Finally, i have time to write! After finishing a test and submitting a proposal for a PR competition by Weber Shandwick, I finally have time to be here. Apologies for missing JUST FOR FUN tuesday, I’m gonna shift that to next week so stay tuned for that!
Anyhows, There has been a pretty good buzz about bloggers and their relationships with PR ppl. I came across Daryl’s and Van Tan’s blog posts on feedback to PR folks that they had when PR folks were interacting with bloggers. Sounded like really simple comms 101 stuff that PR folks has screwed up. Perhaps its the lack of training when dealing with this medium. Investor relations, sure, no problems. Media relations, yeah, we’re good. But social media… erm… spam? last minute entries? irrevalent topic but i like the reach these guys have?
I think both of them brought out some really good points on how PR should change their attitudes when dealing with bloggers. The trouble with this medium is that its ’social’, which means relationship building, which means adding that personal touch which would help in the long run. So here’s to creating a new job in agencies, get a guy to be the contact point for all these bloggers and make him do all the personal emails and calls without having him handle any other accounts. Or, just hire an intern, lol….
In fact, the points brought out were in sync with a recent study done (Yeah, i’m still a sucker for numbers…) on Asian bloggers and the PR industry.
This quote really sums it up
“Bloggers are the new media, they are not to be treated like second-class journalists or expected to behave like traditional journalists. It’s a whole new landscape and PR people should learn to accept it.”
On the other side of the fence, PR folks aren’t dense. I’m sure its the lack of time or manpower (hopefully not training) that they are unable to engage bloggers like they really should be doing. In fact, Meg Roberts has a pretty neat post from a PR perspective of PR folks and bloggers.Would any other PR folks care to stand up and explain why bloggers aren’t getting the right treatment? It’ll be enlightening to know if this feedback is being digested.
At the end of the day, its still having a mutually benificial relationship (Quote from Meg) with a stakeholder. Bloggers might seem like a secondary stakeholder now, but should they be moved up to a primary stakeholder? After all, their growing influence and being opinion leaders about your brand might just be what you need…
And if you wanna ask how am i gonna justify my time and money spent engaging these bloggers? Let’s do a post and set some marcoms objectives, presales and sales. Or if any1 has a corelation btw the sales revenue and r/s with bloggers, plz share!
nice post dude. I’ve always felt the growing importance of blogger relations in the PR industry. It’s without a doubt an area that PR folks need to look into, but unfortunately many are slow to adapt to this changing landscape.
Some of my personal opinions on this issue are:
1.) Unfamiliarity. This results in uncertainty and breeds apathy. It’s simpler and easier to just ignore.
2.) PERCEPTION that bloggers are not as “professional” as trad journos, thus warrant less attention or effort. Stereotyping i suppose.
3.) From an agency perspective: yes, we need to engage in r/s building with bloggers.. and yes, we can assign someone to be a contact point. But are we fully committed to this system? What if that person were to leave and take all these r/s with him/her? It’s difficult to create a sustainable bloggers relations program, simply because the bulk of it is based on human relations.
Just my two cents worth. Anyways all the best in your quest to be AP PR student of the year!
Lol, thanks man, i’m gonna need it to win. If they do create such a positioning, then it better pay more to retain that staff, hahaha, gives us a higher chance to earn more money…