It’s kind of a trend, but not really. Today, communications and PR departments everywhere are being expected (not just asked) to measure their public relations activities and prove their
value. I’m not sure it was ever cool to say you don’t know what your activities
are worth, but I hear from the more experienced that there was a day when they
didn’t have to prove their value.
Of course they didn’t. It was obvious to a person who could
see the forest from the trees that public relations had value. PR was the group that really understood what was going on in the world and what could impact the
organization in a negative way.
Good public relations practitioners have a feel for the
risks the company is taking and how to fix the company’s activities to prevent
disaster, as well as how to use what the company is doing right to generate a positive
vibe. That is value.
That’s changed today because of big data. Big data,
rightfully so, is constantly asking you to “prove it.” Prove that you are
generating value by finding the correlation between your activities and the
company’s success in meeting its goals. Unfortunately, the softer disciplines,
like PR, have a hard time doing that without creating marketing-like activities
to generate the numbers. PR professionals can do that because we understand the
public and know what will resonate with them, but it begins to look a lot more
like marketing than PR.
Yes, big data is important and proving your value as a PR
practitioner is as well. But I have to admit that I’m not always on board with
big data approaches to public relations or marketing. Sometimes, you can’t draw
a direct correlation because you’re looking at too many trees. Sometimes, you
have to take a step back and see that the forest works together as a whole to
create the ideal ecosystem for life.
The same is true in business. It’s not the individual trees
that have made you successful. It’s the ecosystem, or culture, that created the
success. Public relations helps foster that internal culture and make
adjustments as society changes. Public relations understands the softer side of
business and the importance of the one thing that can make or break your
organization – culture.
This might be a little strong for many of you reading this
blog, but culture is the one thing you have to get right, and it has to show in
everything you do. If you get it wrong or you fail to build it into your
organization in a manner that shines through to your publics, you will either eventually
fail or be relegated to second place for a lifetime.
Ignoring the importance of public relations (I use this
interchangeably with corporate communications because they should be one in the
same, but that’s for another blog post.) is a big mistake. Public
relations/corporate communications should be responsible for internal
communications as well as external communications, because your culture should
be aligned in certain respects with your publics.
When you get it right, the culture is magnetic. People
choose you over the competition because of it. Take a moment to think about the
iconic brands in the world. Apple, Southwest Airlines, Nordstrom and Starbucks
have more than just good products. They have distinct, magnetic cultures internally
that show to the public. That’s what superior public relations working with
marketing can help you create.
That’s value that you can’t put a big data number on. That’s
the art of public relations, and it’s worth more than a number in a
spreadsheet.
If you need help building that kind of culturally relevant brand, contact Jakel Communications. We can help.
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