Age of New Media in Communications; keeping abreast as a PR professional

Covid19 has been an eye-opener for innovation for man industries. The age-old, conventional methodologies were wearing out their magic in the face of the pandemic. Thus, the impact has been direct and disastrous for marketers, with advertising budgets low and the idea of public events thwarted due to health guidelines, it was essential that the brand survives the impact and engage in brand awareness that worked alongside the challenges of the pandemic. 

As we were not selling advertisements, creating jingles, doing artworks for hoardings or flyers, it is important to understand the underlying concepts of Public Relations. Which will enlighten one that Public Relations stands on it as its own in the marketing paradigm. As such the recent facelift, Public Relations has achieved in the backdrop of a global pandemic to survive and sustain through engagement of New media is noteworthy. 

For a total outsider, Public Relations is “the management of communication between an organization and its publics.” (Grunig and Hunt,1984). In a traditional sense, this has been an attempt to cultivate a positive reputation among the target publics of a brand. Be it the general public, specific industry stakeholders, governing bodies, general public etc. When I was introduced to Public relations almost 15 years ago, PR worked a lot on in-person engagement. The main medium or communications management tool has been traditional media such as print, radio, and television. This was due to the very fact that Public Relations initiated from the roots of publicity and journalism. However, as we fare through 2021, it is evident that that just like all other things in the millennia and Gen Z culture, Public Relations has also taken a radical transition from its traditional tools to more of digital, social and influencer marketing alongside virtual reality as well as AI technology. 

The public Relations industry and its practices have been impacted by the ideals of New media since the introduction of blogs, web journals, podcasts, etc. of the infliction of internet in households since the early 21st century. The novel forms of communications such as text, audio, and image sharing with impactful tools such as Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, Linkedin to name a few have revolutionized the access to information among publics. As such it has introduced a whole new generation of impactors to the communications industry, sloggers, bloggers, influencers, microbloggers. In an age where reality television reign the entertainment industry, it is not a surprise that the majority of the publics have resorted to accepting the inputs of these new-age impactors to be authentic. Moreover, with New media, the information ‘pours out of digital spigots’ (Stephens 2007, p. 35) and news now arrives ‘astoundingly fast from an astounding number of directions’ (Stephens 2007, p. 35)

In addition to the influx of a whole new medium of advocators that could become agents for brand communications, the internet has also gifted the PR industry with the opportunity towards much-needed market intel, data collection and data analysis, information monitoring and direct dialogue engagement are important assets for the communications strategists. As such the importance of the knowledge on how and when to engage the vast advantage of these new media has been a constant challenge for the majority of the existing PR practitioners, who were used to the hands-on in person media relations with the traditional media. According to Alfonso &     de Valbuena Miguel, the are many PR practitioners who are not comfortable with embracing the new media due to lack of knowledge coupled with fear towards new technology. (2006).

However, if Covid19 taught us one thing, that is, change is inevitable, and adaption and adoption are the keys to sustenance. My past colleague and now a PR industry leader here in Sri Lanka, Ashan Kumar used to say, ‘In order to thrive in PR or for that matter in any industry, we need to learn and unlearn’; as such it is my opinion that we have arrived at crossroads. Those who want to become PR practitioners are now more than ever are on the dire need to happen their skills, gain knowledge and improve work practices to embed new media and use them in creating impactful communications strategies. We have to come to terms with the ideology that New technologies are being developed and updated on daily basis, whereby every passing day poses a new challenge for those of us in the profession. We have no choice but to keep au courant with not only what is available but also of what is being planned for release in the future. 

It is high time that one opens their eyes towards using new PR tools such as impactful influencer marketing, multi-channel PR methodologies, active monitoring of content performance, virtual media, modern metrics platforms while accepting the tides of new media. 

References 

Alfonso, G.-H., & de Valbuena Miguel, R. (2006). Trends in online media 

relations: Web-based corporate press rooms in leading international 

companies. Public Relations Review. [Electronic version]. 32, pp. 

267–275

Grunig, J. & Hunt, T. (1984). Managing Public Relations. New York: Harcourt 

Brace Jovanovich.

Stephens, M. (2007). Beyond News. Columbia Journalism Review. [Electronic 

version]. 45, pp. 34–39.