Public relations - is it really a profession?

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The Oxford Dictionary describes the noun ‘profession’ as: a paid occupation, especially one involving training and a formal qualification. So why then is there  so much debate as to whether public relations really is a profession?

It is well known that PR has somewhat of a negative image in today’s society, and this could be partially blamed on the industry’s roots in the press agentrys and the use of propaganda in the 16^th centuries. Nowadays, many people regard public relations as ‘spin’, ‘gloss’ and sometimes even lies.

Television programs such as ‘Sex and the City’ and ‘Absolutely Fabulous’ have given fictional perceptions of the industry and the fact that strategic, professional public relations can require considerable training and specialised study, is often overlooked. In the past, PR companies would often employ people without any relative qualifications in the subject. However, as public relations degrees in universities are becoming more popular, employers are now starting to choose graduates which bring more academic skills to the industry. To broaden the argument more, some people argue that public relations cannot be taught, it’s a skill certain people have naturally.

Originally an example of a profession would be a lawyer or a doctor; this would be due to the body of knowledge which they function around, laws, facts, scientific truths and the like. However, in the case of PR, there is no black and white approach to addressing an issue and different types of companies believe and implement different styles of working methods.

The Chartered Institute of Public Relations (CIPR) has attempted to ‘clean up’ PR’s reputation by creating and trying to implement a Code of Conduct which all it’s members must adhere to.

My opinion is that whether or not PR really is a profession is neither here nor there. It is the reputation of the industry that should be observed and guarded to stop it’s image deteriorating. The public’s trust and confidence needs to be gained, something which is paramount in order for mutual communication between the PR company and the public to take place.

Is it time for public relations and St Valentine to call it a day?

Before Santa has even parked his sled back at the North Pole, once again our shops are lined with a multitude of pink and red cards, fluffy toys and ‘naughty gifts’ ahead of the festivity of St Valentine’s Day. Now, I understand that everybody has their own opinion with regard to how much the day should be celebrated. Take my flat mate for example, nice guy with a very lovely lady, yet he’s adamant that he will do nothing out of the ordinary for this occasion… “I never have and I never will!” he grumbles.

I myself am slightly cheesier – nothing stupid, but where’s the harm in a home cooked meal and a bottle of red. We tend to do a lot of that anyway. My point is that romance is a good thing, but it shouldn’t be forced.

Anyway, I read this hilarious post this morning on the Real Business blog page, all about public relations companies using Valentine’s Day to promote their products. Amongst the offenders were Pearl Drops with:

“Girls, do you want to make a good impression on 14 February? If you have your eye on someone special, forget saucy underwear and flowers; just make sure your smile is shining for maximum seduction success!”

There are more where that came from, but I thought I’d open this topic up on our site too. So the question is, should Valentine’s Day be another excuse for a PR story, or should we all agree never to tenuously link an unrelated product to the day of love. Let the debate begin..

Cabbies spread the word via WOM

Just over a month ago when I first joined the team at Wolfstar I had never really heard about Word of Mouth (WOM) marketing or social media. It didn’t take me long to realise how major they have become and I have started to notice how quickly they are growing in the UK.

While flicking through The Times I noticed the article “Spiel at the wheel? You must’ve had that adman in the front of your cab.” This article is about how London’s black cab drivers are becoming the latest channels for word of mouth advertising. This caught my eye because I find it to be such an unexpected, but clever, way of marketing.

Tourist boards such as the Tourism Authority of Thailand, and the Tourist Board of Melbourne have been sending taxi drivers on all expenses paid holidays. These are paid for out of their marketing budgets, in the hope that they will promote it to people. Taxi Promotions UK are currently launching a new service: WOMAD (Word of Mouth Advertising). They believe that many more products will eventually find a way to use this channel of promotion.

Intrigued by this I started to research further into the world of WOM and learned from various websites such as WOMMA that word of mouth marketing seems to be becoming one of the most effective form of marketing. It is constantly formulating new strategies, tactics and channels to reach all audiences instead of sticking to traditional ways of advertising such as on the TV or billboards.

I personally think this form of marketing is really clever and disagree that this is a way of deceiving people. Audiences in this country becoming more cynical and less receptive to straight up advertising and clever methods such as this one are needed to get a message across and it seems to be working.

Digital Communications is challenging search engine optimisation

There was an interesting article (paywall) which appeared in the last edition of PR Week which underlined a number of points I have been making in pitches to new clients recently. The main one is that search engine optimisation (SEO) has changed and is continuing to change and although buying into link farms and using SEO specific companies still works to a certain extent there is now a new kid on the block for getting high rankings on Google and that is using digital communications effectively.

