Everywhere you look there is a crisis. It can be on a political plan or for a corporate. Who can solve the reputation and maintain trust, well Public Relation practitioners. They are the key of success or failure. I was wondering what you have to do in order to defence your client when he is in trouble,how should you communicate with the media so they won't ruine a company. I did some research and i found some techniques that helped me to understand better who PR shpuld face a crisis.
WHAT IS A CRISIS
Every organisation at a certain point faces a crisis and the outcome often depends on how they react. A crisis is “A significant business disruption which stimulates extensive news media coverage. The resulting public scrutiny will affect the organisation's normal operations and also could have a political, legal, financial and governmental impact on its business." ICM (2009) A crisis can damage the companies financial standard, business performance, reputation and major stake
What PR practitioners should do when they have to face a crisis?
According to an article(http://www.slideshare.net/) that i found while i was reading about PR and Crisis Management, crisis can cause an uproar of concern, negative WOM (word of mouth), upset customers, and negative media coverage. All of the above could be classified as negative PR, and there are a few ways that you could avoid it:
• Do not avoid responsibility. In the midst of a crisis is not the time to put the blame on someone else. Until you know the facts, do not assume that the fault is not yours.
• Do your research. Once you’ve established and understand the facts, you can respond appropriately. Do your homework, investigate the claims, and figure out your next steps from there.
• Respond in a timely manner. After reviewing the facts you can know whether or not you need to act, and how quickly. It also depends on your company, the sort of claims that are being made, and the repercussions they may entail.
• Take the appropriate actions. This can include recalls, refunds, medical assistance, litigation, and the appropriate notifications that need to come with each of these actions.
• A very important thing is that when media needs information about what happened, PR practitioners must give some answers. If there is no information from the PR the company or organization might face big problems because without no information the media can write whatever they like.
An example of crisis management can be seen by Pepsi who took the time to research and evaluate the next steps. They were accused of allowing syringes to be canned in some of their soda. Instead of first allowing the recall to take place, but while still not avoiding responsibility, they were able to ensure that syringes being canned did not take place in their factories. After time, the claims came out to be rumors, and Pepsi was saved millions of dollars a recall would have cost.
References
www.wikipedia.org
http://www.slideshare.net/
Monday, 21 March 2011
Sunday, 20 March 2011
Spin and PR
What is spin?
It is best to define spin by what it isn’t – a reasoned argument on the behalf of
one’s position that accounts for the facts for and against the position. Spin has
been described as:
· Portraying events or situations in one’s favour through heavily biased
interpretation.
· Deceptive and/or manipulative tactics.
· Presenting only the evidence that supports one’s position.
· Assuming unproven facts to be true.
· Using euphemisms to cover up facts or make them ambiguous.
· Distorting facts to ride a story or burying facts to avoid having them
reported
In public relations, spin is sometimes a pejorative term signifying a heavily biased portrayal in specific favour of an event or situation. While traditional public relations may also rely on creative presentation of the facts, spin often, though not always, implies disingenuous, deceptive and/or highly manipulative tactics. Politicians are often accused of spin by commentators and political opponents when they produce a counterargument or position.
Edward Bernays has been called the "Father of Spin". In his book he describes some situations in twentieth-century America where tobacco and alcohol companies used techniques to make certain behaviours more socially acceptable. Bernays was proud of his work as a propagandist.
Spin techniques
The techniques of spin include selectively presenting facts and quotes that support ideal positions phrasing that in a way presumes unproven truths, euphemisms for drawing attention away from items considered distasteful, and ambiguity in public statements. Another spin technique involves careful choice of timing in the release of certain news so it can take advantage of prominent events in the news.
Nowadays one of the most known spin doctor is Alastair Campbell,who was involved with Tony Blair 's public relations between 1994 and 2003.Last semester we had an interesting debate about some important PR people and Alistair Campbell was one of them. The ones who were on his side couldn’t defence him very well. To know more about this "spin doctor" i have found a video for you to watch.
Through my reading for this topic i have found a very interesting report about spin and PR.
http://www.echoresearch.com/data/Image%20of%20PR(2).pdf
It is best to define spin by what it isn’t – a reasoned argument on the behalf of
one’s position that accounts for the facts for and against the position. Spin has
been described as:
· Portraying events or situations in one’s favour through heavily biased
interpretation.
