PR requires a special kind of person who thrives on action, on ‘doing’ everyday. PR is a series of short sprints that look quite like a marathon, in retrospect.

Everyone’s favourite punching bag

However, the recent spate of critical comment took me back to the question: why is PR everyone’s favourite punching bag?

It doesn’t matter if you’re a marketing or advertising expert; whether you are a journalist, blogger or a social media maven. The bad-dumb PR story tumbles on; not a day goes past when you don’t read about the malaise in PR, another bad hack story, dumb PR pitch, etc. etc.

I’m the first to admit: mistakes are made, extremely dumb ones, arising from inexperience, ineptitude as well as rotten apples that bring disrepute [and exist in every industry].

Quite frankly, while I too shudder at the mistakes made, I can’t overlook the many examples of good public relations practitioners and campaigns.

So this post is dedicated to all the great PR people who ‘get it’ and deliver value everyday by ensuring our clients are the ‘heroes of the story’. By doing this they also inspire and attract young professionals into an industry that has managed to hold steady inspite of the economic crisis the world is living through.

The contrarian view: Good PR is more valuable now

The unending criticism also indicates that good PR is more valuable now than ever before.

For three reasons:

First, corporates are the ‘bad guys’– the high levels of mistrust and angst that companies now face has made us forget that behind every company, are people who commit blood-sweat-tears to running a business. Every entrepreneur/ CEO running a business – big or small – knows this well. Public relations can play a very important role now in making brands and companies ‘feel’ more human!

Second, the breakdown of traditional markets and barrier-mechanisms has created amazing opportunities for the innovative to create new conversations. Importantly, these conversations for brands have to engage people, as real people. Conversations have to be a part of the brands’ DNA, not slapped on after! Brands that do this well, have a competitive edge that’s difficult to blunt.

Third, the trust vacuum i.e. the absence of believability, the crisis of integrity and the hunger for credibility, have created a never-before opportunity for public relations practitioners to do the extraordinary in a credible, authentic manner.

For these reasons, public relations people must start thinking about the ‘conversation’ quite early in the brands’ evolution cycle; and develop how-do-we-get-this-out ideas that will be uniquely identified with the brand. This is the real challenge!

For the many of us who thrive in being change-makers and even for people who’ve had negative experiences with PR, let’s recognise that living on the edge always draws criticism. But its here that new ideas are formed! And knowledge, experience and preparation are all unleashed creatively – everyday!

Picture credit: Travel blog

My colleague, Ashwani Singla has been reporting from Cannes ( and he plans to continue till the end of the festival) and he has put up an interesting post on how to produce winning PR campaigns on his blog. What he said that I like the most was that any campaign has to be built around a central idea, an idea that is simple yet executed well. I  remember having a chat with Prema Sagar before she left for Cannes (she is the only Indian member to be part of the jury in the PR category) that one of the core things that she look for will be a clear and simple idea and how that has been executed.

Some time back, a former colleague said to me that often the best PR campaigns are based on simple ideas. These simple ideas would often come across as very obvious but finding/creating them would take great understanding and insights.

So however complex we want our ppts. to look like, it’s perhaps not about ideas coming in from everywhere and often jumbled together with a weak link. A presentation, somebody said, has to have one slide that sums it all – a slide that contains the central theme.

So good insights, Ashwani. Some points I would like to take away:

1. Programme mission – to influence ‘real change’

2. Central idea – creative, innovative, and powerful yet simple

3. Get people involved without boundaries – internet, mobile, ATL, BTL and press exposures

4.Measurable

I am looking forward to follow this up with more insights and learnings about the judging process from Prema once she’s back – that would give pointers on how the best PR campaigns were executed and evaluated. And more on digital from Ashwani – how digital has been incorporated into campaigns seamlessly into the marketing/ PR campaigns, and not as a separate component. Because those are the real winners.