In fact, the head of Google’s webspam team Matt Cutts issues a warning within the piece: ‘Buying or selling links that bypass (Google’s) PageRank (system) violates our webmaster guidelines. If a webmaster buys or sells links for the purpose of manipulating search engine rankings, we reserve the right to protect the quality of our index.’

Gaylene Ravenscroft, head of digital at Hill & Knowlton adds her point about the importance of social media: ‘Bloggers are becoming so crucial they underline PR’s importance as an integral part of the communications mix,’ she says.

The article itself makes some more interesting points - which I will let you digest yourself. However, it highlights a campaign by Volkswagen Commercial which it claims was successful. The campaign included targeting bloggers with press releases and essentially spamming them. This is not how we would advise our clients to go about their communications.

Social media companies and specialist public relations agencies should be advising their clients to engage in the social element, not in press release spamming, as the blogging community can often find this intrusive and you could do your brand/company more damage than good.

Simon Collister another public relations blogger has also written an interesting post on this article with his views - basically damning the use of spam as a communications tactic. I mean who really likes receiving spam these days anyway - I certainly don’t and I blog.

The article rounds off by making the final point: "So, if any traditional PR agency is dragging its feet on digital PR it may soon find its clients are not only considering other PR agencies for their digital work but also extending the remit for search agencies beyond web optimisation and into digital PR. Once Google toughens up, companies will be begging PR agencies to help."

Cross posted on: Norton’s Notes

Some really interesting business blog links

I’m not a fan of link posts, but for once I’m going to indulge in it myself:

OpenSkies is a new airline from British Airways and it has launched not with a traditional website, but with flyopenskies a business blog where they invite you to “join the conversation” and say they want to try and be open about the process of starting the new business.

My old friend Simon Collister has an interesting post about his just completed CIPR diploma dissertation on “whether political bloggers in the UK have an influence on the media agenda of broadsheet newspapers”. I look forward to reading the full dissertation which Simon is going to publish as a PDF.

Chris Edwards, chief executive of Education Leeds, is someone I know and admire from the days when I was a local councillor. He is now a very prolific blogger at his Interesting Times! blog. After spending the day at BETT with a client I read that Education Leeds and Bluewave SWIFT were winners of the prestigious BETT award for ‘Supporting Institutional Leadership and Management Solutions’.

The always interesting Colin Byrne, CEO of Weber Shandwick, has a good post on online politics about both the Labour Party and the Conservatives appointing advertising agencies, both of which are looking digital marketing strategies. I can’t help but wonder if ad agencies are the right people to assist with this and if public relations consultants might not be better qualified.

PR Week reports (behind a pay wall) that “public affairs chief” Steve Morgan of Morgan Allen Moore is “commuting between London and the US to work for Hillary Clinton”. Given what’s happening with Labour deputy leadership contender Peter Hain I suspect some people think he should be spending some more time in the UK.

Full Disclosure: I was director of communications for Alan Johnson, Secretary of State for Health, and the deputy leadership contender who narrowly lost to Harriet Harman.

XP: A PR Guy’s Musings

The fashion industry demands assistance from social media specialists

  Whilst scanning thorough my Feed Demon updates during my lunch break, I came across an article in Scottish newspaper The Herald. With my fork in one hand and mouse in the other I had been checking out what was happening on the ethical fashion front, as I had written my dissertation on Fair Trade fashion and like to keep abreast of what’s happening in the industry. The article was entitled ‘What will you be wearing this year?’ and hinted at the predicted trends for 2008. Whilst it was the ‘eco’ part that had drawn me to this piece, it was the mention of fashion blogging that caught my eye.

I am a huge fan of fashion blogs. (Being an ex-fashion student can you blame me?)The latest trends, accessories and celebrity styles are available at my fingertips without the £3.20 price tag and the content is up-dated every 30 minutes rather than every month. Shiny Media’s list of the top 100 fashion and lifestyle blogs has become my blogging bible. The number of fashion devoted blogs is increasing by the minute but after a couple of hours delving into the world of web2.0, I struggled to find any blogs by actual fashion or accessory brands. It seems that the majority of names in the business are missing out on this potential gem.

A blog, and several other facets of social media for that matter, could be hugely advantageous to a fashion label, regardless of how big or small. It unlocks opportunities that print just cannot compete with. Runways shows streamed live, 3-D tours of garments and bags through vlogs, new products available to view immediately and style notes to give consumers an insight into the personality of the brand.

I would certainly love to read a blog from a major label but I wait for one with baited breath.

