The Eulogy! office was united in its mirth this week at the publication of a blog entry on I Am the Client, which equated all PR to bad PR. This wittily-written diatribe from an anonymous (and let’s face it – probably fictitious) member of the marketing industry generalises all PR as coming down to three key tactics – celebrities, making things bigger, launching a dedicated ‘day’. In between the general amusement of the author’s assertion that all PRs are always dieting (not with this office’s appetite for cake) and always drinking (surely ruining the diet?), two main points stuck with me.
- Bad PR is not all PR. Yes, celebrity, big cheques and national awareness days are tactics used by some. However, they wouldn’t be used if they didn’t work, at least in certain specific cases. PR is about communicating with audiences in the most effective way for both client and consumer, and delivering on set objectives. If you want to raise general knowledge of an issue, an awareness day is one route to take, among many.
- Good PR has a – perhaps unfortunate – tendency to be anonymous. It’s a lot more widespread than many realise, but when PR works well it’s not always obvious, flashy, or trashy. That’s because you’re getting what you need – information – and the client is getting what they need – the information out there. It’s seamless, it’s effective, and it’s all around you. There’s a reason why, when advertising and marketing budgets have taken a massive recessionary hit, public relations has both kept going and kept growing.
In its purest form, PR is just about communication, creating a dialogue, bringing people together. Personally, I quite like it to be somewhat anonymous, akin to being the man behind the curtain. It’s not flattery, but a simple fact – communication needs to keep coming.
Any number of companies who have simply stopped talking to their audiences know this can be incredibly dangerous. Silence breeds contempt, and it allows rumours to spread. I may have ranted in the past about PR’s bad reputation in film and on TV, but it still rankles when our industry is criticised. At least we (as somewhat smug multi-award winners this year) can take courage from the fact that it’s specifically bad PR taking the flak.
