing this blog.

But the relative lack of comments at Behind the Spin needs some explaining too (three to date on that news story, but one of these is from me and one from another member of the magazine team). Here's my explanation. A magazine is less personal than a blog - and rather more perfect as it's edited. Leaving a comment, while technically just as easy, is psychologically much harder. After all, who is the comment aimed at - the article's author (anonymous in the case of our news pieces), or the magazine's editor. And who might respond? Is anyone reading?

So personal works best. We've always known this in public relations (it's why word of mouth recommendation works). But where does this leave corporate blogs? Personal works; just don't expect a more confessional style here. I'm not that shameless. Honest. One award; one mention in a new book on PR (PR - a persuasive industry?); and one self-indulgent announcement. Enough already.

I'm leaving

Behind the Spin has scooped my news. How did they do that (I didn't write it)?

The great PR degree debate

Wofstar's Jed Hallam has sparked a lively debate on the value of a PR degree (and has shown ingenuity in using other communications channels to encourage comments).

There are 22 responses to date; I've had my say over there so won't comment further here.

The death of subs

I'm enjoying Trevor Morris and Simon Goldwsworthy's new book on PR ('PR is perhaps the ultimate postmodern industry. No one knows what it really is, but it sounds interesting!')

The authors have an easy style and theirs is a lively, intelligent - but not academic - style of writing. A review should follow soon at Behind the Spin.

But having paid £25 for a new hardback, I'm dismayed by the number of proofing errors. Here's the third one I noticed in the first 25 pages, quoted in full:

"Subeditors become an costly luxury."

Evidently, as Carrie would say in Sex and the City (a programme frequently cited by the authors).

How to get on in PR (and how not to impress)

Here's another good debate, especially in tough times. How best to get your PR career started?

Tom Watson (a practitioner turned academic) believes employers should rate those with PR degrees ahead of those with non-vocational qualifications:

"Too often, industry leaders pay lip service to PR education but choose not to recruit students who are job-ready in favour of those from non-vocational universities."

He makes a strong case, but I'm not sure which instruments can be invoked in a free market economy to privilege one set of graduates over another. I also expect that his calls for greater industry support for education have come at a bad time.

Meanwhile, Maggie Kerr-Southin, a self-proclaimed 'PR goddess from Canada's west coast' lists the qualities she seeks in new recruits. It's a good list - and she and Watson at least agree on the importance of an education.

"Being good with people or enjoying events isn’t enough."

Well said.

Is social media killing PR?

It's a well-worn blog topic - the 'death of PR' meme. Drew B links to the latest arguments from the red corner; the case was also well made in the chapter called 'Survival of the Publicists' in Naked Conversations (2006).

In the comments on Drew's blog, I've cited WPP's Sir Martin Sorrell in the blue corner. In his recent lecture to the US Institute for Public Relations (Public Relations: The Story Behind a Remarkable Renaissance) he ascribes the continued strong growth in public relations in part to the growth of social media, 'a natural territory for public relations'.

Student practitioners on our MSc course should be well placed to weigh up these arguments: is social media killing PR or leading to its renaissance? I suspect your answer depends heavily on how you define public relations...

Dynasty

John Harris has written an extended feature on Matthew Freud's connections to the worlds of politics, media and celebrity. It reads rather like an appendix to Miller and Dinan's A Century of Spin: the author can't quite pin his subject down, but clearly senses there's something wrong in someone having this much influence.

Having a famous great-grandfather, being the son of well-known MP and broadcaster, having Rupert Murdoch as father-in-law must confer advantages. I suspect it encouraged him to take risks, because you can see Freud's progress as an entrepreneurial success story - how someone who did not go to university built a business and became connected to the most powerful people in the country. He's earned the money he's spending on private jets and lavish parties, though John Harris sees him as the Great Gatsby of our age.

How to make friends and influence employers

Some of our new student bloggers can draw inspiration from this. Allie Osmar looks back on a year of blogging and podcasting, and lists the benefits: improved writing skills, new friendships, a great job (at Edelman, need I say?), and a flow of new ideas.

Round-up

• The Economist puts blogging into perspective (Oh, grow up). It's no longer new and exciting - but it has entered the mainstream. Is that so bad?
• Facebook's also no longer new, but it's unquestionably popular. And it's continuing to grow. The reassuring thing is that it does such normal, conventional things: it allows people to talk to their friends and form communities of interest.
• I'm putting some time and energy into the PR student magazine, Behind the Spin after a long, sleepy summer break (what's the summer equivalent of hibernation: estivation?). There's some new content up there with more to follow. And we're always looking for ideas and for articles; check it out.

