It was a blog post like this that started it all – that fateful day on the New York Times Small Business Blog when a Long Island haughty restaurateur accused the entire public relations profession of being crazy (no more link love from me). That’s when my guest author Jenn Whinnem responded, and a series was born – What is PR?
A colleague of mine, @DawnComber, who is also a featured Momaraderie, pointed out Adam Singer’s blog post of March 31 and asked my reaction. You see, she’s been watching in the wings and reading quietly without comment as I attempt to corral the Mustangs with a single definition of public relations with consensus. (The grand finale happens this week, after a series of more than 13 blog posts on this topic.)
And, so, to my chagrin, I read Mr. Singer’s blog (link above) post “PR Needs to Shift From Reactive to Proactive” however I did it in fits and starts. My blood began to boil in the first graph where I’m told PR practitioners need to “become truly proactive in their approach to the practice; simply, from reactive to proactive.”
I read this to suggest everyone in PR is reactive; we don’t plan, we’re not proactive, and basically we’re tactical and useless.
Next graph written by Mr. Singer: “Media companies are far more proactive than reactive. They plan their content through editorial calendars. Their leadership teams have the executive perspective on content and have a long-term vision with the goal of influencing an industry. They react to news and happenings, but they plan for it.”
STOP.
- Is Mr. Singer suggesting PR leaders do not have a long-term vision with the goal of influencing an industry? I beg to differ; influencers are our bread and butter; strategic/long-term planning that aligns directly with an organization’s business goals is how we execute against a PLAN.
- By the way, Mr. Singer, the use of ed cals is a highly tactical and only somewhat strategic approach to planning; you’re suggesting media companies (do you mean magazines?) that use a content calendar should be labeled strategic?
- How can someone plan to react? PR is often prepared to react, and that’s called crisis communications. Good media relations professionals are always prepared to react to national news so they can tie in their story and pitch media with an associated angle and a hot influencer to help tell the story.
The PR practitioners I know are always prepared for tomorrow’s news, especially those who work in publicity and media relations. That’s why we consume news from “media companies (?)” and social platforms, etc. to anticipate and be prepared for the future.
Next up on Mr. Singer’s blog:
“I’m convinced that public relations practitioners need to flip their thinking. Simply: from reactive to proactive. But only if they can become truly proactive in their approach to the practice. And the 30% of proactive PR most companies and agencies spend in proactive mode? It’s probably wasted.”
STOP ME FROM BEING STRANGLED.
So, finally, I think I understand. Mr. Singer believes there are only 30 percent of companies and agencies (not PR practitioners) that are proactive. I’m not certain a firm or company can take credit for being proactive without a visionary public relations and integrated marketing team leading the way.
“Most PR professionals flirt from opportunity to opportunity.” (Is Mr. Singer implying we flit from or flirt with opportunities?) I’ve not flitted from client to client in years; yet I’m always on the lookout for the next slice of my pie to fill my business development pipeline. Incidentally, “most?” PR people do this? That’s an amazing generality without proof.
We all know that PUBLIC RELATIONS IS NOT JUST PUBLICITY. Perhaps this is where the confusion in this post lies? The breadth of the public relations profession is being boiled and simmered into this singular blog post. The Public Relations profession has been taking a global beating in the last several months, and there are several of us trying to flip that around to prove our value, credibility and status as professional influencers within our respective vertical markets.
I do agree most people need to be more strategic in how they approach business; but, I’m hard pressed to imply an entire profession is tactical and without influence.
It’s blog posts like this that become choke holds on our collective efforts, and it’s so unsettling to me that this post comes from someone within the profession who should know better than to make generalities for thousands of PR practitioners many of them indeed strategic who do influence brand by aligning communications strategy with business goals .
Before I go any further, let me give Mr. Singer the kudos he deserves. Adam Singer works in public relations; he’s a peer although we’ve never interacted before today as far as I know. Here are his credentials I’ve taken from his blog; you can see for yourself:
- The Future Buzz is the digital marketing and PR blog of Adam Singer, social media practice director for Lewis PR.
- His blog, The Future Buzz, receives from 30,000 to more than 200,000 unique visitors per month, depending on the type of content he creates (extracted from his blog).
- More than 7,000 web professionals, marketers, PR people and bloggers/social media users subscribe to Adam Singer’s content via RSS and email (data from his blog site).
I’m impressed with Mr. Singer’s analytics and blog subscribers; not sure my little one-year-old blog will ever reach those admirable numbers.