Meanwhile check out more coverage of Cannes here: ET, Exchange4Media, and Cannes site. And congratulations to our ad professionals who have won so many lions this year.

What makes a PR campaign a winner? What are your thoughts and insights?

The first person to be appointed to this position from an emerging market, Roger will serve as a voice of ‘BRIC’ and Emerging Markets in Asia for the firm in Europe and North America. He will work closely with Edelman’s Global Client Relationship Managers (GCRMs) and large-client leads to provide an Emerging Markets perspective to global stakeholder engagement and communications strategies.

Roger C B Pereira, an Ad industry veteran at the time, branched out into PR to found the firm in 1987 at the instance of the legendary JRD Tata. The firm started with the most challenging projects for The National Dairy Development Board, Hindustan Lever and the Department of Atomic Energy (Government of India) to The Leather Industries of America. Between December 1985 and April 1987, Roger consulted with several Governments around the world on development issues. His wise counsel through the 1990s and 2000s for companies looking to make a market entry into India, manage their reputation or successfully overcome challenging crisis situations have earned him respect as one of the most sought after communications advisors from India.

Edelman also appointed Robert Holdheim as MD and Country Head for India. A veteran of Edelman Frankfurt and London and current Head of Edelman New York’s Corporate Communications Group, Robert Holdheim will succeed Roger C B Pereira.

(Source: Edelman Release)

63% of PR professionals in India who participated in the 2nd Unofficial Indian Public Relations Survey on India PR Blog ‘are happy’ being in the PR profession, while 30% are ‘ok’, and 7% are ‘not happy’.

The top reasons cited by those who are not happy being in the PR profession include ‘lack of job satisfaction’ (20%), ‘type of work they do’ (19%), ‘work culture’ (14%), ‘salary’ (11%), and 8% chose ‘bad boss’. 8% of the respondents feel that the work is embarrassing and 6% feel that the job doesn’t just suit them.

When asked if they are likely to change their current workplace in this year, 49% said no, 26% said yes, and 25% said maybe.

38% of the participants felt that a PR professional should stay at least 2 years in an agency before shifting to a new one, while 32% cited a minimum of 1 year and 15% cited 3 years.

PR Agencies in India

There are no best or worst PR agencies. While some might excel in something, others might excel in something else. In India, we have PR agencies of all sorts – those who lead by revenues, or number of networks, or number of clients, or number of awards won. Then there are agencies that specializes in a particular vertical. There are also PR agencies with star PR celebrities, and then with good teams.

So we asked a simple question to our survey participants, which PR agency they liked the most and which they liked the least. The results are below.

PR Agencies in India that the survey participants liked the most

Least Liked PR Agencies in India, according to the survey participants:

PR as a Career

We asked the participants why they chose PR as their career and got some pretty interesting answers. There were only 5 participants who mentioned that PR happened by chance, which means the rest of the participants chose PR as their career.

Some select responses are:

1. Enjoy writing. Enjoy the trip of being an enabler – putting the right words in other people’s mouths

2.  I was always lured by the glamor in PR. This job gives me exposure to the latest in a particular industry, the upcoming trends and news and also enables me to handle communication at times of crisis and be an enabler in image building for my clients. Its a dynamic field to work in.

3. To me, it’s fascinating to observe how people form links and relationships. This is why I am in PR.

4. PR allows much room for creative and strategic thinking, rapid planning and action and networking, which i like doing. Secondly, in this profession I came across some of the most interesting people and ideas. Last, this profession is all about change, which is me – dynamic.

5. Everyday is different. Every task is unique. The industry is constantly developing and yet very exciting.

6. For someone who has varied interests, a PR job allows me inside participation across various industries.

7. I am a peoples person, very comfortable and connect very well with them. strong believer in investment in relationships. With very tamed ego , it becomes lot more easier to deal and interact with people… accepting their limitations. So work is fun.. and life goes on.

