You know those hybrid cars that are more expensive because they run on electricity and fuel? Think about public relations…our profession is like a hybrid car, too. We run on different platforms to deliver mileage for a campaign. We blend a variety of marketing disciplines, just like fuel and electricity to produce.
On Spin Sucks June 3, Gini Dietrich wrote about the PR firm of the future. She’s seeking hybrid PR professionals to work with her team, and here are the criteria she’d like to see in that person:
- Media and blogger relations
- Content development
- Content marketing
- Workflow development and email marketing
- On-page search engine optimization
- Issues management
- Client service
- WordPress coding (bonus)
Old PR
Recently, I wrote a post right here about the blending of PR being its demise. In that post, which turned a few heads, I had a list of traditional PR and it looked like this:
- Media Relations
- Spokesperson Training
- Message Mapping
- Thought Leadership
- Blogger Relations
- Writing
- Industry Analyst Relations
- Investor Relations/Stakeholder Communications
- Corporate Communications
- Internal/Employee Communications
- Events Planning/Execution
- Community Outreach
Hybrid PR
Like Gini says, public relations folks need to be a bit of this and a bit of that to succeed in the new and blended frontier. We have to adopt more than just adeptness on the social channels. We have to jump into new and uncomfortable areas to ensure we’re innovating all the time.
You know what the problem is with public relations professionals? Too many of them want to stay pure and not change.
Here’s the rub – WE GET TO CHANGE! We’re in a profession that provides us with the gifts to re-invent, adopt new methods and offer a powerful combination of skills, expertise, and knowledge from content marketing, media relations, digital marketing, social media marketing, thought leadership, message mapping, industry analyst relations, investor relations, employee communications, special events, and so very much more.
I appreciate the word hybrid to describe what I offer. No wonder I’ve had such a challenge sharing succinctly about my services.
Jayme Soulati offers a breadth of public relations services featuring content, social and digital marketing.
Would that begin to describe what hybrid public relations looks like from your vantage point?
Customers At The Core
Regardless of what you offer, it’s really the customer who dictates what you pull out of the hat. If you’re not familiar yet with The ArcCompany, the Canadian upstart making inroads into huge insight, then you need to read this blog post or go find the truly provoking comments of Amy Tobin especially in her Sunday social justice post.
As you’re thinking of your customers, just for the fun of it, I’m going to end with another Gini list that helps define PR and the tactics that ought to be in use today. This is a list from Arment Dietrich; it’s “Some of the things we do” taken directly from this post, and if that’s not hybrid PR, nothing is!
- Develop integrated offline and online marketing plans
- Content development (white papers, videos, podcasts, blogs, eBooks, webinars)
- Marketing that content we develop
- Email marketing
- On-page search engine optimization
- Social media
- Google+ authorship and authority
- Online reputation management
- Crisis communications planning and management
- Employee communications
- Social media policies
- Media relations
- Blogger relations
- Monitor online conversations
- Develop online audits
- Community development and growth
- Influencer relations
- Word-of-mouth campaigns
- Analyze data and web analytics
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