Online PR is a subset of public relations that uses traditional PR tools and techniques in a new medium – the Internet. Since the Internet has radically changed the way we communicate, source, and use news & information; to reach our public we have to know where they are reading, listening or viewing online.
Online PR is a practice that is fascinating and a personal favorite. Adopting an online PR strategy is a must today if you are handling a technology client. That said it is not restricted to technology companies. There are dozens of lists of companies outside the technology vertical that have successfully benefited from well-planned online PR campaigns. (see blogging case studies)
A few days back when an opportunity presented itself, I quickly bounced off some questions to Sally Falkow, President of Expansion Plus Inc., a renowned Internet marketing and PR company.
Sally is a PR veteran of more than 25 years of experience is a thought leader in Internet marketing strategy and an expert in social media. Her blog 'Proactive' was one of the first PR blogs. She is the Co-Founder and Developer of the social media and content syndication tool, PRESSfeed, which was developed specifically for PR use online. Having accorded 'Expert Author' status on WebProNews, she has also authored several widely-regarded books on web strategies and online PR. She is a Senior Fellow of the Society for New Communication Research (SNCR) and has just completed a research study on how bloggers source and use news, which will be presented at the SNCR symposium later this year.
Fast 5 Q&A's with Sally:
Q1. What are some of the challenges that online PR practices are likely to face in the coming years?
The biggest challenge is understanding the social media mores and the tools - and how to be a participant in the conversation, not how to control or spin a message to an audience. Social media participant refer to themselves as 'the people formerly known as the audience'. Q2. How should PR professionals/ PR agencies gear up to face these challenges? Read up, familiarise yourself with the social media, and learn to participate. There are a few good sources of data on social media. Some of these are Social Media Club, Brian Solis (he is one of the founders of social media club, The Leading Edge), and the Bulldog Reporter blog I write. Q3. Suppose today, a prominent blog has written something negative about your client, what is the best way to go about addressing this? First and foremost – be sure you have online reputation monitoring in place so that you catch any comments like this right away. Getting to it early is vital. Contact the blogger offline if possible and see if you can give them your side of the story. Be aware that whatever you say or email them will be 'on the record' and will probably be used in the blog. So think it through carefully before you respond. If it is a genuine situation – the comment is verified and correct – you have to address how you will handle the issue. If it is not true you have to get your side of the story out as fast as possible in as many credible online news sources as you can. Be open and willing to talk to the blogger/s. Q4. Some tips on developing a online crisis communications plan? Have a fully functional online news room. Use RSS feeds. As with any crisis plan think it all through and plan for the worst possible scenario. Have you friends/allies/safe points in place before you need them. Identify the influencers in your space. Make contact and get to know then long before you need them in a crisis. Find the evangelists who love your products. Support them and help them to get their message out. Provide online tools for them to create positive content about you. Q5. How do you measure the effectiveness of an online PR campaign? As with any campaign you measure against your objectives: - Search visibility - Thought leadership - Traffic to the site/newsroom - Referred traffic from your RSS feeds - Articles picked up on other sites - Is your news being featured in online News engines like Yahoo News - Is it showing up in Google in their Universal search results - Online news coverage in other sites - Social media coverage – digg, del.icio.us, etc. - Blog coverage – positive - Reaches from journalists – print and online Download to read a case study on a successful online PR campaign. Sally Falkow will facilitate a Workshop on 'Strategic Online PR', which will be held in Singapore from 20 - 21 September, 2007, and organised by Universal Network Intelligence. Those interested to have more information can email with subject code 'SOPR-I'.
Labels: corporateblogging, mediarelations, Online PR, PR2.0, PRevents
The first All India Public Relations Conference was organised in Delhi on April 21, 1968 by the Public Relations Society of India. The theme of the conference was ‘Professional Approach’ intending to give a new meaning to the definition of the PR profession in India. Earlier, terms such as publicity, press a gentry, information, etc. were synonymous with PR.
A Code of Ethics for the PR profession was adopted and it was the beginning of professional Public Relations in India.
The objective behind designating April 21 as National Public Relations Day is to focus attention on the Public Relations function and Public Relations professionals in India who have an increasingly important role in the development of the country.
This year, PRSI will organise the 29th all India PR Conference at Chennai and the theme will be ‘Achieving Excellence in Public Relations through Information Technology Intervention’. According to Dr. Ajit Pathank, National President, PRSI, 'The theme is very much relevant to the need of Public Relations today. In today's world, it is difficult for any professional to ignore the use of IT. It is more so in the case of PR because if PR professionals have to give results in this era of fierce competition, they will have to give their best in terms of speed, accuracy and quality and IT support to PR will undoubtedly make a significant contribution in this direction. PR professionals who are not friendly with e-media will have problems in days ahead. They should acquire computer knowledge as early as possible. We should be able to shift from conventional communication to e-communication. This will also help us in networking with PR professionals across the world.'
Update: PR Code of Ethics (Courtesy: PR India Post)
We have PR associations like PRSI, PRCI, and PRCAI coming up with series of seminars, workshops, and summits round the year. Besides these, there are agencies and other industry associations organising PR and marketing communications related events.
It will be nice to see all these compiled at a common place for everybody's benefit.
India PR Events Calendar.
Please feel free to leave a comment to each of the events mentioned or contribute one. You can drop in a mail to hobbit.hob at gmail.com.
Subscribe to the India PR Events Calendar feed.Labels: PRevents