8. I got into PR by default than design. But once I got into PR, I chose to continue with it as a career because of several factors – the power that it has in building/destroying a company’s reputation, the challenges, the opportunity to interact with top management, the excitement and newness.

9. I found the concept of Public Relations amazing while pursuing a degree in Economics because of the simple ethical component in it. It was an emerging field then and I thought I would be suitable for the field and would be able to realize my potential.

And some more from those who joined the PR industry from other professions:

1. I actually wanted to pursue advertising as a career, but was not able to get a job and there was a vacancy in PR and that i how i got into it. Subsequently, i did get into advertising, but then i quit advertising and came back to PR again.

2. I moved from journalism to public relations department of a state government. A journalistic assignment being the assistant editor of the state’s monthly magazine engaged me into PR activities of the department including leading press parties, preparing different collateral, managing press conferences, which acted as a stepping stone for me to move over to a company to head their PR department.

3. Prior to my current ongoing tenure in PR, I was in Sales and Marketing , sensing I was not going ahead much, I moved in PR . Today after handling assignments and activities I feel I have moved ahead and I feel satisfied too. This is the profession I am going to stay and continue till I live.

4. I was part of the BPO industry involved with operations, training manuals, training modules etc and was desperately looking for a good break and a nine-to-five job. That’s when I began copywriting and developing content for a client and worked together with their PR agency back then. On completion of the project, I was given the choice to join the client servicing team. I agreed to that and learnt on the job. Till today, its been one of the best decisions I’ve ever taken in my life.

5. I started my career with Advertising and than media planning in my early days but i felt that i should go for PR as it will test my all skills of communications. My teacher & senior gave me the feedback that i am a PR guy, i tried and feeling good though somehow I find that its a fat that PR is a thankless job but very dominating in any company.

Activities in the PR Profession

Type of work/activity enjoyed doing the most in the PR profession:

Type of work/activity enjoyed doing the least in the PR profession:

What Indian PR Professionals Want Training On

These are the areas where the survey participants feel they need improvement on:

These are the areas where the survey participants want training on:

Image of the Boss

These are the areas where the participants feel that their boss should improve/ concentrate on:

PR Outlook 2009

The responses of the participants can be broadly summarized in the following responses we pick from the lot:

1. It’s the year of the downturn. PR agencies need to demonstrate value but not cut costs or submit to unreasonable client demands. Align closer with marketing to showcase how PR truly can do better brand consultancy than advertising. Get into social media – but not before you understand it and treat it with respect and not a freebie-tool.

2. Clients’ focus has now shifted to PR in a major way as they have cut down their Advertising, Marketing budgets. So its become all the more challenging for the agencies & teams because clients are focused only on PR now and hence getting more demanding.

3. For Indian PR – 2009 will be more towards sophistication, agencies will try to achieve a good work culture. For Global PR – 2009 will be more towards new media acceptance.

4. Specialization in core expertise areas is a must going forward.

5. Another important thing would be better synergy between the PR and media industries.

About the survey and the participants

The 2nd Unofficial Indian Public Relations Survey was an online survey conducted among the readers of the India PR Blog.

Out of 85 participants, 58% were female participants and 40% were males. 39% of the participants were in the age group of 21-25 years, 31% in 26-30 years, 9% in 41-45 years, 6% in 31-35 years, 5% in 36-40 years, 4% in 50-55 years, and 6% in the 46 years and above category.

In terms of years of experience in the PR profession, 56% of the participants were under 5 years and below, 18% between 6-10 years, 14% between 11-20 years, and 12% having 21 years of experience and more.

69% of the participants have got a formal education in PR.

