by David Landis, LCI President
It’s the new year: a time for high hopes, refreshed energies and renewed perspectives. So, as good PR professionals, we’re always looking for the best ways to communicate our clients’ stories. With social media, digital marketing and new platforms arriving daily, where should public relations experts turn? Predictably, we usually come back to the age-old question:
Is there a future for media relations?
Opinions vary greatly, but I for one agree with my PR colleagues in Detroit, Bianchi Public Relations. Last year, they published a blog asking, quite pertinently, “Is Media Relations Dead?”
I happen to think that media relations carries authority and credibility with far greater validity than user-generated content. For example, I’ve never had a client say to me, “Can you get me onto Facebook?” Yet we regularly hear, “We want to be in the New York Times.”
Many companies have adopted what Gini Dietrich coined as the “PESO Model,” which reinforces that when communicating to audiences, companies need to utilize all avenues to tell their story: paid, earned, shared and owned. In other words, media relations is a key component.
So is there a simple answer to the question about the future of media relations? Yes. And that answer is that its future is still bright.
Related articles:
Media Outlet Availability On PR Efforts: Business Wire, October 23, 2020
Why Public Relations As We Know It Is Dead by Nathan Miller (Forbes Councils, January 21, 2020)
Media relations is a vital part of the communications mix – but only a part. Those who focus exclusively on one leg of a multi-legged stool will tip over!
Thanks for sharing our post and amplifying our stance. When it comes to credibility and reach via earned media, whether for a B2B or B2C enterprise, coverage by trusted news outlets cannot be beat!
Media relations is a professional skill that helps get information to people that need it faster and clearer. That makes media relations more relevant and essential now than ever before. Plus, editorial oversight makes it more credible.
There is much wisdom in the PESO mix for getting your messages out. It is also true that journalists with fewer resources rely increasingly on skilled communications professionals to get them the access to experts and fact-based information they need to do responsible and ethical reporting. It’s a symbiotic relationship that’s more essential than ever.
100% not dead! You can’t even have PESO without earned media. PSO is not nearly as alluring (or effective). As Polly said, though, any business that expects earned media (or media relations or PR or publicity or whatever they want to call it) alone is going to solve all of their problem, they’re going to have another thing coming.