The art of PR (public relations)

August 7th, 2007

Public relations (pr) should be built into your website business plan from the start.
Public relation is both an art (persuasion) and science (social, linguistic and economic) which builds bridges between an organization/company and its key publics.  

A PR professional has to be able to understand its clients goals, the skills to handle the media relations, the capacity to charm the audience, gain its understanding and acceptance, the ability to practice “a craft that calls for the deft mix of human behavioral skills and communication techniques.” Some of the PR professionals functions can be: to analyze problems and opportunities, to define goals, to identify the audience, to plan activities, to cultivate useful relationships (with the media, with financial organization, legislatives etc), to writes news releases, brochures, speeches, reports, to organize special events, deliver public speeches.   

Usually public relation didn’t have a positive imagine in a person’s mind for various reasons: there was not an ethic standard for this profession, no special requirements to entry into the field,  was believed that everybody can do the job. But according to The Fall of Advertising and the Rise of PR (HarperBusiness) its importance is growing rapidly. People seem to finally understand that public relations means more than advertising a company’s products or services; it means influencing people’s decisions, building reputation and creating brands (the Body Shop or Harry Potter cases for example).   

Public relation is an important part of the marketing (it brings the company messages, products, services to the targeted audience) but it is also well connected to the management (because the techniques used to get public attention and acceptance).  

What actually does a public relation do? It helps the management of a company know what to do regarding policies, relationships and communications, determines the attitude and the behavior of the public regarding a product/service and finds the way to favorable change it, informs and motivates the employees or retirees of an organization and their families, helps company to adapt to public expectations (it is also called “public affair”), communicates with different  regulatory agencies or legislatures to sustain an organization interest (also called “lobbing”); develops relation with the financial community on behalf of an organization (also called investor or shareholder relations).  

Today public relation is a must to any company/organization that seeks for success.

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