Public Relations Trends In 2019

Public relations, just like technology is dynamic and PR professionals need to step up their game and adapt to the changing dynamics. At the beginning of the year, many people predicted new trends to expect in 2019 that will transform the PR sector and now more than halfway through the year there are some specific trends that have come true. Here are some ground-breaking trends that are shaping the PR sector in 2019.
The use of Artificial intelligence (AI) is definitely on top of the list. It is practically impossible to ignore the subject of AI in any industry including the PR sector. AI has been more of a challenge that many professionals have taken up and learnt what it is and what it does. The use of AI-based applications has been detected and has had a great impact on the communication sector. Today PR companies are sitting on client’s data but fail to make the maximum use of it, AI is helping PR companies to process this data and identify behavioural patterns of consumers. This in turn, is helping to deliver customized messages. Still, most PR professionals have not gotten a clear understanding of AI because they have not yet overcome their fear of maths. This is the reason why we still have PR practitioners who have not yet felt the impact of AI in the industry. As the digital media space is getting more crowded, Influencer marketing is now becoming a theme and the future of PR. This is collaborating with influential people on social media to promote your brand. 

Today most PR professionals are integrating this approach and giving influencers the respect they deserve. We have witnessed professionals working with social influencers on social media platforms such as Instagram and Twitter with the aim of developing partnership so as to get indirect to access a specific target audience.  This strategy has proved to be cost-effective in this age of tough competition.

Current research supports a historical trend associating public relations with all things unethical but in 2109 there has been more attention on ethics by PR practitioners. Without ethics, PR just like any other profession can never be trusted. Adhering to the code of ethics builds trust between professionals and the clients. In 2019 we have not had a large number of high profile scandals and outrages, meaning that most practitioners have been doing more than ever to prove their own ethical credentials. Having more ethically-based decisions is firming companies reputation with their clients and the general public.
The use of PR technology and technological tools has been on the rise in 2019 enabling PR practitioners to work more efficiently and improving the quality of messages and content being disseminated. Today, companies are integrating emails with other aspects of the communication process, for example companies are now using Chatbot which is a computer program that stimulates conversations with human users over the internet. Companies use the data from their conversations to send more personalized emails to their clients and the more personalized an email is, the more valuable it will be. The use of emails to communicate between companies and their clients is also a trend that many practitioners are adopting. Also PR is all about noble customer relationship which is dependent on the ability to connect persuasively with customers. Correct use of technology is making relations grow stronger.

Incorporation of data and analytics in reporting has also been embraced. Today,PR practitioners are creatively correlating and interpreting data instead of being ensnared in raw statistics. This has enabled them to make their reports more authentic, identifying new customers and understanding which campaigns have been successful and which ones have failed to generate impact. Also data comes in handy when explaining the significance of PR to investors.

Preparing For a crisis

A necessary, but stressful aspect of public relations is crisis communication. Crises are almost inevitable since we are human and constantly make mistakes and to put it frankly, things happen that are beyond our control. It is in those moments that we need to be able to effectively communicate key messages to our audience and maintain the integrity of the organization. In order to better prepare for a crisis, your organization can take these steps Establish and create a crisis communication plan having a crisis communication plan makes communication during a crisis seamless.

According to Bernstein Crisis Management you should include the following in your plan; clearly identified individuals who operate as the crisis communication team. Identifying a team ensures that everyone on the organization knows who to field questions and inquiries as events unfold during a crisis. The team will drop most of their other responsibilities and focus solely on getting the organizations messages communicated through social media, traditional media and the internal stakeholders. The second aspect of a crisis communication plan is to identify a crisis spokesperson. This person should be someone who knows the organization well. They should more than likely be someone on the executive team or the communication team in order to establish credibility. The spokesperson should be the one who delivers all the statements and gets in front of the media, in order to show consistency with the organization.

Another thing that your organization should have ready to go should be holding statements. Holding statements are messages that are created beforehand in order to be sent out to your stakeholders as you are preparing your full statements. For example, if the crisis is health related a statement could be, “Our hearts and prayers are with those who are in harm's way, and we hope that they are well.” Holding statements are crucial because another crisis can develop if the public feels that the organization is taking too long to communicate or respond. Organizations should strive to get out statements and messages as quick as possible and share information with the public immediately after they get it. Finally, the next step is to identify the stakeholders. Stakeholders can be internal or external. Most organizations often think of the external stakeholders as they are getting their statements out, and often neglect the internal stakeholders. Every employee in your organization needs to be receiving constant communication as well.

Have crisis simulations Once you have developed a crisis communication plan, anticipate all of the things that could go wrong with your organizations, create different scenarios and have everyone on your team practice them. Crisis simulations will put your crisis communication plan into action by testing it to ensure that everyone understands his or her role. On Friday’s blog we elaborated more on an example of a crisis simulation.