PUBLIC RELATIONS
What is Public Relations?
Public relations has two general purposes:
1) Public relations is the continual negotiation of relationships with people, organizations, departments, and offices that your organization needs or prefers to associate with.
2) Public relations is also the management of image and reputation that the general public perceives in the media and community.
Thus, public relations generally employs one-way and two-way
modes of communication to facilitate relationship building and
image management.
Why is Public Relations Important?
Public relations is important because an organization needs to
have positive relationships with its associates and partners as
well as a positive image in the public eye. Positive relationships
with others contributes to productivity and growth while a positive
image contributes to current and potential relationships.
What is the Difference Between Public Relations &
Marketing?
Although they may use similar methods, public relations are marketing
are often conflated as the same thing when they are actually very
distinct. A possibility for this is because the words publicity and
marketing are often interchanged due to similar definitions. One
way to discern between public relations and marketing is to
remember that public relations is relationship
building while marketing is impression
building. In other words, public relations involves
relationship and image management. On the other hand, marketing is
based on building impressions, or the number of times your
organization is noticed by the general public.
resources for MARKETING >
modes of public relations || relationship building || professionalism || branding
Modes of Public Relations
Correspondences
Correspondences is basic communication between your
organization and another. Methods of corresponding range from
emails to phone call to memos to face-to-face meetings.
Correspondences should have some form of regularity, enough that
the other organization knows that you are serious about the
relationship between your organization and their
organization.
Meetings
Although it is the most difficult method of correspondence to
establish due to everyone's busy schedules, face-to-face meetings
are often the most impactful due to the opportunity to do multiple
things at one time such as gain immediate feedback, offer quick
responses, and present material and information.
Presentations
Meetings also give your organization the opportunity to perform
presentations that highlight your organization, its programming,
its needs and interests, and what it would like out of the
relationship.
Press Releases
Press releases are one of the first things that people think of
when they hear the term public relations. A press release is
generally a formal statement about the organization that is
distributed to various media outlets. Most press releases are meant
for the general public to see. Like public relations and marketing,
press releases are often confused with flyers. Press releases tend
to be more detailed, written in prose form, and are usually void of
flashy elements.
Articles
Similar to a press release, an article is distributed through
a particular media outlet and is generally developed for public
viewing. A general difference between an article and press release
is that the former is written by the media while the latter is
written by your organization. Also, articles may have a spin or
slant to them. On the other hand, press releases tend to be
objective and informational.
Websites
A well-developed, constantly updated, information-packed
website can do wonders for public relations. Such websites
serve as an easy way for other organizations and the general public
to stay updated with your organization. Marketing efforts are
needed, however, to direct people to the website. Remember this
rule of thumb: a well-developed, constantly updated,
information-packed website tends to be revisited versus a stale
website that rarely gets updated.
Brochures
Brochures can be very strong tools for public relations
because of the amount of information they can contain. The two
drawbacks to brochures are that they are expensive to produce,
especially in mass quantity, and that they cannot be constantly
updated.
Newsletters
Newsletters can solve the updating problem of brochures.
Newsletters that are sent at a regular interval (i.e. monthly)
serves as a good way to update information. However, like
brochures, newsletters may be expensive to produce, especially in
mass quantity. One way around this expense is to create an online
newsletter or a newsletter in pdf format that can be emailed.
Press Kits
Press kits are sets of material that provide an overview of
your organization. Kits may include a letter, brochure, newsletter,
information sheets, sample marketing material, and other items.
Although press kits are usually designed for the media, kits can be
sent to anyone who you wish to network with.
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Relationship Building
What is Relationship Building?
Relationship building is the establishment and management of
organizational relationships with people, organizations,
departments, and offices that have the potential to contribute to
the success of your organization. A relationship between your
organization and another organization takes effort and management.
Relationship building entails constant communication and
interaction to ensure that mutual benefits are enjoyed by both
parties involved.
Why is Relationship Building Imporant?
Relationship building is important because an organization
cannot succeed on its own, no matter how strong the leadership is
internally. Organizations operate within a broader environment
filled with people and organizations who can either make you
stronger or weaker. Relationship building is the continual process
of developing positive relationships with others and managing them
in a way to ensure that everyone involved benefits from the
relationship.