Mr. Singer’s blog post rankled me; I’m sensitive after having adopted this journey for more than a month to define public relations and facilitate discussion within the profession. There are so many generalities in this content targeting public relations as a whole that are just false; yet they are stated on an influential blog with 7,000+ subscribers.
Credibility in public relations has always been something we strive for as professionals. None of us need a thorn like this from someone working in our very own profession.
(Image: SEOConsultants)
Just my opinion, but all of this publicity vs. PR, proactive vs. reactive goes back to people (the public) not understanding the difference between publicity and PR. The problem with that comparison is that both PR and Publicity haven’t accepted the idea that there is no longer such a thing as Publicity.
A studio used to be able to have the Publicity department put out the trailer for a new movie, and that was fine, people could see the preview and decide whether or not to see the movie, but that doesn’t work now. That paradigm was designed to function in an era where information was unidirectional, the studio had something to say, and the potential audience is who they wanted to *tell* it to. Times have changed, everything is bidirectional now. Sure the studio can create the movie and put out the trailer, but anybody who see’s it can now *answer* that trailer, telling everyone in the potential audience what they think of it. This is not an eventuality that is accounted for with publicity model, it is however what public relations is all about.
Everyone can talk to everyone, so *telling* your point of view to your customers without listening to the inevitable response is both rude, and potentially suicidal to your business. You need someone to get your message out, AND, listen to what people think about it. Publicity is dead, long live PR.
Ray, are you in PR or just a pretty smart tech geek?
Nope, no PR experience … but I did stay at a Holiday Inn Express last night 🙂
Ribbit
Like Ray said, I think reactive vs proactive is going back to the age old publicity vs public relations debate. Publicity might be planned, but it’s not a strategy – it’s a tactic. As such, it does tend to be mostly reactive.
Public relations is a communications strategy that touches all aspects and departments of a company. Since it’s a strategy, you are almost forced to take a proactive approach to anything PR-related if it’s to be defined as PR.
Then how can this guy, who works in PR at a firm, be in PR? Since when are we not proactively planning ahead to anticipate the next hook, trend, event, company announcement, blah, blah? I’m so challenged by these statements.
Am liking the “PR Justice League.” Time for a blog post. Thanks, Beatriz!
1) We do need to be more proactive than reactive. That’s everyone almost any field, any industry.
2) IME that has always been the goal. Research, plan, strategize and prepare. I review editorial calendars, not just reacting but also to find ways proactively use that intel. Last week I sent an ed cal suggestion to a media outlet.
3) More than proactive or reactive, GOOD public relations is responsive, adaptive. Like you said that flexibility, it’s how we manage a crisis, how to take that one media exposure and make it something more, how like in Ray’s example, we can take that positive fan response and let it run, or fight creative ways to counter a negative.
IDK what to tell you Jayme. I’m less rankled by the post than you, even with it’s generalizations. If I read it right, It’s his opinion that good PR should move to different model, building reputation and buzz with target publics without having to wait around for a media outlet to shine light on the brand. That is what we often try to do; that’s what we should do. He’s talking about a blog so powerful it becomes the go-to for an industry, and the media then adjust their ed cals to follow. He’s talking about being Apple, and your product defines an industry, all the chatter around it. So I tend to agree with him, though like you I wasn’t sure about labeling an entire industry thusly. FWIW.
This is where peoples’ opinions are theirs and others regard them differently based on backgrounds, training, insight, and perspective. Statements like this, presented in general broad brush strokes, may not be intentionally negative but no one has the same perspective and that’s what makes conversation robust (whether you like that word or not).
I saw two other comments in agreement with this author, too. My perspective is more from a position of almost three decades; perhaps that’s what one of his commenters said “flip the old guard on their heads” although I don’t consider myself as old guard as much as the old guard really is. Heh.
If I disagree, I’m less inclined to say so. Because I’ve been immersed in the crisis of image in public relations for more than a month now, this post did not do PR kind justice; in fact, it paints us poorly outside the profession yet again, and this comes from someone inside the ranks. That’s what pushes my buttons.
Vein throbbing right now…will compose intelligent comments once calmer…wow…(not you Jayme, but Mr. Singer!)
This is an interesting debate. Aside from not waiting for a media outlet to give you shine, what else does “being proactive” actually mean?
Thanks for coming by here. I can also read this as being more strategic versus tactical, as well. Where I took major offense with Singer’s opinions is with the “flit from opportunity to opportunity.” When a practitioner is working a campaign, they are highly strategic to integrate PR with marketing and social media channels, too. What do you think?