Public Relations and Communicators Blog

The recent controversy regarding celebrity endorsers being penalized for misleading endorsement has brought to light an old debate. Is spurious brand endorsement merely the responsibility of an endorser? What is the brand's obligation in making a claim? If something goes wrong, where and how does the blame get assigned? All combined, the debate about changes to the Consumer Protection Bill surrounding the penalization of celebrity brand endorsers with misleading claims ought to be conducted on an open platform. There are several layers to the debate and these must be considered carefully before the panel’s recommendations are put into effect. At present, the debate revolves around the suggestions of a parliamentary standing committee on food, consumer affairs, and public distribution, which recommends celebrities be held accountable for the brands they endorse. If the parliamentary panel’s recommendations are accepted, a celebrity endorsing a brand that has a misleading...

The power of Public Relations is the power of the masses. If used well, not only does the Brand get etched into the public minds, but it also has the ability to turn mere ‘carriers’ into ‘idea transmitters’. Public Relations can convert mere believers into self-powered evangelists. What is it that gives an evangelist missionary purpose, infectious zeal and volcanic energy, to go about spreading the ‘faith’ unflinchingly? The idea-meme which converts them, if pure and potent, has the ability to make the transmission of idea-meme a vital reason for their very existence - sometimes even the only reason for their existence. Those who dedicate their lives to religion, country, family, community, society, or organization, exhibit visions similar to that of ‘faith-keepers’. Ideas that may seem insignificant to many still find their faith-keepers, and often these evangelists turn these ideas into revolutions. A few examples include the legendary Jane Goodall who dedicated forty-fiv...

If language is the liberator of human beings, the Communication function is the liberator of an  organization. It frees businesses from the constraints of time and space and the incarceration of their own mindsets. Of the various communication tools an organization uses, Public Relations is the one that comes closest to taking on the role of a mind-liberator, almost like a spiritual guide. PR is a versatile communication tool which serves the organization by serving the needs of the community and society. It is the only such tool that was created for the sake of the public, in response to their needs, facilitating “public understanding and acceptance”. One definition of Public Relations has the following words:  “Public Relations helps our complex, pluralistic society to reach decisions and function more effectively by contributing to mutual understanding among groups and institutions. It serves to bring private and public policies into harmony.” Sounds more like a mes...

With over a decade of professional experience in the field of public relations after having spent the previous decade in various other unrelated businesses, I often remember the time when I was first introduced to term ‘Public Relations’ as a professional opportunity. I gaped back in answer. Despite my outright rejection at the prospect and my first words in reply being “What’s that?!”, I was comforted and told that all I had to do was read newspapers, have common sense; and I would be able to make a business out of PR. The response I first gave when confronted with Public Relations is the very same I get from many others when I tell them what I do for a living. Not much has changed I guess. Even sibling professions like advertising or marketing don’t know what PR can do, much less how it gets done. Almost ten years later after I joined the profession, I have promoted & managed two successful PR agencies (Blue Lotus Communications and i9 Communications), the second of which w...

The world's best marketers clearly understand the value that Public Relations can add to their brand. More importantly they understand the limitations of PR and therefore are able to use it more effectively. See Richard Branson talk about PR Unfortunately, there are not that many well-grounded marketers who understand the subtler aspects and nuances of public relations. Usually most marketing professionals are off the mark by miles and they often overlap PR with the external manifestations of advertising. But then, PR is not even of the same DNA as Advertising, let alone being look-alikes. Unlike advertising, PR has far more layers and factors impacting the outcomes. Speaking about the two in the same breath is as aberrant as is comparing mud with mud-pie. Public relations requires subtle skills, advertising relishes blatant outbursts; PR purrs while advertising rumbles; PR builds trust and credibility, while advertising moves the audiences to action. To make the most ...

Over the last decade I've seen the role of the junior most trainees and executives in PR change substantially. The first rung in the ladder in the years of yore of the PR profession would start with the mundane task of cutting, pasting & filing news clippings for clients and their competition. The agency would typically reason that since this was the most essential grounding that any PR professional needed, the longer they spent time in this task, the better the professional's media knowledge and understanding would be honed. This was also the time when the executive was to 'observe' all other activities and get a feel for media relations, client servicing and reporting. The other task the junior executives were assigned was to do with reporting. An onerous task at one point, where each of the clipping details had to be painstakingly entered into an excel file with the headline including title, page, journalist and size. Often the poor executive would spend 3...

Am posting this sitting at a very large retail event in Delhi, pretty exasperated at the phenomena we might casually call 'imps' . We all know how keen a PR professional's instinct needs to be to spot the journalist from a distance - the eye becomes trained by continuous habit and need. Many times, 15 minutes into the scheduled beginning of the press conference or event, the lack of media attendance can cause a small panic attack in PR professionals. So naturally, while one mans the media counter, the PR professional's eye is continuously scouting for the elusive journalist. That constitutes the training by habit part. Another reason that futher helps develop the 'spotting instinct' is because the PR professional is continuously getting thrown into new situations (like new cities for instance), and made to manage media events in places where they hardly know the media. Here, the hardy professional learns to recognize gestures & demeanor, walking styles, conf...

With over Sixty million blogs floating around in the cyberspace, what difference could another blog make? Quite a bit, if you’re to go by what industry analysts say. India, still new to the blogging phenomena, is poised to take off in this sphere too opined some communications expert when spoken to recently. Blogging is about connecting & sharing with your own sub-cult, a sub-group, something more akin to a Special Interest Group. Subjects as varied as technology, healthcare, personal finance or shopping, or a specific geography, dot the list of the most popular blogs in the world. The influence of blogs in India too is increasing rapidly following closely on the lines of the TIME magazine’s list list of bloggers who are impossible to ignore today. Management of the internet blog environment with relation to a company’s image has become even more essential because left unmanaged such mass movement blogs can fuel and propel negative perception. Managing the blog ecosystem requires o...