- For example:
A student group may co-sponsor a program with another group where the relationship is basically centered around this single program. Once this program ends, the relationship between these two groups often ceases to exist. Instead of letting relationships die down, it is in the best interest of both organizations to maintain and manage this relationship via communication and interaction that fosters short-term and long-term mutual benefits.
Keys to Strong Relationship Building
- Communication: Constant communication ensures continuous flow of information and ideas and lets each party know that the other is serious about maintaining the relationship.
- Interaction: Although interaction does not need to be as constant as communication, regular interaction also aids in the positive perception that both parties are serious about the relationship.
- Key contacts: It is unnecessary to have all organizational leaders be a part of the relationship building. Instead, each organization in the relationship should have key people serve as the contacts or liaisons that manage the communication and interaction between the organizations.
- Mutual benefits: The key to a strong relationship at the organizational level is mutual benefits. The benefits do not need to be the same but it is critical for eachorganization to gain significant benefits by being in the relationship. One-sided relationships are prone to fail.
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Professionalism in Public
Relations
What is Professionalism?
Professionalism is a social expectation of how to behave and
present oneself in public or to others. This expectation tends to
place high regard on characteristics such as intelligence,
organization, maturity, and composure. In an organizational
setting, whether in the workplace or on a college campus,
professionalism is a critical element of leadership as well as
organizational image and reputation.
Why is Professionalism Important?
Professionalism is important because it reflects positively on
a leader or organization. As a result, it signals to others that
your organization is serious about doing what it can to succeed in
a fair and ethical manner. Professionalism also confers onto others
the level of respect they deserve.
Keys to Professionalism in Public Relations
An organization should exhibit professionalism in all aspects
of itself. Public relations is one aspect. Keys to professionalism
in public relations include:
- Organization: All public relations campaigns should be organized in a logical fashion. Branding is one way to promote organization (for more information, click here).
- Accurary: All public relations material should contain accurate information. Inaccurate information, especially a significant and/or constant amount of it, reflects carelessness and lack of seriousness, which in turn contributes to a negative image of your organization.
- Aesthetics: All public relations material should be fairly aesthetically pleasing. They do not need to be professional-looking but they should at least look clean and organized in appearance. For example, a brochure that looks sloppily put together reflects carelessness and lack of seriousness.
- Punctuality: All public relations methods that involve meeting with people or submitting material should have punctuality in mind. Tardiness again shows carelessness and lack of seriousness.
- Courtesy: All public relations methods that involve meeting with people should also have courtesy as a key element. Everyone should be treated with respect no matter how high or low they are on the social or organizational ladder.
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Branding
What is Branding?
Branding is generally the development of a product, line of
products, program, or campaign that is based around a central
theme, concept, image, tagline, etc. A brand can include anything
from a logo to a phrase to an attitude.
- Branding examples:
* McDonald's Golden Arches and the "I'm Lovin' It" campaign
* Nike's Swoosh and the "Just Do It" campaign
Why is Branding Important?
Branding is important because each organization needs to not
only create an identity for itself but also set itself apart from
the competition. Creating an identity is critical because it allows
the general public to immediately recognize your organization with
very little prompts in the media. In addition, an identity for your
organization allows the general public to immediately realize the
difference between you and other similar organizations.
How Do We Brand Our Public Relations?
Although there is no cut-and-dry method to developing a public
relations brand, these simple steps should be able to get you
started:
- Brainstorm: Come up with as many ideas as possible that convey the image or reputation you want the general public to have of your organization.
- Build consensus: Carefully decide which idea(s) would be the best at what you want to convey.
- Create: Develop the brand you decided on. Sometimes it's good to develop variations of the brand so that it can be customized to different media formats.
- Key questions to ask:
- How do we want the general public to know us?
- What do we want the general public to know about us?
- How can the general public benefit from us?
- How are we different from other similar organizations?
Keys to Branding in Public Relations
Branding is a powerful technique in both public relations and
marketing (for more information on branding in marketing, click
here). Keys to branding in public relations include:
- Clarity: Your brand should be as clear as possible so that the general public isn't confused with what your brand is conveying. Your brand should also be as dissimilar to other competing brands as possible. Remember you want to create an identity for your organization.
- Consistency: Your brand should be used in virtually all public relations campaigns and material. For example, any time you see any public relations campaign produced by Nike, you'll always see the Swoosh.
- Repetition: Your brand should be exhibited in the media as often as possible to increase awareness of your organization and solidify your organizational identity.
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