For those of you who keep tabs on the world of public relations, there was a particular article that was floating around from agency to agency. It provided quite a bit of talk around the water cooler. Although it spread spread like a wild fire, it certainly didn't elicit the feelings of angst and worry as one would expect. In fact, the general consensus was bewilderment and general amusement.
Tom Foremski is a contributor to the technology website, ZDnet, and a notorious PR-loather. On Thursday of last week, he posted an article titled, "Did Google just kill PR agencies?" following Google's changes to their page ranking in their search function. In an effort to deter people from trying to chat Google's search algorithm's by pumping their press releases full of SEO language, Google announced that it would actually be purposely lowering these search results to punish those offenders. This should come as no surprise as Google's search engine algorithm is the foundation of the company and they certainly don't want people trying to cheat the system.
Foremski, however, suggests that with these rule changes, Google is turning PR agencies obsolete. Essentially, he bundles all of PR into the development of press releases and warns PR professionals that we are all doomed because Google will now start to punish companies that try to maximize their coverage through as many links and press release repostings that they can muster.
Sigh. I don't even know where to begin with this.
Let's just start with the obvious fact that when we develop press releases, most agencies are not just looking for repostings. On the contrary, while marketing folks and product managers may consider a reposting a press success, many PR professionals only aim for original coverage. This frequently means sending out the release (or more commonly a pitch on the story), arranging a briefing for the vendor and the journalist, and providing the rest of the information over email for a story that the journalist crafts himself (by the way, PR people, if you want a good laugh, please check out Foremski's article from 2006 on what he would like PR professionals to send to him to help write his story. You'll get a kick out of it).
So, no, Tom, if the release I write doesn't end up on 30 press release aggregator websites anymore, I won't really lose any sleep over it. Nor will my clients. Because the one article that I land in an InformationWeek or your own ZDNet will draw more impressions that those release websites would in ten years. For PR pros who hold themselves to a high standard, a straight cut and paste of a release isn't a victory and these rule changes will only continue to whittle out the lazy individuals.
The next biggest issue with this article is the suggestion that PR agencies are just machines that churn out release after release: mindless zombies that insert marketing-speak into carefully designed templates, day in and day out. Foremski makes it seem like our job is to sit at our computer, just trying to load the system with so much of our client's information that Google will help boost our efforts with their algorithms.
I would invite Tom to come join me for a week at work to see what we actually do. Executive messaging, thought leadership campaigns, media pitches (not press releases), social media, digital content development, crisis management, etc. In fact, of all things associated with public relations, the press release is the one that I spend the least time developing. In the 14 months I have been in the industry, I have written one press release and one newsbyte. That's it. I've also managed to secure coverage for my client in a variety of respectable technology publications through the tactics I mentioned above.
We are not robots. We don't push out press releases with the same frequency that we drink cups of coffee. We do not settle for press release repostings. And we certainly don't rely on Google to produce positive news coverage for our clients.
If a PR agency's business actually suffers from these rule changes, then they are doing a disservice to their clients as it is. The press release is merely one sword in our arsenal as public perception shapers and one that should only be drawn in completely necessary situations.
Google certainly didn't kill PR. The search behemoth is just trying to make us develop all of our skills, not just the press release.
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