There was a time when clients contacted PR agencies because of the relationships they had. And smart PR folks nurtured theirs over time and could tap into the proverbial Rolodex to help clients achieve goals (i.e. get press coverage).
And the world turned…
You’d often hear PR pros talking about the connections they brought to the table – let’s called those owned relationships. And the quality of those owned relationships is what differentiated agencies and helped keep the business from becoming a commodity.
Then along came a funny new technology called the facsimile machine (or ‘fax’ for short) and all of a sudden you could send out multiple releases or advisories to a big list at the same time.
What an innovation!
But the excitement didn’t stop there. Next came emails, which spawned a major attachment fetish that led to the all-inclusive bcc spam packages that started to give the industry a bad worse name.
Who needs to worry about a relationship when you could buy a list and blast out your news – relevant or not – to all and sundry?
We didn’t know it at the time but we were commoditizing ourselves. We also didn’t realize we’d turned ourselves into broadcasters and in doing so devalued the very thing that was at the core of our industry – and part of our name.
And the price we paid: Relationships.
Enter social media. And the confluence of spin-smammery, media upheaval and resurgence of one-to-one communication, left a good part of the PR profession staring at their databases with quizzical looks on their faces.
Out of desperation, people recalled the past and started railing on about their so-called relationships, the ones they’d forgotten about, the ones that no longer existed the way they once did.
Picking up the phone does not a relationship make
They fell back on a nostalgia for what used to work and started ordering millennials to pick up the phone. That’s what’s wrong with the industry, they cried, no one is talking on the phone anymore.
They missed the point that the phone is simply another piece of technology.
Enter shared relationships
Today, relationships are more important than ever and that’s a great thing.
And while the essence of relationships is the same – they’re built over time and require commitment and earning trust – the way we get there is different.
People who are active on social networks know you can build them online, in person and often through a combination of both. The trick is thinking about the other person and what they want and need.
I think another difference is that relationships should no longer be held in one person’s back pocket the way they were in the past. Instead, they should be shared.
PR people should be the ones making connections and facilitating direct interactions between people. It’s time to relinquish our gatekeeper mentality and forget about so-called control.
With shared relationships, you’re building a community of clients, influencers, media and customers and colleagues. It’s more open and therefore more likely to engender trust.
Isn’t that the essence of new PR?
I’m interested to hear what you think and how you build relationships that matter.
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