Technology has made quite a few leaps over the 20th Century. New Media is a result of these leaps. Today, New media is not a fad but rather has become the reality. People these days rely heavily on New Media because it has made their lives simpler and has completely changed their ways of communication. It is because of new media that today international boundaries are not boundaries anymore. Organizations and businesses can operate more effectively (both cost and time wise) with their stakeholders nationally and internationally without any quandaries. Since the objective of PR is to help organizations maintain communication and relationships with its stakeholders I believe the emergence of New Media can and is effecting the PR industry the most.
Social Media marketing is an important advantage that the PR industry enjoys due to the emergence of New Media. Researching the target audience is an important part of a PR practitioner’s job. It is through blogs and various web-based forums that they can establish conversations with their target audience to know their mindsets. New Media has greatly aided instant communication methods. Be it a product /service promotion message or a case of crisis communication PR practitioners can now do their job of reaching their stakeholders and target audience with relative ease due to the various social media platforms such as Facebook, Twitter, YouTube where they can easily update information and respond instantly to any query. It is through these platforms that they can post regular updates regarding their businesses to a large group of people and also establish and maintain personal relationships with each individual customer.
Like the numerous advantages that the PR industry enjoys due to the emergence of New Media there are the disadvantages as well. New Media has empowered all its users to turn from mere content consumers to content producers. People can get all forms of information from the various Internet sources. This means that almost anyone can start a conversation about anyone\anything on the social media platforms. Rumours and crisis news can spread faster through these communication mediums. Sometimes a simple problem can be blown out of proportion in these social media platforms Ex-Dominoes Pizza. It is in fear of these aspects that companies and organizations these days are forced to be more transparent with their stakeholders. PR practitioners have to keep a constant eye out for any coverage’s that their clients get.
Now comes the main question: Does the rise of a transparent new media challenge the power of PR? The PR industry is mostly associated with spinning and manipulating. The emergence of New Media has definitely put a restriction to the amount of spinning power that the PR practitioners have but it has also aided them in many ways. Therefore, rather than saying that new media has challenged the power of PR, I believe it is better to say that it the double edged sword for PR because aside from exercising certain restrictions the PR industry is also benefitting greatly due to the emergence of New Media.
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