Recession in PR: Perception or Reality?
My column today in the Daily Dog online newsletter, the leading PR industry site:
Here’s a reality I learned long ago as a correspondent at CBS News: Perception can be the highest form of reality.
The media has always managed to create stories out of perceptions that sometimes carry enough substance to become reality. We make personal decisions based on how we perceive something or someone. And no two perceptions are exactly alike. We can be poles apart in our perception of something, and both be “right,” because our perceptions define our reality.
You and I see a cloud. It reminds you of Elvis holding a microphone; to me, it looks like a sailboat in the sky. Still, someone else might see a storm approaching. All different perceptions, all correct up to a point and certainly our own truths.
Today, the public relations industry is abuzz with questions about recession—will a recession hit the U.S. economy? Are we in a recession already? How would a recession impact the PR industry? How can we protect our PR agencies and businesses from a recession?
[Click here to read the full column online ...]
Category: Personal notes, Public Relations, Strategic Communications
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I think it is only technology change
Hi David,
I’m interested in your thoughts and those of others about the challenges facing traditional media in the face of Web 2.0. As a former CBS network news correspondent, do you think that developing social networks around their content would benefit traditional media (radio, newspapers, TV)?
Timely question. Mainstream media has been called, “fractured.” Traditional revenue streams are shifting toward the Web, newspapers are cutting staff, TV news is cutting expenses and, with the exception of NPR, radio news is running on a shoestring. It’s all because of audience shift to online sources for news and information. My opinion is that it is essential, not only for the media but for all meaningful businesses to develop skills with the powerful tools of Web 2.0. We not longer are in the era of talking to audiences but rather in conversations with key audiences, listening to what people express and responding an a transparent manner.
Interesting. So do you think that this type of product will draw in substantial numbers of NEW listeners/readers/viewers?
If you are referring to the communications tools of Web 2.0, they are not products but rather components or, as I say, tools that can become dynamic elements of an organization’s online Web site. Quite frankly, the days of static HTML sites have pretty much gone the way of FAX machines and have been replaced by interactive elements that better engage audiences in conversations. Will the tools of Web 2.0 favorable impact audience appeal? Yes, if used within an over-arching strategic communications plan that includes conventional marketing and PR with blogs, streaming video, wikis, podcasts, etc.