When will the PR Industry be Fighting Over the Last Journalist?
By Steven Phenix, ViaMetric Principal
When public relations professionals discuss the future of the PR industry the arguing gets so tortuous it’ll make your head spin. (But not mine. I’m a PR guy. I can handle spin.)
I thought we had this one settled when I cited a report published last month by the Council of PR Firms, saying that PR people should get wise to the ways of Web 2.0, social media, blogs, and the like. See PR people: Repent the end is near
But the crying ain’t over yet it seems.
Amanda Chapel at Strumpette is fighting a rearguard action against accepting this report. Be warned that Amanda is using terms like “ethical PR” and the “credibility” of the profession. Better take a dizzy pill before you go.
Me, I’m moving on.
Traditional PR is simply running out of traditional turf. Tom Foremski has been pondering for a year or two: the pool of journalists is shrinking, how come the PR industry is booming? When will the PR industry run up against these new limits, and find itself fighting over the last journalist?
I trust Tom to monitor this for us. I look forward to more stories from him like Media industry is going to hell in a handbasket - Where is PR industry’s handbasket?
Journalists themselves are very hip to Web 2.0, and all the print publications have adapted to the ways of the Web in order to survive and get ahead. The New York Times itself expects to be purely Web-based in a few years.
It will always be true that getting a story about you in the NYT is worth a lot of green, but the world is not a lock-in anymore, market opportunities are everywhere, and bad press can ignite like a firestorm. And there are skilled webmasters who can create news stories more easily than PR people can plant them.
The readers of PR’s target publications have become a whole different animal nowadays, with lots of power and tools of their own, thanks to Web 2.0. Reputation today cannot be controlled by traditional PR alone.
And on the positive side of the same coin, it’s a long-tail market now, where individuals are unique, and run in small niches. And the tools to reach them are - oh you guessed - Web 2.0.
Steven,
Apples, oranges and a strong snort of f**k-wad [edited] glue.
The Council’s report is a call to action NOT a final determination.
I am NOT fighting accepting this report. I’m allowing the discussion to happen as its lead author is requesting. See http://tinyurl.com/2mmsdf .
As to traditional PR running out of traditional turf… complete glue induced hallucination. Totally urban myth.
As to why the PR industry is booming… it’s because they’ve so diluted themselves so as to accept ANY money as long as it’s green, they are now whores without standards.
Lastly, as far as the ecosphere being otherwise polluted where a webmaster can create news stories… indeed… Web 2.0 is a f-ed up place. With a bag of SEO tools, pure dee s**t [edited] can appear popular.
Your post is exactly why we need a bona fide independent media.
Sincerely,
Amanda chapel
Managing Editor
Strumpette
dunno Amanda - seems to me that the very lack of an independent media is the force driving blogs. There really is a discussion in this aggregation and republishing thing, people are trying to sort out what’s real out of all the spin.
It’s a wonderfuil dream and I’d vote for it in a minute, but where are you going to get this independent media from? How in this corporate day and age can such a thing possibly arise?
Ross,
Respectfully…
1. To say MSM is all biased is urban myth. Sure, there is slant but there’s also integrity.
2. As to the driving force behind Web 2.0… it’s a populace revolution. It’s the have nots using a tool to try to redistribute wealth.
3. As to the discussion of spin and sorting it out… I am VERY familiar. I am NOT all that hopeful
- Amanda