The question of public relations and the public good

It had been an obstacle on the rocky road to the royal charter - the question of how PR contributes to the public good.

I'm a guest at a police public relations conference and no one here would have any difficulty in answering this question. Their everyday work on crime reduction and their handling of major incidents exemplifies this. They don't need to go chasing headlines; they're in the local news each day and frequently gain national attention.

I'm humbled by the quality of the work on display. One former broadcast journalist told how he used his visual storytelling skills to relate the experience of a young victim of fireworks burns. The video only had a few hundred viewings, so he used his persuasive skills to have it featured on YouTube in the run up to November 5. It was then watched hundreds of thousands of times. Cheap, creative, effective; and clearly for the public good.

The attendees are typical of other public relations gatherings: there's something like a 60-40 ratio of women to men. At last night's black tie dinner this seemed to me as glamorous a group of people as you would meet at an equivalent awards dinner attended by consultancy staff. But they're a few years older, on average. The typical route in to police communications remains print of broadcast media experience, though there's widespread respect for education - I had many conversations about the CIPR professional qualifications and our MSc in Corporate Communications.

There was an award for a talented young communicator and Amy Grimshaw, a final year undergraduate, gained plaudits for confidently delivering the better part of 'my' talk on communications and social media.

Change

Faced with a financial crisis and with growing cynicism about party politics, we needed this. The US election campaign has been compelling, dignified and engaging.

That both candidates for president were to some extent outsiders has helped. As commentators have pointed out, president-elect Obama has defeated in turn the two most powerful political machines in the US: the Clintons and the Republicans.

Of course, money still talks. But Obama has raised the money he's spent, mostly from small donations. His victory shows the groundswell in action, as well as reminding us of the power of rhetoric to effect change.

Sorrell on Keynes and Friedman

Heard in an interview on the Radio 4 Today Programme this morning, and taken from today's WPP results release:

"the revival of Keynesian economic policy and eclipse of Friedmanite monetarism, along with state-directed capitalism, have pumped and will pump massive amounts of liquidity into the system."

I read this out in a lecture to final year PR students this morning, and I'm offering a prize for anyone who can come and explain what Sir Martin Sorrell means. No takers yet (but I've been busy meeting students all day so far.)

UPDATE: No one has come forward to claim the prize (one student says there were too many long words!). By the way, I did understand the point Sorrell was making and wasn't singling this out as an example of impenetrable jargon. Just as a genuine challenge to students seeking to understand the complexities of what's going on in the world of business.

Ordure! Ordure!

Merde. After five years of hard-earned and well-merited obscurity, this blog is up for an award tonight. The Flackenhack category - Wank 2.0: User Generated Twat.

I can't make it tonight. But I hope I'll be able to take those on the shortlist out for dinner some day: I'd be honoured to spend some time with Ben Hammersley, Jeff Jarvis, Richard Millington and Brendan Cooper. May the best blogger not win!

Practitioners: 'what do you read?' meme

I'm keen to start a regular 'bookshelf' column in Behind the Spin magazine. This will give PR practitioners a chance to say which books they most often consult. In previous issues, Lord Chadlington has mentioned his admiration of the novels of Anthony Trollope. Currently, Karl Milner praises Drew Westen's The Political Brain (a timely read about the pyschology of US presidential campaigns).

They could be books on politics, business or society; textbooks, style guides, self-help manuals or novels. They could be standards or surprises. Either way, I think it will help today's students and young practitioners.

Here are the groundrules. Choose up to ten books, and write up to 100 words explaining each choice. Send these to me with your portrait photo in JPG format (email address on right). You're also welcome to cross-post to your own blog.

To get you thinking, here are the top ten books I most often refer to (space does not allow descriptions):

1. The Tipping Point, by Malcolm Gladwell
2. Strategic Communication Management, by Jon White and Laura Mazur
3. The Empty Raincoat, Charles Handy
4. The Economist Style Guide
5. Here Comes Everybody, Clay Shirky
6. Journalism: Truth or Dare?, Ian Hargreaves
7. Naked Conversations, Robert Scoble and Shel Israel
8. Permission Marketing, Seth Godin
9. Evaluating Public Relations, Tom Watson and Paul Noble
10. The Fall of Advertising and the Rise of PR, Al Ries and Laura Ries

Toby Young's How to Lose Friends and Alienate People came surprisingly close to being picked and this morning I found myself recommending Richard Dawkins's The Selfish Gene whilst admitting I've never read it myself...