FeedDemon now free

I’ve long been a fan of FeedDemon as in my opinion it is by far and away the best RSS reader on the market. So good that it was worth paying for, even though most of its competitors were free.

Well FeedDemon is even better as Newsgator (the company that acquired the product) has made it free.

Eight things you don’t know about me

Stuart Bruce has tagged me with the ‘Eight things you don’t know about me’ meme. My theme for this post has to be all things random!

1) I love foreign languages; my Norwegian is fluent, but I have also embraced Indonesian, Italian, Persian (salam azizam is my favourite - it just sounds so cool), most of the other Scandinavian languages and very VERY basic Chinese.

2) I have swam down the azumini river in Nigeria.

3) My favourite drink is a dirty martini.

4) I was born in Scarborough.

5) I’ve won two trophies in my time - the first came from a rugby sevens competition at the age of 13, followed by a 1st place at a Golf comp in Pescara, Italy - which made it into the local papers!

6) I consider the middle east my future home and hope to grow our business in the Gulf.

7) My Didush (Granddad) is Ukrainian. He has taught me to grow and nurture fruits and vegetables in the most efficient and tasty ways - a few years ago we grafted two plants together to create a tree that grows both lemons and limes. Yet his favourite meal to date remains a pork pie and pint of Yorkshire bitter.

8)I’ve just asked the lady in my life to move in with me…..she smiled and said yes!………for those who know me well, you will appreciate this is a not a decision I made lightly. 

I’ve tagged some contacts,  but mainly people who’s blogs I read  or podcasts I download on a regular basis: Brian Solis, Annie Mac, Neville Hobson, Peter Darch, Paul Pritchard, Jemima Kiss, Graham Holliday and the team at Word of mouth.

Eight things you don’t know about me

Stuart Bruce has tagged me with the ‘Eight things you don’t know about me’ meme that is currently floating around, so here’s mine:

1. I am a European and five times National champion Cheerleader. I am a competitive cheerleader for the Leeds Celtics, my University team which I am still a member of and train for four times a week (and no we don’t use pom poms).

2. I have appeared on ITV’s television show ‘Britain’s got Talent’ where I performed in front of Simon Cowell, Amanda Holden and Piers Morgan.

3. I am 5ft 11 inches tall, which I feel is rather tall for a girl, which makes me around 6ft 2 if wearing heels. Men in bars and clubs seem to have the need to point out to me that I am tall, as if I had somehow been aware of this fact.

4. I graduated from Leeds University in July 2007 and this is my first full time job.

5. I have performed in front of the 2012 Olympic committee in a conference room in a London hotel. We were so close to the audience that we nearly hit them during stunts.

6. I have made TV duo Ant & Dec do some cheerleading stunts with me, which took some persuading but was hilarious to watch.

7. I watched Titanic six times at the cinema when it was released and cried every time. (I was only 11 at the time though, so it is not as bad as it sounds).

8. I would love to live in New York City at some point in my life and strut along the sidewalks like Carrie Bradshaw. My friend is currently working there for a year and her stories have been making me extremely jealous (including ones about a Krispie Kreme party!)

Here are the people I have decided to tag as I enjoy their blogs Heather at Go fug yourself, Zara Rabinowicz, Sebastian Mysko, Arianna Huffington, Graham Hill

Eight things you don’t know about me

Stuart Bruce has tagged me with the ‘Eight things you don’t know about me’ meme. So here goes:

1. I came sixth in the British DJ Championships at Earls Court in London and lost in the finals to the overall winner who went on to play across Ibiza in the following summer.
2. My favourite food is Pizza (New York Pizza is the best) and I hate eggs.
3. I was part of a jury which had to decide on a case which included a well organised drug smuggling ring. The jury also included the deputy editor of the Sunday Times and a well known author.
4. When I was a kid I met the green cross code man who also played Darth Vader in the Star Wars films.
5. I was trained in four different martial arts and used to fight at the British Freestyle Karate Championships on a regular basis. My best positioning was ninth. I should also add that when I was knocked out that year - I was literally!
6. I worked on a nuclear power station in Lancashire and strangely never managed to get contaminated or glow in the dark.
7. I have always holidayed abroad since the age of two months but places I would still love to visit include Australia, China, Hong Kong and several parts of Africa.
8. I once had to compere live on stage in front of more than 1,000 people with a well known celebrity chef from Ready, Steady, Cook.

Eight is quite a lot but I tag the following people as I read their blogs: Darren Rowse, Vince Bank, Joel Postman, Lilly Allen, OurmaninNewcastle, Brian Solis,

Cross posted on: Norton’s Notes

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