Working in the trenches of PR, I receive a lot of training-related emails. Vendors like Bulldog Reporter, PR NEWS, Pro Marketers, etc. are constantly offering sign-ups for teleseminars, webinars and other coursework related to “Social Media Bootcamps” and “Getting Started with Business Blogging” and “PR Writing for the Web.”
On the one hand, I am heartened to see our industry’s hard lean into Social Media territories. Every agency gets these emails, which means that even the mom-n-pop PR boutiques are getting the message that Social Media is the future of communications.
Personally, I don’t sign-up for these courses. And the folks at SHIFT who have attended routinely suggest that our internal training is more helpful (but that’s a necessity, given our focus). Still, these courses are not worthless — in fact, I know and respect many of the speakers, so my assumption is that the content is helpful to the uninitiated. I also reason that if the vendors continue to offer these courses, it means that somebody’s buying them: there’s an audience for this stuff.
Yet we continue to see too many examples of PR folks getting it wrong. Spamming. Ignoring the research on how-to succeed in Social Media. Following-up too relentlessly. Sending unasked-for attachments. Leaving anonymous comments in blogs and YouTube. Rushing past the need to create relationships with bloggers and web-native journalists — even cynically (or ignorantly) exploiting their targets’ openness.
I truly do think Social Media is dramatically and relentlessly changing the practice of Public Relations for the better.
I just wish it weren’t taking so long.