Here at The Future Buzz we have long since promoted the notion that\u00a0every company is a media company. We\u2019ve also asserted that in such a world,\u00a0PR should lead.<\/p>\n
Personally it\u2019s one of the reasons I left the boutique digital agency to join LEWIS PR, I believe in this and want to see it executed at scale<\/p>\n
So it was good to see a conversation started this week by Todd Defren from SHIFT on why\u00a0PR will own content\u00a0reacting to an\u00a0earlier post\u00a0by\u00a0Adam Cohen from Fleishman Hillard.<\/p>\n
Tier-1 PR teams possess the executive perspective on editorial which is the natural skill set to lead content. They don\u2019t fall prey to many of the\u00a0content marketing challenges, for example, they\u00a0consistently are able to answer the all important \u201cso what?\u201d test of web content. After all they are already directly\u00a0interfacing\u00a0with media every day who\u00a0have to<\/em>\u00a0fulfill\u00a0this to their audiences. Too cutthroat these days for any media that want to survive to be boring.<\/p>\n But while PR may have strategy, marketing departments for the most part are better at analytics, process and perhaps most importantly\u00a0execution and consistency\u00a0(not to mention technical chops). I still think PR is best poised to lead strategy and direct the organic content machine of an organization, but marketing and PR need each other and have to work together to win.<\/p>\n However, no matter who is leading I understand completely: it\u2019s not easy for\u00a0any<\/em>\u00a0communications specialization to own content production and while I may think one is best poised to lead, certainly we\u2019ll see this vary across organizations.<\/p>\n With that said everyone needs to overcome the following challenges we\u2019re still seeing:<\/p>\n Stop thinking in terms of \u201cthe big idea\u201d<\/strong><\/p>\n Community building happens\u00a0inch by inch. Sure, you should\u00a0throw in some buzz\u00a0for good measure, but without the stuff in between none of it matters. Show up. No\u00a0excuses: if you can\u2019t do this,\u00a0you fail\u00a0as a modern communications professional.<\/p>\n Go through the process yourself<\/strong><\/p>\n There is no chance anyone is just going to just get lucky at web publishing and randomly build a organic opt-in audience. You really have to\u00a0go through the process\u00a0yourself from start to finish. I think you can partner here, but if you haven\u2019t completed this successfully somewhere you are in no way, shape or form positioned to become a media company. Experience counts and having been successful with micro content is\u00a0not enough. CMOs listen up: hire agencies and team members who have done this before. They exist, find them. Hire away from media if you have to.<\/p>\n Embrace having\u00a0personality<\/strong><\/p>\n If you hope to create a following on the web behind content you will\u00a0have<\/em>\u00a0to polarize audiences somehow. Anything less means blanding away ideas to the point they\u2019re basically unreadable. This is difficult and counter to what most organizations are able to do from a self-publishing standpoint.<\/p>\n Sure they pitch stories that have bite or interest, but it\u2019s \u201csafer\u201d to let it come from a reporter. If you want to self-publish, you have to have some sort of voice.\u00a0Have opinions and take sides.\u00a0Make enemies. Obscurity is a far greater threat to companies than any perceived\u00a0repercussions\u00a0from being interesting.<\/p>\n Become data-driven<\/strong><\/p>\n Publishing content on the web goes well beyond activating\u00a0pull PR. If you follow an effective content strategy, optimize your templates and call people to action you can impact outcomes such as leads generated or sales. But this can only happen if you\u2019re\u00a0data-driven, establish\u00a0conversion goals\u00a0from the beginning and iterate and refine based on metrics.<\/p>\n Most start publishing without even establishing benchmarks which is sad, because without data you\u2019re flying blind. But with this data you\u2019re in the most powerful seat of all: the ability to get\u00a0immediate feedback\u00a0from your ideas and refine them bit by bit. Also learn how KPIs from self-publishing ventures such as blogging impacts your commercial web page KPIs (such as passing link equity and referring traffic).<\/p>\n The time to act on this is now\u2026<\/strong><\/p>\n The real question is, what PR teams are willing to destroy any\u00a0remaining artificial barriers\u00a0and\u00a0go direct to media \/ customers in an open format?<\/p>\n It\u2019s no doubt work, and still a new approach for many. But it\u2019s the future of effective and scalable PR, evolving it from something which (previously) meant borrowing attention from others to\u00a0building equity\u00a0and your own high-value channel of distribution to the world.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Here at The Future Buzz we have long since promoted the notion that\u00a0every company is a media company. We\u2019ve also … <\/p>\n