After the telecom thunder and the retail rush in India, Healthcare seems to be the next biggest bet for everyone. With promises of many billions of Indian Rupees, large diversified conglomerates such as Reliance, Birlas, Tatas are all betting their money in the Indian healthcare delivery space. As has been with other high growth sectors in India that witnessed a rapid meteoric rise, those who don’t jump into the bandwagon quickly are likely to miss the speeding bus completely. Industry experts promise that among other businesses which will ride the crest of this healthcare delivery boom will be the erstwhile non-starter business of healthcare communications. Many communication giants who were early starters in healthcare communications (having started two to three years ago) in India had to face the embarrassing ignominy of their businesses not taking off despite repeated attempts at survival. Some continue to struggle, but on the whole, it would be safe to say that most have been deci...

You know the maxim of bottles & wines right? I have a theory that says that old wine in any bottle has to taste better. If the taste is not to your liking, chances are that its time to change your drink. Public Relations agencies take pride in old and steady relationships. We do too! But a spate of recent pitches that we were invited to, shock-struck my eyes open. Thrilled as we were to participate in these pitches, we were gloating in the fact that Blue Lotus was making dents into decade old relationships. We were also excited to explore how help change the way PR can be used for these ‘rock-steady’ organizations. Just a few weeks ago, we’ve replaced an agency which had a 13 year old relationship, and another pitch we were invited for where the relationship had soured progressively over the last 10 years!! During one of our pitches (in the penultimate round) I was while casually conversing with the client on their rationale for change of agency after so many years and I got enligh...

The Essentials of Managing Ethics in Financial Public Relations The world has woken up to ethical issues in corporate governance & accounting practices. Corporate heads that were not guillotined were forced hang their heads in retrospective shame. The heads that fell were the victimizers, and the axe that fell, fell too late, and the punishment received, was way too little compared to the suffering, pain and financial losses that the organizations’ stakeholders suffered. Trust of millions of investors was lost overnight. Ethics in governance is one part of the story, the other link in this dubious chain of deceit is usually the professional services like auditing, legal and public relations which work closely with the organization. Such large scale deceit becomes possible only with the active collaboration of these so-called ‘professional’ services. Hardly professional, really! The Indian investor has been victim to a lot of companies attempting to make a quick buck in the markets....

Indeed, these are wonderful times we live in. I prefer to call this the Disruptive Age - an age where almost anything, anyone (and not to mention, any country) can disrupt even century old concepts, beliefs and businesses. An era where the old gives way to the new with ease, a time when anything is possible! This era has also seen a resurgence of some old business concepts like public relations which have reinvented themselves and have taken a prominent central stage in all other businesses. Till some years ago, it was rare to find someone who understood public relations, and today while many understand it, not everyone who does uses public relations to do what it is meant to do, viz to build brands. Reputation is the most basic building block of brand image, and public relations is arguably one of the most reliable tools of reputation building, making it indispensable to brand building in the current disruptive era. For practitioners of PR in India, 2006 will be considered a watershed...

The business of building and maintaining positive public perception rests of fundamental pillars of Passion & Purpose which are fanatically pursued at Blue Lotus. This article attempts to decipher the elements that go into the making of a successful public relations agency. The power of Passion Passion is an extraordinarily powerful spring. Without it religion, history, romance, and art are useless. Likewise, Public Relations too becomes completely deflated without the essential ingredient of Passion. It demonstrates avowed belief, everlasting appeal and steadfast loyalty. So why does passion become so much more important in the business of public relations as compared to any other service industry? To convert others to your way of thinking, being a believer first is essential. It is then that you can take a convincing stand with people of different attitudes, perceptions and sensitivities. It is necessary to have an obsessive faith in your client’s business & philosophy and yo...

Think for a moment! If you were to do a business, be in a profession or a job that you loved, something that was a passion and you considered worth doing; would you ever think early retirement or rush home early from work? ‘Doubtful’ is a certainty, to say the least! A few years ago, I perchance drifted across a book titled ‘To Sail Beyond the Sunset’ in which Robert Heinlein’s character, Jubal Harshaw, said something that left a lasting impression on me, and ergo, naturally, on the way I look at life. Jubal says “Happiness lies in being privileged to work hard for long hours in doing whatever you think is worth doing. One man may find happiness in supporting a wife and children. And another may find it in robbing banks. Still another may labor mightily for years in pursuing pure research with no discernible results.” “Note the individual and subjective nature of each case. No two are alike and there is no reason to expect them to be. Each man or woman must find for himself or herself ...

Background The organized PR industry is just over a dozen years old in India and over these years, PR is slowly evolving to become a critical tool for Indian businesses. Currently valued between Rs. 175 & Rs. 200 crores the industry is estimated to be growing at robust pace of approximately 40-45% p.a. Estimates show that the top 15 to 20 PR agencies in the country contribute upto 60-70% of the total sector turnover; the balance 35 to 40 odd agencies form the middle segment and the balance 1000 to 1100 odd agencies are one-man shops set up (usually) by ex-journalists/ex-professionals. The total number of professionals working in the PR industry is estimated to be between 10,000 to 11,000; with 25%-30% of them working with the top 20 agencies. The Indian PR market is burgeoning into a force to reckon with, and the world’s focus on India, and India’s focus on the world will make the communication imperative impossible to ignore. The real challenge The biggest issue that faces Blue Lo...