Disclaimer: The results above are the outcome of the 2nd Unofficial Indian Public Relations Survey that was conducted for research and educational purposes on India PR Blog in Feb 2009. The results are indicative of only the votes given by the participants who visited this blog and chose to participate in the survey. These results might not necessarily reflect on the true workings, image, status, or ranking of any PR agency or other organisations in India. Readers who read this are advised to treat the results as opinions of select PR professionals from the industry, who willingly shared their inputs on conditions of anonymity, and should be awared that these inputs might be subjective. Names and contact details of participants have been withheld and names of companies mentioned in participants’ comments have been removed in this post to protect the identities of participants. The survey is not associated or owned by any PR agency and has been independently conducted by IPRB.

To give credence to the results, we have mentioned that we will contact senior PR industry veteran who is not associated with India PR Blog. Thus, before publishing these results, we have also shown this post with the actual results from SurveyGizmo (the tool we used to conduct the survey) to Mr. K Srinivasan, image audit guru, CMD of Prime Point Foundation, and a luminary in the Indian PR industry. He also moderates popular online groups like PR Point and Image Management. Please see note from Mr. Srinivasan below replying on email.

Our special thanks to the participants of the survey and to Mr. Srinivasan for sharing their time and inputs and making this survey a success.

* The percentages in the above charts are based on the number of participants

For any arguments, compliments, or discussions, please leave a comment on this post. For anything else, email editor@indiaprblog.com

You might also want to read about the 1st Unofficial Indian Public Relations Survey and other PR surveys.

Note from Mr. Srinivasan:
Thanks for your mail and seeking my views.  I downloaded the excel format of the data.  I found from the IP addresses and other information, there appears to be no attempt by anybody to hijack the survey.  All the responses appear to be genuine from the different persons. I have only quickly gone through the responses.  I have not made any analysis.  You can release them.

I have one personal view. When you are the asking about the best PR Agency, I found at random, the members give the vote only for their companies.  Mostly, their personal factors would have influenced the rating of a PR agency as worst or best.

Normally, I used to tell my clients and also in my classes like this. When you want to get the perception of few products or establishments from the audience, I strongly feel that all the audience should have experienced all the products under review.  Then only, they can rate them properly.  This is only fundamentally  a common sense and not any theory.

If you ask 100 people to rate four hotels for the quality, service (under different parameters), I insist that all the 100 should have gone to the four hotels.  then only they can rate them.  If they do not have direct knowledge about the four hotels, each one will be tempted to give the hotel which he knows.

That is why, whenever, I do an image audit, I will put the questions, where the respondent is familiar with the choices given.  Also, I will specify the parameters clearly.

(A PR agency can be best or worst in different parameters.   Nobody can be totally best or worst.  working conditions, salary, quality of training given, etc. etc. may be different parameters)

In this particular case, all the respondents are from different agencies.  They do not have any direct knowledge of the other companies.  Whatever they hear is from the peers or not heard.  When you ask the question, they will be tempted to give the name which is more familiar, and not necessarily the best or worst.

(Once, when I was doing the Image audit for an IT company, the management insisted for the employees to rate other companies.  I explained to the management as above.  Ultimately, I made the question as ” what is your dream job and where do you want to work’ like this.  Since the responses used to be anonymous, they gave good feedback.  Some of them mentioned their own company.  Still it was better to find out the loyalty.  -  some compromise)

If some one asks  me who is the best social media evangelist giving choice (1) palin and (2) some person in US whom I do not have any familiarity, my choice is only for palin.  I do not know the other person and hence, my vote goes to palin.  If i know the other person, definitely, i may weigh both and at that time, the other person also is likely to be rated better.

I have not made any detailed analysis of agencies which they have ranked.  However, I do not consider them valid, due to various factors, explained above.   Otherwise, I find all other responses genuine.  I really liked the responses of what they like, do not like, what they want, etc.  I also look forward to your consolidated report.  They are worth considering by all the PR agencies.

The survey, undertaken between November 5 – December 14, 2008, indicates that the percentage of those in India who trust business to do what is right has fallen by 9%, from 74% in the previous year to 65%. In the US, the percentage has fallen by 20%, from 58% to 38%. Globally, business has lost trust with 62% saying they trust corporations less today than they did a year ago.

