One on One

I sat with Steve Barrett, editor-in-chief of PRWeek, for a wide-ranging discussion yesterday at the PRWeek annual conference. We covered three major areas in our half-hour chat. 

1. The U.S. Election — I told the audience that there is much to be learned from the Presidential race. Trump has moved campaigns into a post-advertising era with a total reversal of spend from paid to earned media. He uses Twitter as his main news medium. His use of simple language that excites (or incites) his core followers creates social traction and forces mainstream media into catch-up mode. The speed and frequency of his communications gives the aura of genuine and authentic connection with the public. The “truthiness” of Trump’s so-called facts, the questions he posed on President Obama’s nationality or jobs destroyed by free trade, has the same effect as dueling scientists on issues such as obesity or climate change. I urged the PR community to consider short-form content that is shareable and visual. 

2. Trust and Populism — I showed data from the Edelman Trust Barometer that reflected the alienation of the mass population from establishment institutions. The gap between informed elites and the mass audience has grown steadily since the Great Recession of 2008. The U.S. and UK show the largest divides, but there are similar findings in France, China and India. I suggested that the average person now believes that he or she has information sources as good as the elite, namely through search and social media. There is now a conviction that the elites are self-serving and that the mass population has little chance of advancing to the upper class. It took some time for this realization to sink in, but continued scandals in banking, corruption in relations between business and government (Brazil with Petrobras), and excessive compensation for CEOs have taken their toll. The Trust data also suggests that companies should communicate simply and quickly; they do not need to make the CEO a social media star; and they should empower their employees to speak, because employees are now so much more credible than establishment leaders of business and government.

3. The PR Industry — Six of the top 10 PR firms did not grow or went backwards in 2015. This should be PR’s time, given the complexity of the environment (nationalism, populism, fear of pace of innovation) and the explosion of media options. Meanwhile, the advertising industry is suffering from a crisis of confidence, with the disappearing advertisement from cord-cutting and ad blocking, plus the continued investigation into click fraud and media buying by the ANA. I contended that the management of PR agencies has not sufficiently recognized the opportunity on the marketing side of the business. The emphasis on continued increase in profit margins has pushed our sector toward public affairs, crisis management and corporate reputation. The pivot to marketing will also mean the investment hiring of new kinds of talent, from creatives to planners to paid media. The swim lanes between PR agencies and sister firms in digital, advertising and media buying will be blurred. We have to improve our ability to deliver tangible results, namely sales, not simply awareness or change of attitude among opinion formers. This is our time, but only if we reposition our business as communications marketing, with equality of the disciplines. We must be able to appeal to the CCO and CMO with programs that have purpose at the core, that start movements and solicit views of the core community of brand supporters.

PRWeek put on a very strong event that deserves more support from the PR industry. From the CEO of Cleveland Clinic to the CMO of Mars to the CMO and CCO of GE, the content was perfect for rising executives in our firms. Maybe next year the event should be held during Advertising Week so that more clients can participate.