· Deceptive and/or manipulative tactics.
· Presenting only the evidence that supports one’s position.
· Assuming unproven facts to be true.
· Using euphemisms to cover up facts or make them ambiguous.
· Distorting facts to ride a story or burying facts to avoid having them
reported
In public relations, spin is sometimes a pejorative term signifying a heavily biased portrayal in specific favour of an event or situation. While traditional public relations may also rely on creative presentation of the facts, spin often, though not always, implies disingenuous, deceptive and/or highly manipulative tactics. Politicians are often accused of spin by commentators and political opponents when they produce a counterargument or position.
Edward Bernays has been called the "Father of Spin". In his book he describes some situations in twentieth-century America where tobacco and alcohol companies used techniques to make certain behaviours more socially acceptable. Bernays was proud of his work as a propagandist.
Spin techniques
The techniques of spin include selectively presenting facts and quotes that support ideal positions phrasing that in a way presumes unproven truths, euphemisms for drawing attention away from items considered distasteful, and ambiguity in public statements. Another spin technique involves careful choice of timing in the release of certain news so it can take advantage of prominent events in the news.
Nowadays one of the most known spin doctor is Alastair Campbell,who was involved with Tony Blair 's public relations between 1994 and 2003.Last semester we had an interesting debate about some important PR people and Alistair Campbell was one of them. The ones who were on his side couldn’t defence him very well. To know more about this "spin doctor" i have found a video for you to watch.
Through my reading for this topic i have found a very interesting report about spin and PR.
http://www.echoresearch.com/data/Image%20of%20PR(2).pdf
International PR
Today i was reading some interesting articles about international PR. I am a romanian and i know that in my country PR is a bit different than in the UK. Because we were under Communism for many years some of the romanian population still has some communist culture. This is way PR practitioners have to be careful when they address to their audience, the language that they use, the media that they target and also a very important thing what PR materials they use in order to send their message across the audience.
I wrote some important things to keep in mind when we talk about Culture and PR.
The Public Relations (PR) industry is responsible for creating and maintaining relationships between clients and customers. Through areas such as brand management, advertising, media relations and crisis management, PR practitioners seek to foster interest, trust and belief in a product or company.
PR practitioners are aware of how best to carry this out when dealing within their own nations and cultures, however, when dealing with a foreign audience it is critical that cross cultural differences are recognised.
Cross cultural differences can make or break a PR campaign. It is therefore crucial that PR practitioners dealing with PR campaigns that incorporate a cross cultural element analyse likely cross cultural differences. A few key areas shall be highlighted in order to help PR practitioners begin to consider how culture may affect future projects.
Language & Culture
In order for a PR campaign to be successful abroad, an appreciation of the target language and its cultural nuances is necessary. The PR and advertising industries are littered with examples of poor translations and a lack of cross cultural understanding leading to PR failure.
Translation of documents, slogans and literature must be checked for meanings and cross cultural nuances. This should not only take place between languages but also within languages.
The Written Word
Press releases, features and copywriting all require a certain amount of cross cultural sensitivity when being applied abroad. Journalistic traditions, writing styles, news worthiness, delivery systems and whether a 'free press' exists are all areas that will affect how the written word is tailored.
In addition, the most important point, from a cross cultural perspective, is how to write in a way that engages the readers in that society or culture. Some cultures may prefer colourful and inspirational writing, others factual and objective. Some may be motivated by language that incorporates a religious or moral tone, others by a money-orientated or materialistic one.
When writing, the first step should always be to look at and integrate the cross cultural particulars of the target audience.
PR Materials
The use of publicity materials in PR campaigns such as logos, slogans, pictures, colours and designs must all be cross culturally examined. Pictures of seemingly innocuous things in one culture could mean something different in another.
The above cited areas are but a few of those that require decent cross cultural assessment by PR practitioners if they wish their international and cross cultural campaigns to succeed. The aim of implementing a cross cultural analysis in PR is to build campaigns that target the audience as best as possible, meaning appealing to their world view while avoiding offense.