CEO credibility has also fallen globally but the fall in India is marginal (from 66% to 60%), against a six-year low of 23% in the US and a fall from 44% in 2008 to 19% in 2009 in China.

A majority of opinion leaders concede that government should impose stricter regulations and greater control over business across all industries.

Business has lost credibility to lead unilaterally…

“A major concern is that business appears to have lost credibility to lead unilaterally. Clearly, today it must partner with others to solve issues like global warming, the financial crisis, healthcare and energy — 65% in India believe that business must partner with governments and third parties like NGOs, with only 33% believing it must do what it can alone and 2% believe it has no role to play,” said Mr. Alan VanderMolen, President, Edelman Asia-Pacific.

Despite the worldwide economic and financial crisis, in ten of thirteen business sectors in India, trust is stronger than last year as against China, where only 4 of the 13 sectors show stronger trust than 2008. Top industry sectors in India include technology (93%, same as last year); automotive (80%, same as last year); healthcare (80%, up slightly by five points from 2008) and its related industry pharma (81%, up slightly by 3 pts.).

Interestingly, companies headquartered in UK and Germany remain the most trusted in India; companies in China and Poland are least trusted; and trust in US companies has suffered the biggest decline.

High Expectations

Indian companies are expected to move quickly and make changes to correct problems and difficulties when they arise (87% and 86%, respectively). They are also expected to admit their mistakes (81%).

Greater support for responsible companies

India is more supportive of responsible companies than most countries. This includes support for preferential treatment for tax, employment and environmental practices; pursuing changes in local laws or permissions and even allowing foreign investors a controlling interest in local companies.

The global 2009 Edelman Trust Barometer found that Government and business share the lion’s share of responsibility for the global problems of the financial meltdown, global warming, affordable health care and the energy crisis. On the other hand, they place the burden of responsibility for solving these problems on the shoulders of government. Business is expected to play a role in support of government (62%) and approximately 7 out of 10 expect business to find and invest in solutions to each of these problems.

Media enjoys higher credibility in India

Respondents give all forms of media higher scores for credibility than other countries in the APAC region. It is second only to South Korea in trust extended to the traditional media and is the leader in trust given to corporate communication sources. Academic spokespersons got the highest credibility ratings in India (74%). CEOs in India also enjoy higher credibility ratings than any other country in the APAC region.

Examining the drivers of a good and responsible reputation, India is similar to Indonesia in its emphasis of CSR behavior. Committing resources, money and time to the greater public good as well as a strong commitment to environmental protection is very important to a good and responsible reputation in India.

Sixty percent said they need to hear information about a company three to five times before they believe it. Specialists remain the most trusted purveyors of information about a company, with 62% globally saying an academic or expert on a company’s industry or issues would be extremely or very credible.

We conducted the 1st Unofficial Indian Public Relations Survey in July 2006 and may we say, it was a much discussed topic in the industry. Now it has been almost two years since then, and we think the Indian PR industry needs a quick reality check. What do the PR professionals think of the profession, the agencies, their bosses, and so on. And so today, we are back with the 2nd Unofficial Indian Public Relations Survey. There are 22 questions – not necessary that you answer all of them, but we would love it if you do. The questions cover more area than what we did with the first survey. We are trying to focus on the industry as well, like what do a PR professional think of his/her daily work, is he/she enjoying his/her job, etc. – rather than just an agency vs agency questionnaire.  Of course, we can’t wait to pronounce the best PR agency in India, unofficially of course.

Surveys are rare in the Indian PR industry and thus it will be interesting to see what comes up here. We will highly appreciate your 5 minutes spent on filling up this survey. Before publishing the results, we will request a senior industry professional, not associated with the blog, to cross-check them against the actual survey responses. Survey ends February 24, 2008.

To participate, please click here.

