PUBLIC RELATIONS AND MARKETING

In my last post I shared the difference between public relations and journalism because it was one of the professions that was overlapping it. This week I will want to share the perspective from marketing and public relations.

Marketing is the field most commonly confused with PR not unreasonably since marketing refers to PR in its texts and practices as part of the marketing mix.  It looks at a clear exchange of money for goods and services. To marketing practitioners and academics, PR is one of what they refer to as the 4 Ps – product, place, price and promotion – which is needed for a successful marketing campaign. This is not far from the truth since PR plays an essential role in creating successful products. Much of public relations activity is directed at support of marketing to the extent that it may in some instances amount to the principal promotional tool used by marketers.

Wilcox et al (2003) has identified a number of PR activities which support marketing efforts by creating new leads through gaining editorial coverage in trade and consumer media and also producing sales brochures. In a competitive field, such as fast moving consumer products, publicity can be crucial to success and PR provides avenues for publicity. While the marketing team may create special offers and sales promotions, the publicity people will be seeking media coverage and arranging launch events and together a create success.

Marketing has a broader remit that perceives customers as being one public or several disaggregated publics among many. The key words for marketing are ‘consumers’ and ‘profit’

Understanding the consumer and producing products or services that will satisfy consumer needs to the profit of the supplier is the traditional arena of marketing. There is a clear exchanged of money for goods or services which is easily measured. PR campaigns on the other hand are often harder to quantify. Many organizations may not have goods or services to sell but have messages to communicate or receive. They need to maintain relationships which are too complex for marketing to handle which is where public relations come in.

Kitchen (1997;28) explains perfectly the relationship between PR and marketing by saying that “Public relations and marketing are two major management functions within an organization but how they are organized depends upon managerial perceptions, organizational culture and historical precedents.” He goes on to say that “Marketing is concerned with an organization’s exchange relationships with consumers in which quid pro pro transactions occur. On the other hand, PR deals with a broader range of publics involved with or affected by the organization. Subsuming PR into marketing delimit organizational ability to function successfully in highly competitive environment.

PUBLIC RELATIONS AND OTHER RELATED PRACTICES

Public relations is something that is very dear to me, this season I am going to dedicate my blog to anything communications, public relations and media. One thing I realize is how public relations is being confused or misunderstood with other professions. I will share with you one after the other. Enjoy…………….

Public relations is usually confused with allied professions. PR draws on expertise and experiences from many fields while also overlapping with other disciplines and the profession tends to integrate rather than exclude and this is mainly due to the history and development of the practice.

Public relations encompasses various functions, from issues management to public affairs, advertising, lobbying and investor relations. This serves as strength for the practice but when it comes to definition and description of the profession this becomes a weakness.

There are recognizable differences between PR and these allied professions and the focus of this is to look at these professions, bringing out not only their differences to PR but also demonstrating how PR complements these other professions and vice versa.

PR and Journalism

Public relations and journalism have a long history. In fact founding fathers of the profession started their career as journalist. Thus it is no wonder a lot of people see PR as synonymous to journalism. Journalist and PR practitioners have a mutually beneficial relationship.

Organizations actively try to exert influence on policy-decision process and so they tend to seek access to the news media, with an assumption that greater and sympathetic media coverage of their stance will result in public opinion and policy making being favourable to them. As media space is limited, those who seek media attention inevitably have to engage in the intense processes of competition for this media attention (Anderson, 1993; Schlesinger&Tumber, 1994)

Many suggest that if organizations are to attract favorable media coverage, journalists must view them as a legitimate news source. Journalists rely on their own “judgments” when selecting sources. They treat sources differently “according to the degree of respect” with which they regard those sources(Blumler &Gurevitch, 1995, p55). They may view regular and accurate sources as more reliable and thus more legitimate. They may evaluate sources that can command more resources, as more important and thus more legitimate.(Anderson, 1991)

Theorists argue that journalists view certain sources as more legitimate, thereby allowing those sources to prompt media access and dominate the news in a public debate. Journalists tend to confer “a de facto legitimacy” on certain sources although it is “something that has to be gained by other sources” (Goldsmiths Media Group, 2000, p.36). Institutional sources for example, receive priviledges access to media and become the “primary definers” of news agendas by virtue of their power, representatives and Journalists also tend to assume that certain sources are entitled to know certain things by virtue of their social structural position and routinely rely on these authoritative sources; as it is the most efficient way of gathering news. Public relations practitioners are viewed as reliable, legitimate source of information for news content by journalist.

PR could be a key strategic choice that “already legitimate” and alternative sources should pursue, either to consolidate their media access or to make frequent interventions as they contend for media space. Public relations in some cases helps sources bypass the commonly cited obstacles such as lack of economic resources and realistic strategy for groups off the “beaten” path and without institutional legitimacy, to achieve media access.

Journalist for example may consider a large pressure group with a separate public relations staff as a legitimate news source. The size of the membership base of a social movement group may enhance the legitimacy of the organization in the eye of journalists. It should be noted, however, that not all actors in the public arena pursue media access. Rather, some corporations want to stay out of any news. Some groups pursue strategies of avoidance and secrecy. Other concentrates on their involvement in legal, political or education areas rather than on obtaining media coverage (Corbett, 1998). Thus, it is possible that such organizations may use their Pr departments to minimize rather than increase media attention. Studies of how PR influences news content to date have generally assumed a rather narrow view of PR efforts.

Much of the literature focuses on how news media utilize sources information subsidies are accepted whereas others are rejected.

Other studies highlight journalists’ perceptions of PR practitioners and the information subsidies they provide and the potential and actual effect of those perceptions on new coverage of the practitioners’ clients. Sources that can provide journalists with constant and usable story ideas are likely to become regular and favorable source. As a result, journalists and the sources can establish relationships, and the journalists may become dependent on the sources of news. Working under deadlines and competitive risk of being scooped, journalists also would consider responsiveness – the speed with which requested information is delivered to journalists- as a prime quality in practitioners (Hess,1984)

For their information to become news, practitioners must supply the information to the media by using the methods that coincide with the techniques journalists use to gather news. Although many accept press releases as the most ubiquitous information supply tool, other techniques include press conference, press interviews, background briefings, phone calls, and staged events. Journalists prefer information from sources that they perceive have no obvious self-serving economic interests. The “public interest appeal” strategy has proven particularly advantageous for nongovernmental groups, often operating in unfriendly political and media environments. 

Access to news making is a critical political resource in that it provides organizations the opportunity for their voices to be heard and to have an influence in public debate. Recent studies show that nonmainstream organizations increasingly achieve and maintain an authoritative and legitimate source through their media strategies developed by their public relations departments.