It is hard to see anything but social media being the tactical focus for public relations in 2011, but my guess is that most clients of agencies will still be allocating the bulk of their budget to media relations. I don’t think organisations, in general, are sophisticated enough yet to realise there is better ROI to social media than having stories in the media. But 2011 could be the year where this changes.

It is amazing how many people who work in PR, and how many agencies, do not have blogs. Their benefits are clear: enhancing reputation, credibility and word-of-mouth recommendations; SEO; and walking the Goddamn talk! It is less amazing – even if it is professionally sinful – that if you are a committed PR blogger like me you struggle to find the time to check your peers. Bearing this in mind, I would officially like to go some way towards repenting and recognise some of the excellent PR bloggers out there.

Mobile, hand held devices such as PDAs and iPhones are the future being manifested now for marketing and PR pros. Their use is on the way to swamping that of desk-bound computers and even laptops. For stakeholder engagement to occur effectively, communication professionals must customise their strategies and tactical means of communication to take heed of this development.

TV as we know it, or more specifically the networks themselves, is dead. But TV as a medium is not fatally wounded, Dan Ilic told Frocomm’s 2010 New Media Summit and a move from ‘network’ TV to ‘networked’ TV, such as peer-to-peer TV, is on its way. The predicted death of the networks is attributed to the high cost of broadcasting compared to the internet’s ability to offer cheap, and also live, viewing. But it is also the networks’ descent from flourishing cultural hubs to organisations lacking accountability, credibility, independence and creativity that has sealed their fate.

It is a fundamental part of any Facebook communication strategy to leverage the potential viral dimensions of content featured on the Page, said Edelman’s Matthew Gain at Frocomm’s 2010 New Media Summit. The more it lends itself to viral promotion (i.e. endorsement) the more fans will be attracted to the page (with all of the attendant benefits this can deliver).

This emphasises the need for a well thought out, long term and big picture content strategy. Issues to address include:
• What is the approach to the generation and usage of content across all communication mechanisms, for instance, including the corporate website?
• What communication platform gets the ‘exclusives’?
• I have even asked is PR missing the main digital game by focusing on social media and not the corporate website?

The key to engaging stakeholders through Facebook, said then Weber Shandwick’s, but now Edelman’s, Matthew Gain at Frocomm’s 2010 New Media Summit, is identifying existing communities where fans can be recruited, forming strategic alliances, leveraging off existing communication platforms and utilising Facebook advertising. This post focuses on tactical aspects of utilising Facebook for public relations results.

It should come as no surprise to hear that Google, one of the most potent organisations in the world, has trust as one of its positioning lynchpins…yet in a (business) world still coming to terms with the fact that those defining a brand are more often its stakeholders than the brand itself, this is still close to being revolutionary, especially if it is being effectively put into action, rather than simply being pontificated on.

Free report on PR and social media…Trust, crowds (utilisation of, communicating to, segmenting of…), integration (or not) of social media and corporate websites, the death of ‘networked’ communication, content generation issues and the challenges of change within social media were some of the primary themes that were either explicitly stated at the 2010 Frocomm New Media Summit, bubbled under its surface or were notable not for their articulation, but by their surprising absence…

Whilst I don’t pretend to have any great insights on this matter, I was recently interviewed by British uni student Hayley McDonald (@HAYCMAC) on how social media is impacting on the practice of PR and how it is changing the way PR pros work, with the critical upshot being that making the right strategic decision, on a variety of levels, is more important (and, yes, more challenging) than ever.

The strategy driving what content goes on corporate websites needs to fit into the overarching organisational communication strategy, yet so wide-ranging and large can corporate websites be, that they sometimes seem to occupy their own ‘micro-climate’ where a unique approach, arguably, needs to be applied.

In this post, with the insight and assistance of a range of communication professionals – digital, SEO (search engine optimisation), marketing, public relations – I am going to outline a number of strategic and tactical elements to consider when utilising websites as an organisational communication mechanism.