Public Relations Principles for Small Businesses Online: PR 2.0

Even as a Denver Marketing company we have come to see the shift in how public relations is approached in the online world.  We see that people aren’t simply shooting out press releases for every single event that takes place at their company.  Public Relations has become more social, reaching directly to the consumer; at times avoided the gatekeepers of news altogether.

To gain a full understanding of PR 2.0 lets look at a brief synopsis of what public relations is and how we arrived to the point of seeing PR revolutionized enough that it is in 2.0 form.

Public Relations has always been about reaching people.  It has never been about spinning a story or simply submitting a news release.  With the entrance of social media and online commerce into the public relations realm of influence a change was going to have to happen.  People’s negative views on public relations were causing them to not even listen at times to what public relations professionals were saying online.  This in turn brought about an idea to evolve into PR 2.0.

PR 2.0 was birthed out of the fact: the internet is social.  So if public relations is about people, then public relations professionals should be interacting with people online.  Here is a good example of how PR 2.0 should look from this standpoint, taken from the book: Putting the Public Back in Public Relations on pg. 31:

• PR>Traditional Media>Customers
• PR>New Influencers>Customers
• PR>Customers
• Customers>PR

From this we see that there are four distinct ways for public relations professionals to reach out online.  We are always reaching to traditional media, which will eventually reach customers.  Then reaching new influencers; such as bloggers, who carry high klout (or simply influence) within their specific community online.  The second half of this diagram is the key difference that everyone should realize and embrace.  In PR 2.0 public relations professionals now have the opportunity to reach customers directly.  In return they also have the opportunity to listen to them directly.  In doing this, the public relations professional is able to receive direct feedback.  They are also going directly to the source, which helps avoid any convoluted messages about the company.

This new form of public relations shows a shift from the traditional way of thinking.  It is forcing PR professionals to become more public.  They are no longer simply broadcasting but investing in community.  They are about reaching key influencers and customers and creating friendships with them.  In one final diagram from pg. 36 of Putting the Public Back in Public Relations, we see the changes from traditional PR to PR 2.0 documented:

• News Releases vs. engaging with communities
• Spin vs. relevance
• Speaking in messages vs. genuine conversations related to the subject matter of peers
• Wire services vs. social/conversation tools and networks

Hopefully some of these things have already been embraced by your company.  Maybe at this point your head is spinning.  We would love to hear in the comments how these ideas are working for you.  We would also love to answer any questions you have about this shift.  Please don’t hesitate to leave a comment below!

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If you have read all of this and are simply wondering what social media is, this e-book is for you.  This collection of posts has been compiled around how social media works for businesses.

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