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PR vs. News Style

DH | February 16, 2010 | 1 Comment

I was being interviewed the other day by a global corporate consultancy about the success of the online newsroom model of ISCNewsroom.com versus other, more stereotypical corporate newsrooms.

If you examine the statistics, ISCNewsroom.com has become the most popular site in a worldwide industry in a very short period of time.

It had caught their attention, and they wanted to know why … what’s the secret for its success.

It comes down to one word … Style.

Corporate communications professionals and PR people learn to write, take photos and to do things in a PR style and that is counter to the appealing, credible and captivating style of news. Poles apart.

In PR, people are selling an idea, concept, service or project. They are in push mode. Like saying, “Listen up, I want to tell you something …”

Push no longer works in the digital era. We as consumers have gotten smarter. Inundated … bombarded by messages, we have learned what makes sense and what doesn’t. That is reflected partly in the demise of trust in traditional advertising and ineffectiveness of such PR tactics as news releases. We prefer, instead, to trust peer opinion over advertising.

Most online newsrooms of corporations and organizations are presented in push mode. They are selling something … and no one cares.

ISC Newsroom and the other corporate journalism initiatives by The News Group Net are presented as balanced news. We call it corporate journalism. The writing, photos, video and look and feel are news style that reaches out and engages audiences. It’s like saying, “Let me share something with you … ”

I think PR style is taught in university while News style is a discipline learned through experience.

These styles live at opposite ends of a spectrum – PR to promote, news to engage. Poles apart.

What emerged during my conversation was consensus that we live in times when the only way to cut through competitive clutter and differentiate a brand is through the more open, balanced, engaging and transparent style of news.