Back in the day, public relations, advertising and marketing were firmly divided in their respective silos and disciplines. We in public relations were often referred to for real in jest as the “bastard step children” of marketing.
Often we’d sit in an integrated meeting of the disciplines and keep our traps shut until we tossed out a bit of value-added strategy into the mix while our peers across the aisle glared nicely.
Today, the blended nature of marketing has public relations professionals up in arms. Some are balking at the integration of PR so cohesively into marketing. In short, these people are having an identity crisis.
They don’t want to be a marketing smoothie. I get it; nor do I, BUT,the nature of marketing today is quite different than the isolated and unintegrated way we worked in the past (as recently as six years ago).
Marketing in its broadest and most inclusive sense now requires every single communications disciple to integrate and blend while learning others’ expertise. For people in public relations, that’s called hybrid PR. For people in marketing, that’s called integrated marketing – the blended whole.
If you don’t do either or both, you die. Purely and simply, you become antiquated.
Change is now; change is always the future. Change makes some people uncomfortable and others squiggle with glee (that’s me). The changes you make as a professional can be methodical or they can be all-in. Regardless of how you change ensure you’re changing to innovate and not merely to keep up with the Joneses.
What’s a Marketing Smoothie?
I know you’ve made a smoothie in your day with all the good, healthy and nutritious ingredients stacked up looking all colorful. Then, what happened? You clicked the “on” button and voila! A blended smoothie chock full of nutritious wholesomeness.
Marketing has become that – a blended beverage with the smarts and nutrition of a plethora of disciplines feeding into and around the other for the benefit of the user, customer, prospect, etc.
Public relations is a powerhouse in that smoothie; it’s the energizer and protein that packs punch. It brings integrated value few other disciplines can brag on. We in public relations do this for every marketing smoothie you’ll ever drink:
• Put the core business goals front and center into strategy
• Build communications strategy against the business with results-driven comprehensive and inclusive programs
• Message map the core outbound and external messages for the C-suite and spokespeople and train them to be on top of such messages
• Build and create content against the business goals (content marketing)
• Optimize that content for on-page performance (search marketing) and toss in a bunch of optimized online news releases every campaign benefits from
• Write the landing pages and title the calls to action to drive traffic to sites and generate leads (digital marketing)
• Write and optimize the online newsletter that ties into the digital strategy using the core messages from the message map (email marketing)
• Create and execute blogger relations, influencer campaigns, thought leadership, industry analyst relations, investor relations, and internal communications, to name several
And, yet, all that goodness listed above is not done alone. Some may believe it is and tell you so, but don’t be fooled. An expert public relations practitioner needs her sisters to fully develop and deliver a solidly trackable and measurable campaign with every single ingredient to create the best-tasting smoothie marketing has to offer.
(This post originally appeared on Steamfeed.)
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Spot-on post Jayme! I’ve written about the same concept as (less creatively named) web presence optimization, but the principles are the same; all members of a marketing/PR team need to work together to maximize the brand’s total online presence, in a relevant, consistent and compelling manner.
TomPick1 Hi, Tom! Thanks for coming over! “Web-Presence Optimization!” Oooh…I’m not sure I get that, but OK!! I’m going to need to go find that post on your site and learn all about it. If you get a chance to share the link here, that would be wonderful! Thanks!!
Soulati | Hybrid PR TomPick1Hi Jayme, no problem! Here’s one of my original posts on WPO (https://webbiquity.com/social-media-marketing/what-is-web-presence-optimization-and-why-should-i-care/) and here’s an updated version of the framework:https://webbiquity.com/social-media-marketing/maximize-your-online-visibility-the-web-presence-optimization-wpo-framework/
Nice job Jayme. Smoothie is a much nicer way of saying Mutt-Marketing aka mixed up or mashed up bag of services.
The lines have blurred, it is no longer about ownership and it is back to being all about effectiveness.
Right on Jayme! Regardless which discipline we came from, we
are all on the same team now. Our common focus is THE STRATEGY. Keep spreading
the message, sister.
digitaljgo Hah. Love that comment and thanks for making it!! When you get @Livefyre commenting system for your blog, then I can just click on your latest blog post and come over to visit!
1ad_dad I could’ve said mash up, but it seems someone else has already done that one to death!! How’s it going in the Nashville town? What’s happening over there? How are you?
TomPick1 Soulati | Hybrid PR Gonna come by…thanks for sharing these!
Soulati | Hybrid PR digitaljgo I have LiveFyre set up. But it’s not showing my recent post when I leave comments. Looks like another setup puzzle to solve. But do stop by — guests welcome!
Soulati | Hybrid PR 1ad_dad All is well here, Jayme thanks for asking. Hope you are well. I love your Smoothie analogy, feels healthier too. : )
Yes, Smoothie is good and healthy, especially served by creative @Soulati with ingredients of PR, Advertising & Marketing! Hold tight in the mixer 🙂
digitaljgo Soulati | Hybrid PR @Livefyre offers tremendous support, John. Do reach out to them on Twitter and they will jump in to help you. When you log in to your LiveFyre dashboard, it may be a quick button somewhere in there that indicates whether you wish to share latest blog post. I would do that and get familiar; I know I’ve done that in the past.
FairPlay365 Do I have the pleasure of a FIFA peep in my comments? Love that! Just spent the weekend at kidlet’s soccer tourney, and as an ex Rec coach, it’s hard for me to sit on the sidelines and shut my mouth.
Thanks for coming over to share some health with me!
Soulati | Hybrid PR FairPlay365My Pleasure, and there you go, now She coaches at this level, should not
fans of Her Eminent Social Media Skills begin to get worried that She
leaves for the Soccer Champions League…?
Soulati | Hybrid PR digitaljgo I did just that yesterday after our exchange here. The response was amazing. Ten minutes after I posted my question on their forum I got a reply with a two-click solution. It was a button I was not finding. Awesome support. Thanks for the tip!
Jayme I have a confession to make. In all of my years in business, I never once gave any consideration to PR/media relations. Perhaps even more awful is that none of the marketing firms we chose to help us, mentioned it either. I have to say further, in my circle of acquaintance and peers (other business owners), it’s not something we discuss.
Clearly, this must end. Especially given that PR is the powerhouse in the marketing smoothy. Will you do a hangout with me for Clarity for the Boss please and let those other people, like myself, who may not even know what they’re missing, know that A) PR is hugely important and B) it’s definitely for small business?
Thanks,
Sharon