References:
http://aboutpublicrelations.net/international.htm
Steven R. Van Hook “HowToMarketing.us”
Neil Payne “Kwintessential”
'Cataunya' Ransom “Mosnar Communications”
I wrote some important things to keep in mind when we talk about Culture and PR.
The Public Relations (PR) industry is responsible for creating and maintaining relationships between clients and customers. Through areas such as brand management, advertising, media relations and crisis management, PR practitioners seek to foster interest, trust and belief in a product or company.
PR practitioners are aware of how best to carry this out when dealing within their own nations and cultures, however, when dealing with a foreign audience it is critical that cross cultural differences are recognised.
Cross cultural differences can make or break a PR campaign. It is therefore crucial that PR practitioners dealing with PR campaigns that incorporate a cross cultural element analyse likely cross cultural differences. A few key areas shall be highlighted in order to help PR practitioners begin to consider how culture may affect future projects.
Language & Culture
In order for a PR campaign to be successful abroad, an appreciation of the target language and its cultural nuances is necessary. The PR and advertising industries are littered with examples of poor translations and a lack of cross cultural understanding leading to PR failure.
Translation of documents, slogans and literature must be checked for meanings and cross cultural nuances. This should not only take place between languages but also within languages.
The Written Word
Press releases, features and copywriting all require a certain amount of cross cultural sensitivity when being applied abroad. Journalistic traditions, writing styles, news worthiness, delivery systems and whether a 'free press' exists are all areas that will affect how the written word is tailored.
In addition, the most important point, from a cross cultural perspective, is how to write in a way that engages the readers in that society or culture. Some cultures may prefer colourful and inspirational writing, others factual and objective. Some may be motivated by language that incorporates a religious or moral tone, others by a money-orientated or materialistic one.
When writing, the first step should always be to look at and integrate the cross cultural particulars of the target audience.
PR Materials
The use of publicity materials in PR campaigns such as logos, slogans, pictures, colours and designs must all be cross culturally examined. Pictures of seemingly innocuous things in one culture could mean something different in another.
The above cited areas are but a few of those that require decent cross cultural assessment by PR practitioners if they wish their international and cross cultural campaigns to succeed. The aim of implementing a cross cultural analysis in PR is to build campaigns that target the audience as best as possible, meaning appealing to their world view while avoiding offense.
References:
http://aboutpublicrelations.net/international.htm
Steven R. Van Hook “HowToMarketing.us”
Neil Payne “Kwintessential”
'Cataunya' Ransom “Mosnar Communications”
Tuesday, 15 March 2011
Ethics in Public Relations
Mass communication is an area that requires a very well developed code of ethics. Ethics in mass communication can be considered a way to achieving greater success. Impeccable morality and correct information networking are deemed to create transparency and build trust with a company’s stakeholders. Being transparent overcomes one major challenge: succeeding while keeping reputation intact.
Public relations is an area that can be considered to have a major impact on a company’s image, integrity and reliability. As recent events have shown in the case of Goldman Sachs [Gorenstein (2010)] and British Petroleum (BP) [Leake (2010)], their images have been tarnished by internal conflicts and mismanagement and it is now up to the public relations department to put their prestige back on track. The fact that those behind the public relations department are likely to be unknown by the external crowd, gives this body an even greater impact and is thus shielded by the public outcry in case of any unfortunate event. In the case of BP, the only one held responsible for the oil spill was the Chairman himself and not one of the PR department’s members. They were and are still faced with the task of cleaning up behind the curtains BP’s image of a strong, multinational and reliable company.
Like other forms of media, public relations is often accused of being a potential tool for manipulating the masses. The existence of a well implemented deontology can avoid such
problems. This deontology should assume and emphasize the ethical implications that public relations may have. According to Heath (2004), “Improving public relations ethics (codes) has been seen as a key component in achieving greater professionalism in the field”.
Some can say that the only way to practice ethical PR is to work in NGO's, then all for profit organisations or corporations practicing PR are fundamentally unethical in their activity. This cannot be taken as sustainable evidence, unless we consider that making money is an unethical act.
