Online PR embraces blogging - 10 years too late!

The blog Herald recently wrote about UK PR’s slowly coming to terms with blogging.
Wow, better late than never I guess!!!

It has always amazed me how much PR’s have buried their heads in the sand as far as digital media is concerned. Whilst measures are being taken to correct this approach, I still have a little chuckle when I hear that a struggling PR company has opened up a digital division (with great fanfare) in a belated attempt to get on the bandwagon.

Look under the hood a little, and this either turns out to be someone (desperate to save their job) over projecting their skills within the company and being offered the digital role or it’s a spotty intern straight from school who “gets” social media - umm a recipe for disaster I think - example Habitat’s awful attempts to garner exposure on Twitter using Iran related hashtags.

There are some harsh facts here:

1. Most conventional PR’s are going to find it hard going in the digital world. Example, I was training a PR lady in digital media and she said to me “this is so complicated, how I yearn for the days of picking up the phone and getting coverage in the Times or Independent”. In my experience this is the prevailing sentiment within the PR industry.

2. Generalistion here but most PR’s aren’t technical. Fact. The brave new digital world requires an understanding of how blogs work, how social media works, how SEO works, how analytics work and how this all works together. Plus it’s a moving target with new technology changing the rules everyday. Staying on top of this for your average PR is daunting to say the least.

3. The result of this is that alot of PR companies and PR employees are doomed. The inexorable shift of PR and marketing spend online will leave many old style PR’s high and dry.

And out of the ashes a new PR industry will evolve.