Or fill out your responses below:

With 2009 upon us, we decided to ask some of the leaders in the Indian PR industry on what they foresee in this year.  Check out what they have to say. What do you say? Let’s discuss in the comments.

Ashwani Singla, CEO, Genesis Burson-Marsteller

The recent Satyam saga has demonstrated the close inter-linkage between good corporate governance, transparency and an unblemished corporate reputation. As the science of influence, public relations plays a central role in building and sustaining corporate reputation through powerful communication of a company’s good work. As we look forward into 2009 and beyond, we will see public relations being leveraged far beyond traditional press relations to enable deep stakeholder engagement on a sustained basis, forming a key to protecting and enhancing corporate reputation.

As more and more brands compete for the consumers share of the wallet, the emergence of buying power of the youth of India will form a pivot for change and innovation. This ‘youngistan’ will continue to grow in the coming year the information and influence sources will increasingly shift to ‘New Media’ and the internet will become a dominant medium for the Gen Next to share information and express themselves. With the advent of 3G networks and the growing penetration of notebooks, clients would need to effectively harness these new developments to connect and converse with their audiences. Virtual media such as online journals and magazines, personal blogs, podcasts, community radios, and other fast growing ‘social media’ like Facebook, Orkut, Flickr, etc. thus need to be understood and leveraged effectively by public relations professionals.

And finally, the engagement with government will grow as the momentum towards accountability, transparency and responsiveness grows. This will lead to a growing demand for Public Affairs expertise as the Government evolves from a player in the arena to a referee and the third umpire our journey of nation building.

Madan Bahal, Managing Director, Adfactors PR

I see a robust bounce back of business in the first quarter of financial year 2009 – 2010. This will be driven by two factors: a growing realization that PR delivers cost efficiencies that no other marcomm tool does, and increasing uncertainty & scrutiny that corporates are faced with. The PR industry should not feel gloomy in the light of the events of quarter October to December 2008. Focus on capacity and resources and be prepared for the opportunity which will be regardless of the continuing economic slowdown.

Sunil Gautam, Managing Director, Hanmer MS&L Communications

PR is now going to be more innovative and creative. It’s going to get better at identifying the big story and get going with it. Driving PR in the context of the consumer, the last man standing is today’s challenge amidst the clutter and  I am excited to see how we go about doing that. Of course PR has to get more credible and show some well defined results to get more business as we all face an economic down turn… It’s Darwin time… Survival only of those who are the fittest and we are ready.

Some great work has gone into the digital PR campaign of the US presidential elections and I wish some thing so cohesive and well directed could be done here. 2008 was surely the year of Digital PR breaking even and what best than Obama’s campaign.

The industry had very few business magazines and dailies which devoted in promoting the agencies. Even the quality of paper in terms of reproduction and coverage was very limited but as time passed by, today, we have every newspaper offering a weekly supplement on marketing. But more often we only see the Ad Gurus being featured week after week with occasional appearance of some noted marketing pundits. I sometimes ask myself if it is really required to do so much of chest thumping to self promote, instead of showcasing great work and interesting case studies. Also two decades back, we had very few advertising professionals who were more concerned with their client’s work and their interaction with the media was limited. Today that has quadrupled and what we hear are quotes and sound bytes -  some relevant and some off the tangent. I am hoping this will slowly change as clients are today seeking more value for their brands through action and not words.

Give me a hardworking campaign any day:

Great advertising campaign examples and successful marketing case studies must be exposed in such papers without any doubt. This could be both Indian and international examples. These will really help the consumer, students from management schools, and prospects who are seeking to partner or join good creative agencies.

I still remember that many clients in today’s world candidly tell the agencies who pitch for their business – show me the piece of work done by the group which will work on our brand. They are not bothered about the work done by some of the (Patli Gully work) other branches for some accolades achieved in the form of awards.

