Personally, I share the same opinion that media and public relations ought to play a significant role in framing not just important global issues but also local issues that are relevant to us. Furthermore, media relations is not only about building relationships, it is also about communication and communicating well with clients.
Where campaigns, strategies, tactics, objectives and actions are concerned, all of these aforementioned elements are critical to aiding PR practitioners in effectively using media relations to communicate to the target audience.
My stance on strategy is explained in the following analogy: Strategy is like a spider web. It comprises of and is many tactics weaved together to form a beautiful piece of 'art', of which either leads to the success or failure for their client's organisation. Hence, the strategies selected to execute a campaign can either make or break the 'spider web'.
I agree completely, that any media relational relationship should be dialogical, building trust and reputation between a client and stakeholder. However, should integrity and trust be broken, do efforts come to a halt causing both client and PR practitioner to bear the consequences? It is understood that the consequence differs according to circumstance, but not every relationship is pure and easily appeased based on mutual terms.
Knowing and understanding the client's requirements and executing campaigns or movements according to those requirements is of great importance. Ultimately, even if success is at hand but the campaign did not meet the standard of the client, it would still end up as a partial failure. Thus, in media relations, a PR practitioner not only has to understand the medium used, but also the criteria and expectations of the client.
In my opinion, where objectives meet actions (tactics) in media relations, actions are of more importance. Why so? Simply because without action, there cannot be objectives. As Stanton stated, "Objectives rely on tactics to reach a goal." These goals act as driving forces and motivation towards making the overall strategy a success for the client.
At the end of the day, clients pay not for success, but for innovation, creativity, flexibility, effectiveness and most of all, potential. Proving to a client that it is possible to accomplish such a feat truly shows the mark of an effective and skilled PR practitioner.
Yeo Ying Wei Natalie
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C3085607
I agree that media relations is the practice of building good relationships and communicating effectively with the targeted audiences and personnel at the media outlets as well because the purpose is to achieve good and fair media coverage on the business of an organization. Therefore, public relations must operate together with the organization’s fashion plan so as to provide an accurate picture or image of the organization and public should view the organization’s message and understand the meaning it was intended to be. Also, public relations play an important role in providing reliable information on the types of environment the organization is operating under, both external and internally and one of the methods can be through identifying the stakeholders. Thus, it is a two-way asymmetrical flow of communications and this is when the importance of strategy, objectives and actions comes in. A point to take note of when it comes to campaigns, strategies, tactics, objectives and actions is that, they may and can be applied differently because different countries have different cultures and political-economic systems. These also include the differences in the types of organizational settings such as the government agencies, corporation and non-profit. Thus, it is important for an organization to regard public relations as an important component in its strategic management processes.
ReplyDeleteFirstly, I want to congratulate Natalie for a succinct yet thought-provoking post.
ReplyDeleteWith the evolution of publics and the increasing media convergence, an open, dialogical and symmetrical relationship between client and stakeholders are of great importance.
However, the framing of issues by both the media and public relations is the first crucial step of reaching out to the publics. As mentioned in the above comment, strategies and tactics must be tailored towards a country’s cultural, socio-economic and political systems.
Take the Obama campaign for instance:
The framing of his campaign was appropriate to the dire socio-economic situation at that time, as he was touted as the change and hope that America needs. This was very crucial in appealing to citizens, who are frustrated with the Bush administration.
Moreover, with the use of social media, Obama is able to enhance participatory culture among citizens as they feel that they have a part to play in deciding America’s future. He encouraged grassroots support through donations made via facebook and formed genuine conversations with younger voters using twitter.
The inclusion of social media in Obama’s presidential campaign is a tactic that made dialogical relationships with the public consistent. More importantly, it was an excellent move as most of the collegiate population were tech-savvy.
Obama’s victorious campaign may have been decided by the usage of social media, which was arguably the right tool for change at that time, although we must not discount Obama’s charisma, influential supporters and other variables that contributed to his win.
Thanks Natalie for posting the first! Nicely done! (:
ReplyDeleteI think this pr relationship game is challenging (hard to grasp) yet fulfilling (when objectives are met). Essentially, framing of the message and the media are tools to building this relationship. However, in my opinion, knowing your audience carries greater weight than the credibility and medium factors.
I strongly believe that when a company knows its audience well, they would eventually use the appropriate media and methods to reach out to them. Hence the basis of any PR activity should be knowing your public. (:
Hey Nat,
ReplyDeleteYes, I agree that Media Relation is not solely about building trust and relationship between an organization and its publics, but also to communicate well with each other.
However, our assigned organization, Singapore Philatetic Museum, does not consider Media Relations as one of its strategies to reach out to build trust and relationship and to communicate with its public. Rather, they believe in other strategies like Government Relations and Community Relations, hoping to reach out and retain their publics.
Singapore Philatetic Museum displays to us that an conservative organization, could still be able to reach out to its public at a smaller scale using other channels, like having good and reputable word of mouth.