Even if PR has its own codes of conduct not all the practitioners are following them step by step. However the ability to engage in ethical reasoning in public relations is growing in demand, in importance and in responsibility. Academic research, university education, and professional practice are all paying attention more than ever to matters of ethics. Careful and consistent ethical analyses facilitate trust, which enhances the building and maintenance of relationships – which is the ultimate purpose of the public relations function.
Public relations is an area that can be considered to have a major impact on a company’s image, integrity and reliability. As recent events have shown in the case of Goldman Sachs [Gorenstein (2010)] and British Petroleum (BP) [Leake (2010)], their images have been tarnished by internal conflicts and mismanagement and it is now up to the public relations department to put their prestige back on track. The fact that those behind the public relations department are likely to be unknown by the external crowd, gives this body an even greater impact and is thus shielded by the public outcry in case of any unfortunate event. In the case of BP, the only one held responsible for the oil spill was the Chairman himself and not one of the PR department’s members. They were and are still faced with the task of cleaning up behind the curtains BP’s image of a strong, multinational and reliable company.
Like other forms of media, public relations is often accused of being a potential tool for manipulating the masses. The existence of a well implemented deontology can avoid such
problems. This deontology should assume and emphasize the ethical implications that public relations may have. According to Heath (2004), “Improving public relations ethics (codes) has been seen as a key component in achieving greater professionalism in the field”.
Some can say that the only way to practice ethical PR is to work in NGO's, then all for profit organisations or corporations practicing PR are fundamentally unethical in their activity. This cannot be taken as sustainable evidence, unless we consider that making money is an unethical act.
Even if PR has its own codes of conduct not all the practitioners are following them step by step. However the ability to engage in ethical reasoning in public relations is growing in demand, in importance and in responsibility. Academic research, university education, and professional practice are all paying attention more than ever to matters of ethics. Careful and consistent ethical analyses facilitate trust, which enhances the building and maintenance of relationships – which is the ultimate purpose of the public relations function.
Friday, 11 March 2011
NGO'S activism in PR
In class today we have also watched a very interesting video called " Super size me". Documentary filmmaker Morgan Spurlock makes himself a test subject of this documentary about the commercial food industry. Rigorously eating a diet of McDonald's fast food, three times a day for a month straight. Spurlock is out to prove the physical and mental effects of consuming fast food. While doing this, Spurlock also provides a look at the food culture in America through it's schools, corporations, and politics as seen through the eyes of regular people and health advocates. "Super Size Me" is a movie that sheds a new light on what has become one of our nation's biggest health problems: obesity
Why was this movie relevant with our topic. Well because in this case NGO are against this junk food corporations. They are not healthy at all and in time you can die. What PR is doing? In this case not much. When Morgan tried to get in touch with someone from the communication department it was impossible. He tried several times and no answer BUT when he could get in touch with the "PR of McDonalds he couldn't get the answers he wanted. This video was a clear example of NGO's role.
We all know that one of the biggest issues for PR is non governmental organisations. They always look for the right things to happen. They want to make justice everywhere is possible. We also know that even if PR is a tool to shoe transparency, promoting, campaigning, etc there are some ways that are not on the same line with NGO's desires. This is way there are always "battles" between the two.
Non-governmental organizations need healthy relationships with the public to meet their goals. Foundations and charities use sophisticated public relations campaigns to raise funds and employ standard lobbying techniques with governments.
The relationship between NGO’s and PR is quite interesting. PR and NGO are very rare associated to each other. This is because of the negative perception associated with the word ‘public relations’, even if NGO work almost the same as public relation, having the same materials such as campaigns or media relations, events etc. Another reasons could be that NGO's are afraid to be in the same bottle with PR. Public Relations is mostly used in corporations and this a paradox since the corporations are the target of NGO'S. . But if you have a detailed look, you will find that NGO'S do the same thing as PR such as writing press releases, briefing journalists, maintaining relationships with stakeholders and organising an event etc. Even if is almost the same work NGO’s think their are different and the work that they make is better than PR.
Why was this movie relevant with our topic. Well because in this case NGO are against this junk food corporations. They are not healthy at all and in time you can die. What PR is doing? In this case not much. When Morgan tried to get in touch with someone from the communication department it was impossible. He tried several times and no answer BUT when he could get in touch with the "PR of McDonalds he couldn't get the answers he wanted. This video was a clear example of NGO's role.