A few years back, I had gone for a meeting to a client who had put us on notice. During the discussion, one of my senior colleague mentioned that we recently won some awards and some good visibility. The reply to this from the client was – you guys are great in building your agency but that does not excite us. Tell me what have you done for my brand so far and tell me what you can do in the near future.

Clients have become very smart and canny; let’s stop fooling them by doing PR for the agency and oneself. End of the day we must realize that our dal roti comes from campaign that delivers results and help building their brand.

PR is a must, over dosage will kill credibility:

There is absolutely no harm in doing genuine PR. But most of the times this does not happen. We have the maximum awards this industry offers and therefore to fill up the spaces of some of the marketing dailies just wait for either covering this awards function or getting quotes from the advertising experts. So much of awards on an ongoing basis have prompted some of the ad agencies not to participate or even if they participate look at only the selective ones. The over dosage of awards and repeatedly seeing the same mug shots and clichéd quotes has to a large extent diluted the interest levels and the credibility of the news that get published. On a global basis on advertising, we have just one or two magazines which have a tremendous equity and it covers this industry in depth with lot of substance and meat. It’s time we also move on the same direction to give our audience some quality and credible coverage, which can impart new knowledge and learning.

Lastly let me also salute this industry as this industry has built several brands over the past several years and has also built in several processes and business ethics. Also on the international front, we have made our stamp by creating world class campaigns.

If the stalwarts of this industry focus on the bigger picture instead of self promotion, it will definitely provide a boost to this industry and we will see more talent being attracted to the industry.

Over the past few months the buzzword has been recession and in the name of recession companies are revisiting their marketing budgets to keep a tight control on expenses. This is one of the old tricks most companies apply when there is recession and the first thing they do is to slash the marketing and promotion budgets. While the global meltdown and inflation has reduced the spending power of the Indian consumer but the recent terrorist attack has further shifted the gears of most companies in all sectors. All this is fine but brands still need to in the minds of consumer but at what cost is worrying the brand teams in most organization. And which is where the power of Public Relation can play a significant role.

Why PR and not other expensive medium?

The general mood has taken a deep dip after series of incidences. Today shopping and traffic at malls has dropped considerably in spite of Christmas and New Year around the corner. Even if marketers come out with killer strategy in terms of promotion the urge for shopping is being deferred due to various economic factors. With big ticket events like Champions league in cricket has been deferred has made the advertiser to rethink as to what new communication tools will help to keep their brand alive. Although GEC programs have given fairly good viewer ship the return on investment is not encouraging for brands to spend big bucks on the electronic media.

In this scenario brands must effectively use PR to maintain the some presence in the market. While I agree it will not generate rapid awareness for the brand the way advertising does through mass media it will most certainly help clients to look at a cost effective tool. And what is important here is brands should balance their strategy while using PR by judiciously managing advertising spends. This is where PR agencies also need to chalk out new strategy to pitch stories with the journalist to get favorable stories which will help not only brands to raise saliency but also build strong credibility.

PR cannot work in isolation:

Having said that companies should not completely depend on PR. Companies must use the 360 degree approach where PR will supplement and boost the brand awareness through sustenance mass media advertising and other innovative tools which is beyond advertising. For example companies can use branding through cybercafé by resting on the desktops of PC’s. With more cybercafés mushrooming both in cities and tier 2 and 3 cities brands need to exploit this new medium. Interestingly many brands have moved to this space as clients are able to capture the hits to the brands through well supported technology which is able to monitor the traffic. Also this is able to help marketers to extend their consumer outreach to smaller towns.

There is always a concern when one uses PR. Is it measurable? Yes it is measurable if companies seriously view in measuring this in a scientific manner. We have strong processes to measure this which not only helps in effective messaging but will also able to throw consumer insights which will help brands to check if the communication strategy and their messaging has met their defined objectives.

Finally as a brand custodian of the brand the brand manager has to believe in what he is doing and should have a complete faith in PR. Miracles may not happen but well thought out PR strategy will definitely yield results.