According to Wikipedia Public Relations is the discipline which looks after reputation, with the aim of earning understanding and support and influencing opinion and behaviour. It is the planned and sustained effort to establish and maintain goodwill and mutual understanding between an organisation and it publics.
However the practice of public relations has often been associated or looked at as spinning, as a matter of fact the father of PR Edward Barneys has been referred to as "the father of spin." When people think about PR and spin it always comes down to PR being all about a certain agenda and promoting that particular agenda at all costs even if it means spinning it a little or a lot. The world spinning insinuates making the information work in your favor.
People like Alastair Campbell former press secretary to British Prime Minister Tony Blair has done nothing but "add fuel to the fire" about PR being nothing but spin. Campbell was referred to as a spin doctor and created more controversy during his time as chief press officer. In a video "News No. 10" we watched in class we saw Campbell doing what he did best being a powerful press officer and kept control of the news going in and out of his administration.
I think more than spin Campbell did a great job at controlling what the media knew and what media outlets knew what. Even though he was not liked by many and accused by many of being manipulative any good PR person for any organization will like to have and keep control because by keeping control of what comes in and out you are always on top of everything. However Campbell maybe took that a little far because there is a fine line between control and SPIN!
Here is a Video of Campbell on Newsnight
Wednesday, April 13, 2011
Activism and PR
So today the very important topic of activism and PR was discussed using a very effective example the documentary "Super Size Me." In 2004 the documentary film both directed by and starring Morgan Spurlock, an American independent filmmaker. Spurlock's film follows a 30-day period from February 1 to March 2, 2003 during which he eats only McDonald's food. The documentary was sparked on the back of two teenage girls who sued the fast food giants and blamed them for their obesity. So Spurlock went a little deeper into the fast food giant to see how unhealthy it was by using himself as a guinea pig.
So how does this relate to PR? In this case Spurlock represents many many NGO's such as Greenpeace and Save the Children. NGO's need healthy relationships with the public to meet their goals. Foundations and charities use PR campaigns to raise funds and use standard lobbying techniques in regards to government.
Many NGO's use different tactics to protest and get their points or word out using PR as the appropriate tool or avenue to get their point across. For years NGO's such as PETA has staged countless PR stunts againts celebrities to support their cause and have used many celebrities to support their cause. But what Spurlock did was fascinating by using himself as the experiment and showing his audience the response that he got from the McDonald's corporation by creating this documentary was pure genius. At the end of the day what any NGO would like to accomplish is change or rather action that will result in change or action and Spurlock hit it spot on. As a result McDonald's removed and stopped offering the "super size" size from it's menu and actively made healthier options available on its menu.
Here is the opening of the documentary:
So how does this relate to PR? In this case Spurlock represents many many NGO's such as Greenpeace and Save the Children. NGO's need healthy relationships with the public to meet their goals. Foundations and charities use PR campaigns to raise funds and use standard lobbying techniques in regards to government.
Many NGO's use different tactics to protest and get their points or word out using PR as the appropriate tool or avenue to get their point across. For years NGO's such as PETA has staged countless PR stunts againts celebrities to support their cause and have used many celebrities to support their cause. But what Spurlock did was fascinating by using himself as the experiment and showing his audience the response that he got from the McDonald's corporation by creating this documentary was pure genius. At the end of the day what any NGO would like to accomplish is change or rather action that will result in change or action and Spurlock hit it spot on. As a result McDonald's removed and stopped offering the "super size" size from it's menu and actively made healthier options available on its menu.
Here is the opening of the documentary:
Tuesday, April 12, 2011
Crisis Management and PR
The nature of crisis management in PR is made up if two words danger and opportunity meaning that an organization needs to be able to spot a crisis when an issue arises that has the risk or tendency to become dangerous and cause a potential issue for the organization.
With organizations such as BP and Toyota to show us what not to do by either keeping quiet like the case of BP, and allowing people to come to their own conclusions and run with them and in the age of social media it barely took days for Facebook pages asking people to boycott BP began to pop up. To date there are more than 20 boycott BP pages on Facebook with the biggest having more than 815,000 members. Or Toyota who sat back and waited and gave every other reason in the world for the issues their cars were having.
On the other hand we have other companies who have given great examples of crises management and have even avoided the crisis completely by acting as fast as possible case in point Johnson & Johnson and their Tylenol crises. In 1982 Tylenol was tampered with. Someone had been placing cyanide pills inside of Tylenol bottles, and it was killing people. Johnson & Johnson reacted quickly and pulled their product off the selves. Instead of suffering long-term damage to their reputation, Tylenol regained consumer confidence quickly because their crisis management plan told them to act in the interest of the consumers.
Every corporation needs to have a crisis management plan and its even more important now than ever because the consumers have platforms now that are more powerful than ever so poorly handled crisis management isn't a risk that organizations can afford anymore especially when their reputations are on the line.
With organizations such as BP and Toyota to show us what not to do by either keeping quiet like the case of BP, and allowing people to come to their own conclusions and run with them and in the age of social media it barely took days for Facebook pages asking people to boycott BP began to pop up. To date there are more than 20 boycott BP pages on Facebook with the biggest having more than 815,000 members. Or Toyota who sat back and waited and gave every other reason in the world for the issues their cars were having.
On the other hand we have other companies who have given great examples of crises management and have even avoided the crisis completely by acting as fast as possible case in point Johnson & Johnson and their Tylenol crises. In 1982 Tylenol was tampered with. Someone had been placing cyanide pills inside of Tylenol bottles, and it was killing people. Johnson & Johnson reacted quickly and pulled their product off the selves. Instead of suffering long-term damage to their reputation, Tylenol regained consumer confidence quickly because their crisis management plan told them to act in the interest of the consumers.
Every corporation needs to have a crisis management plan and its even more important now than ever because the consumers have platforms now that are more powerful than ever so poorly handled crisis management isn't a risk that organizations can afford anymore especially when their reputations are on the line.
How Important is Social Media?????
While we all know what a phenomenon Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, Blogs and most other social media sites have become the idea of New and Social Media as a course was quite weird for me. So as a student my natural reaction was to look into how these sites will impact and affect me going into the PR industry.
So as the popularity of social media grows more and more organizations and corporations have began to utilize it more and more to reach their public and establish more of a conversation with their audience or public. Recent studies have shown that if Facebook were a country it would be the fourth largest in the world with more than 500 million users and more than half of its users logging in every day Facebook has become a phenomenon and has shot social media into the forefront of the PR industry.
So how important in social media? with companies and corporations pumping money into its new media budgets for obvious reasons such as direct, engaging conversation with its audience. Social media I believe is very important to any corporation or organization right now that wants or needs to have a presence or resonate with its public and audience. The days of one way information communication are over.
So as the popularity of social media grows more and more organizations and corporations have began to utilize it more and more to reach their public and establish more of a conversation with their audience or public. Recent studies have shown that if Facebook were a country it would be the fourth largest in the world with more than 500 million users and more than half of its users logging in every day Facebook has become a phenomenon and has shot social media into the forefront of the PR industry.
So how important in social media? with companies and corporations pumping money into its new media budgets for obvious reasons such as direct, engaging conversation with its audience. Social media I believe is very important to any corporation or organization right now that wants or needs to have a presence or resonate with its public and audience. The days of one way information communication are over.
Wednesday, March 2, 2011
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