We all know that one of the biggest issues for PR is non governmental organisations. They always look for the right things to happen. They want to make justice everywhere is possible. We also know that even if PR is a tool to shoe transparency, promoting, campaigning, etc there are some ways that are not on the same line with NGO's desires. This is way there are always "battles" between the two.
Non-governmental organizations need healthy relationships with the public to meet their goals. Foundations and charities use sophisticated public relations campaigns to raise funds and employ standard lobbying techniques with governments.
The relationship between NGO’s and PR is quite interesting. PR and NGO are very rare associated to each other. This is because of the negative perception associated with the word ‘public relations’, even if NGO work almost the same as public relation, having the same materials such as campaigns or media relations, events etc. Another reasons could be that NGO's are afraid to be in the same bottle with PR. Public Relations is mostly used in corporations and this a paradox since the corporations are the target of NGO'S. . But if you have a detailed look, you will find that NGO'S do the same thing as PR such as writing press releases, briefing journalists, maintaining relationships with stakeholders and organising an event etc. Even if is almost the same work NGO’s think their are different and the work that they make is better than PR.
Monday, 7 March 2011
Social Media . The "must" in PR world
When we had the class talking about social media i was very happy. I could see myself in the right class. This is because i think that nowadays if you are not aware of the importance of this revolution you cannot have a successful career in Public Relation. I will try to touch the most important things concerning this new digital era in which we are living.
Social Media overall
Social Media overall
Social media is a method of communications. Social media tools facilitate these communications. To be effective in social media, whether as a marketer or just an ordinary participant, you must, first and foremost, communicate well.
Yes, social media tools are mostly driven by technology. But they are driven by technology to deliver a message or messages. You don’t trust your IT department to layout your print ad. Why would you trust them to run your blog?
As I’ve said before, we are in an era of technology transition. Communications professionals are learning quickly that to be relevant and effective in the age of social computing, there’s more to competency than communication skills. Technology has become a requirement of the skill set. Yet, so many communications professionals – from public relations to customer service staff and from copywriters to journalists – are horribly deficient in average computer understanding, much less that of web-based technologies and tools.
In my mind, social media is essentially public relations in the online world. Divide the category up by component — blogs, social networks, microblogging, podcasts/Web TV, wikis/collaborative software — they each ladder in some way to a component of public relations — writing, corporate communications, community relations, media relations, event management.
PR as social media owner in many ways also addresses the concern of the online community that marketers don’t belong. Assuming we can trim away the corporate speak and manage transparent communications efforts in years to come, public relations representatives are the least likely to sell and most capable of speaking as humans to humans, rather than up-selling hucksters to “consumers.”
" A good way to think about social media is that all of this is actually about being human being" Anthony
Mayfield
Sunday, 6 March 2011
"War Spin"
At our first class in this module we focused on a discussion around PR and propaganda and we had the opportunity to watch "War Spin: The Media and the Iraq War." The documentary examines the story of US Private Jessica Lynch and tries to reveal some troubling facts about how American news media spins the truth in an effort to increase war-time morale.Also we could see how some tactics are used in a time of war regarding PR. At the beginning everything is normal. They had conferences, video shows from the field, pictures. Basically everything was transparent but behind all these you could easily see how the spokespersons were trained to talk and how they have used emotional messages in order to control everything. Is this PR?Well in a period of war i cannot say that PR can be used in the best way.
Also British journalist John Kampfner presents his view on what happened to Lynch, and points out discrepancies in the news and stories that were sent out to the public. By bringing forward several aspects of the news industry, the program raises questions about war-time propaganda and the ethics, of lack thereof, of journalists.
Friday, 4 March 2011
My internet
I am so sorry that i couldn't post from the beginning of this module but my internet didn't work for almost 2 months. But now that i have my internet i would like to present a little my module which is called "PR Issues". It is a very interesting module because we have the opportunity to see behind the line what is PR all about.
I do hope that all my posts will be interesting and everyone who will be on my blog will leave will useful information and will want to come back. So let's keep moving.
I do hope that all my posts will be interesting and everyone who will be on my blog will leave will useful information and will want to come back. So let's keep moving.
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