Public Relations and Communicators Blog

Brand Equity, the popular supplement of India's leading financial daily has a small snippet in today's Bawdy Copy (BC) column titled 'PR Kiya Toh Darna Kya' that almost makes an individual feel bad about hiring a PR agency. I'm equally sure that this small BC piece will actually cause the PR agency that Kurup hired to be hauled up, and if you ask me, its only for doing their job well. Lets understand one part. As much as corporates hire PR agencies, individuals too, the world over hire PR agencies. Doctors, Artists, Politicians, Actors, Authors, Creative Directors, Lawyers, and any other professional (or not) who've achieved something in their lives thinks of PR at least once in a lifetime. Its an excting proposition to see one's name in the papers after all! So, if that is true, what did Kurup do wrong? Is it wrong for an individual to hire a PR agency? Should individuals be quiet or even covert for having hired a PR agency? Most need and use PR, including ...

The term Intrapreneur dates to the 1983 PhD dissertation by Burgelman though its antecedents may lay in the thoughts of some intellectuals much earlier. Almost 7 years before Burgelman’s dissertation, Norman Macrae predicted in The Economist a number of trends in business – among them being ‘dynamic corporations of the future should simultaneously be trying alternative ways of doing things in competition within themselves’. Other people who gave the concept prominence were Gifford Pinchot who defined it in his 1985 book, "Intrapreneuring"; a revised edition. By 1986 John Naisbett’s book titled ‘Re-inventing the Corporation’ and Steve Jobs’ description of the development of the Mac as an intrapreneurial venture within Apple, made intrapreneurship the mantra for established businesses to find new markets and new products. By the 90s, the term intrapreneurship had become so overused that it perhaps got into the intellectual blind spot. Being ahead of its time is perhaps the oth...

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...

The World Cup, cricket’s biggest extravaganza, is just round the corner. Starting any time now, we are going be inundated with ad. campaigns centred around this noble game. From colas to cars, from health drinks to insurance, our cricketers will be seen endorsing a range of products. Every product manufacturer and service provider worth his salt will try to cash in on the exalted status that cricket enjoys in this country. In the weeks leading up to this gala event, our cricketers will be the toast of the nation even as footballers and Grandmasters cry foul. But any voice of dissension will be drowned by the collective hysteria that this game evokes in our countrymen. If our boys manage to do well in the competition, they will be feted and rewarded and be generally fussed over. If they do badly, then a few effigies will be burnt; maybe the coach and a few inconsequential members of the team will be sacked. But come the next cricketing jamboree and everything will be forgotten. And the ...

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...

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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...