As I have been helping my soon-to-be college freshman explore the incredible breadth of college majors focusing on marketing and public relations available to her, I have seen firsthand how diversified this industry is in the digital age we now operate in. Just 10 years ago, Public Relations was more of an add-on to the main strategy but now has top billing in any solid tactical plan with the inclusion of all forms of social media and search engine opportunities.
Managing communications between a business and its audience is the traditional definition of Public Relations. And that perfectly describes how social media and SEO function in this brave new world of marketing.
The drawback however, is content-overload; sometimes companies are more focused on having constant ‘marketing touches’ to their audience and they ignore whether that message is relevant. And that is where the ‘old school’ teaching of Public Relations comes back into play – evaluate the message, rank its relevance to the audience, decide which media channel is appropriate, and examine if it even has any positive impact on the organization’s marketing presence.
“Content is king” has always been and will continue to be true, but managing all that content in a memorable, actionable and meaningful way is an art form in itself, and puts Public Relations smack in the driver’s seat.
As a follow up to last week’s post about David Ogilvy’s “How to create advertising that sells,” I wanted to share another gem from the long list of 38 tips.
For most of recent memory, panic about advertisers leaving the stalwart network and cable advertising in droves to move their budgets into social media have been the ad industry’s words of warning. However, a recent article in the New York Times tells a different story of how traditional media can successfully partner with, rather than compete with, social media.
These were the wise words from a respected boss years ago. He was speaking to the issue of improving sales, but as 
business, we like to think we are a pretty progressive marketing firm that has kept up with the industry and trends. However, we try to be pretty selective about what trend we fall in line with: we aren’t rabid Justin Beiber fans, (sorry!) we have so far avoided being lured into watching Jersey Shore marathons, and have just said ‘no’ to Lady Gaga-inspired footwear.
marketing
advertising
