The role of PR within a recession

September 10th, 2008 by Wendy McAuliffe

It’s official - the UK will fall into recession in 2008, the European Commission has this afternoon predicted. The gloomy facts can be read here in this BBC report.

So what does this mean for the PR industry, and what can we expect to see happen over coming months? Here are a few of my own predictions…

The PR industry will reinvent itself

Over the past couple of years, there has been increasing pressure on the PR industry to wake up to the impact social media is having on communications, and evolve. Some have responded more quickly than others. Liberate Media was infact set-up back in August 2006 to respond precisely to this change, and since then we’ve seen other agencies set-up in-house digital divisions. However, this movement has not spread across the whole of the PR industry at the speed it should - it hasn’t gone unnoticed by industry critics and observers that many more traditional PR agencies have turned a blind eye, largely through fear of the unknown.

A recession will force PR consultancies to get their houses in order, and evolve or die. So, in actual fact, a recession could ultimately be a good thing for this industry, separating the quality, digitally-aware practitioners from the run-of-the-mill.

The profiles of individual PRs will become more important

We’re living in an era of Personalised Relations - PR has always been about engaging with people, but the personal touch is today more important than ever. Jeremiah Owyang, senior analyst at Forrester, in his blog talks about PR folks becoming their own hubs, where “they’ve developed real relationships with influencers regardless of who their client list is”. If you’re looking to hire a PR who ‘gets’ online PR, it’s becoming easier and easier to spot them. Blogging and microblogging is making it so simple for PRs to build their own profiles, above and beyond the agency they work for - it’s a great way of assessing who’s truly active within social media, and who’s just talking about it.

PR will no longer be a beauty parade

This prediction is somewhat biased, but I say it with the experience of having worked as a trade journalist for six years. For decades, selecting a PR agency has been somewhat a beauty parade. Large brands have often felt more comfortable employing a well-know London-based agency, based on the kudos of having their contact details on their press releases. However, in my mind, a recession will place smaller, more niche PR consultancies in a position of strength, based on their ability to adapt their business model more rapidly in line with changing economic conditions. Definitions of ‘beauty’ will evolve, and be more about the ROI and quality of service a consultancy can deliver.

New business will be won/put to tender in less orthodox ways

The pitch process has been perfected by PR practitioners - weeks go into preparing, and the delivery is generally rehearsed to perfection. But as many brands will have discovered, this is not always the best way to select a suitable PR partner. The team who present will not always be the team you end up working with, and once the business is won, enthusiasm levels will quickly switch to the next exciting pitch that comes through the door.

As budgets become reduced, and ROI becomes key, word-of-mouth and recommendation, as well as networking, will I think become a more widely used route to winning business.

In addition, as all aspects of digital communications merge, new business will also be won through collaboration with partner agencies. Keeping yourself isolated is no longer an option for successful PR agencies.

And finally…CEOs will need to prioritise PR more highly

It goes without saying, that in order to get the most out of your PR resource, you need to make it a two-way relationship. This takes time, and many PR campaigns fall down on senior people not dedicating enough time to their PR campaign, be it for media interviews, signing-off press materials, or attending meetings etc. In a recession, brands who continue to see the importance in PR will need to make sure their investment is working harder for them, which means devoting more time to it.

We’re living in an age where conversations happen online about your products and services, in real time. When consumer spend is low, those who engage with their publics will reap the best reward. Your PRs cannot pretend to be you - and so CEOs etc will need to make more time to engage in these conversations around their brand.

** These are just my humble opinions. It’s an unsettling time for the PR industry (which has never done a great job of doing its own PR), but let’s hope the recession offers the shake-up the industry needs. Please let me know if you have other predictions to add to my list above.

      

Tags: economy, online PR, PR, recession, Social media

This entry was posted on Wednesday, September 10th, 2008 at 3:44 pm and is filed under Blog, PR, Social media, Trends and research. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.