Public relations should receive a far better press

If you stopped the ubiquitous ’man in the street’ and asked him or

her what advertising, direct marketing and public relations is all

about, what do you think might be the reply?

I know, because I did it - although I needn’t have bothered. We all

know, don’t we, that the popular view of anything complex is always

simplistic and rarely positive. And yet, as our harshest critics on any

matter you care to mention, shouldn’t we take note of the view of Judy

and Joe Public in their public bar?

The responses certainly come as no surprise. Advertising is an

aggravating, extravagant interference getting in the way of press and

broadcast editorials (witness the emergence of the verb ’to zap’), and

only serves to bump up the prices of goods and services that would be

cheaper without it.

And should the grim reaper ever finally catch up with him - which I

doubt - Drayton Bird would surely turn in his future grave to learn that

direct marketing is, of course, just ’junk mail’. And no Joe or Judy

will naturally ever admit to being influenced by an ad, or responding to

a mailing, despite the overwhelming evidence to the contrary.

But at least advertising and DM are visible and tangible. What of

PR?

Judy and Joe still have a view. It ranges from the sad spectre of shady

shysters pulling strings behind the scenes, to the worlds of

manipulative spin doctors, and kiss ’n’ tell busty blonde bolly-sodden

bimbos.

It seems the prime purpose of PR people (please don’t say ’PR’s’)

revolves around hustling a hard-pressed press in order to push a

client’s product.

Words like ’puff’ and ’bumph’ predominate and the term ’PR exercise’ is

seen always to be a negative.

It’s all true of course. There are bimbos ... of both genders. Their

off-stage antics do reinforce the popular image of vacuous excess.

But like all truisms, it’s not the whole truth, and nothing but the

truth.

Does it matter?

Should marketers care? Well, PR’s particular problem is that one of

society’s most influential groups - hacks - are themselves consumers of

the service in its most humble and often puerile form: the press

release.

And so, paradoxically, PR gets a poor press. And yet at its best it is a

philosophy that strikes right at the heart of any successful

enterprise.

It begins with asking ’who are we/what are we?’ questions, moves on to

the formulation of a meaningful culture based on the results and then

helps communicate to all those stakeholder groups upon whose success the

organisation depends.

PR with some of these groups, like employees, involves not a single

journalist. At the top end PR is the most intellectual of all the

disciplines.

Heady stuff? No way. It’s true. So shouldn’t the public be told?

Nah.

They’d never believe it.

Quentin Bell is chairman of the Quentin Bell Organisation.

This article was first published on Marketing