I couldn’t disagree more. Bad PR practitioners are in the media-pitching business. Good PR practitioners are in the engagement business. There is much more to PR than media relations. As a PR person you should know this.
Social media provides an opportunity to engage your clients’ audiences and receive a real-time snapshot of how your clients are viewed. It’s not just pitching bloggers and befriending them on Twitter and Facebook. It’s about embracing all audiences, including online media, customers, employees and other stakeholders. Social media PR is fishing where the fish are, not throwing a line out in the middle of a pond.
Think of political microtargeting. Social Media allows companies and brands to microtarget small (and often influential) groups. There is no better way to learn of the success or failure of your strategies or tactics than by connecting to real people.
Media relations is only a tactic of public relations. PR firms that can’t get beyond this are the failed firms that spam journalists by the thousands. It is these firms that think social media is another media relations tactic, and they will never understand the power of engaging the public.
Social media provides an opportunity to engage your clients’ audiences and receive a real-time snapshot of how your clients are viewed. It’s not just pitching bloggers and befriending them on Twitter and Facebook. It’s about embracing all audiences, including online media, customers, employees and other stakeholders. Social media PR is fishing where the fish are, not throwing a line out in the middle of a pond.
Think of political microtargeting. Social Media allows companies and brands to microtarget small (and often influential) groups. There is no better way to learn of the success or failure of your strategies or tactics than by connecting to real people.
Media relations is only a tactic of public relations. PR firms that can’t get beyond this are the failed firms that spam journalists by the thousands. It is these firms that think social media is another media relations tactic, and they will never understand the power of engaging the public.