PR 3.0 - Regaining Credibility

There was a quote about the railroads that still floats around today that talks about the demise of the railroads in the United States.  Put simply, if they railroads realized they were in the transportation business rather than what they perceived as the railroad business, they would have transitioned better and been more relevant to the economy.  Perhaps even taking on a whole new business model as the times advanced.

Now, there is a whole new slew of "PR is Dying" blog posts running around, from Dennis Howlett's "PR is So Over," to Andrew Smith's justification of that sentiment.  This is nothing new, as we saw Chris Anderson drop his hat in the ring by calling out all the PR people that have "spammed" him in the past, countless posts about the death of the Press Release, and a whole host of others chiming in the chorus of how social media is killing PR.  Well, that and Charles Cooper's response to that.

Now, he has a point about Kara Swisher from The Wall Street Journal's All Things Digital questioning: If the message is empty, why bother?  Very true.  And there is a whole other blog post (or 10) that can be written about the vacuum of good story and good messages in pitches these days.

But I want to get back to the railroads.

I've always believed in the inherent credibility of PR and felt that when done correctly, this concept and approach to getting the message out was extremely powerful.  After all, isn't this what social media is asking for?  Transparency, open dialogue, good message, relevancy?  It should be a cake walk.  But it isn't.  Why?

Because PR doesn't see themselves in the credibility business, they see themselves in the PR business.

And that is what is "killing" PR in my opinion.  Not social media.  In fact, social media may only be killing PR by means of the account executives that believe these new tools to be the answer and trying--unsuccessfully--to incorporate them into their programs.  With the level of understanding they have of the tools, this serves as little more than a distraction.

One quick example.  In a recent meeting in a conference room of one of the large PR firms, a conversation about Twitter occurred.  Or rather, a conversation about how to get the message out about a client.  A conversation to gain them visibility (and implicitly, to gain credibility as an organization).  One of the "big" ideas?  Quote: "let's post something on Twitter."

Let's not get into a post vs. a Tweet, or the longevity of the content piece in a conversational medium like Twitter.  Let's look at two fundamental issues with this.

1. Understanding of the tool:  if you "post" something on Twitter, and you have no followers, who (outside of the public stream) will see your message?  (Another quote from that meeting: "well, how do you get followers, then?"
2. Understanding of the role of PR: the answer to "how do you get followers" is exactly what the brainstorm should be about.  That is what your job is.  Not to just suggest Twitter because you read about it in a book talking about PR 2.0 tools.

There are several reasons for this, but I would like to look at solutions.  PR is not going to "die."  But they are "bleeding" at the moment and there is a way to stop it and emerge better for it:

1. Stop the competition.  Staff members at all levels who are afraid of this change are drowning out the good ideas to protect their role on the team and putting forth uneducated ideas of their own and pushing them through to save their job.  Stop it.  Learn from your peers that know what they are doing and become a team.  It's not about you, it's about the client.  It's about credibility.
2. Stop with the writing test.  Now, I don't mean this literally, but I use it as a way to talk about hiring practices.  That same PR firm blogged recently how important the writing test is.  I don't know anyone that lives in 140 character tweets, 160 character text messages, and blogs that are mostly draft quality that will be swayed by a PR person who writes like it's going in a newspaper.  It's the idea, the message, the thought that counts right now.  Not the window dressing.
   
   1.  Update: maybe you can still do the writing test, but ask the interviewee to get the message across in 140 characters or less.  That would be interesting.  But who would grade it? 
3. Rethink hiring.  When print publications was the way to get the credible third party message out, PR firms hired journalism majors, editors from the newspapers, and beat reporters.  They did this to be more aligned with the channels in which they got their message out.  But the channels have changed.  So why not your hiring methods?  Why not hire bloggers, social media consultants, digital marketers and the like? You will have to make room for them and not have them report to old media bosses.  Maybe that's why you aren't hiring them.  But you did it once, you can do it again.  Rethink who and why you hire.
4. Rethink Teams.  There is no "Digital" group.  Only digitally-minded people.  Interactive may need to be separate for the design, code, and otherwise, but the strategy is not different than what is discussed in the meetings on strategy.  Make sure digital strategy is laced throughout the program and your team structures.
5. Rethink the role of PR.  Remember, it's about getting a good message out through credible channels.  Go back to thinking about gaining that credibility.  Throw away the print mentality.  Stop with the press releases.  Stop being in the business of PR and get into the business of credible messaging again.