Social Media and Public Relations: A Match Made in CyberSpace

Social Media is not only important for Public Relations, Social Media IS Public Relations.

Simply put, Public Relations is doing good and getting credit for it. Crisis Public Relations (Crisis PR) is doing not-so-good and defending a reputation in spite of it.

Since the early half of the last century, it’s been established that both Public Relations and Crisis PR work best when in-depth strategic planning is performed before methods or messages are discussed.

Key questions needing answers include:

• Who are our key publics?
• What does our target market look for?
• What are their current perceptions?
• Where can our audience best be contacted?
• How do they want to be reached?
• Why do we need to communicate with them?
• What are our key messages?
• What are our desired measurable outcomes?
• How will we evaluate our results?

Enter social media – Public Relations on steroids.

The most powerful communication medium ever created, Social Media makes it possible to economically extend a message’s reach and to globally impact target markets.

The good news is that blogs and social media provide two-way communication, opening up direct channels of communication between organizations and their publics.

The bad news is that Social Media’s immediacy demands shorter response times. In fact, this instantaneous interaction with Social Media such as blogs, Twitter or Facebook in many ways resembles Crisis Communications (or Crisis PR.)

Consequently, Richard S. Levick, President and CEO of Levick Strategic Communications says Public Relations and Crisis PR are important for Social Media:

“Given the power that Digital and Social Media now wield over the perceptions that drive corporate crises – and the speed with which that power is applied – systems that are designed to protect a company’s online reputation when it matters most are now an absolutely essential element of effective crisis management.”

Furthermore, according to the 2009 Digital Readiness Report, Social Media is important for Public Relations:

“Public relations professionals are taking the lead in managing the organization’s use of social media communications channels, and social media skills are nearly as important as traditional media relations skills.” *

Sounds to me like the jury’s in. Social Media and Public Relations…a match made in cyberspace.

* Study conducted by iPressroom with support from Korn/Ferry International, the
Public Relations Society of America (PRSA) and Trendstream.