Sadly enough, many local Halal based products brand owners, especially small to medium business owners have not looked into how to maximise the utilisation of specific or targeted Public Relations solutions for their brands, organisation and overall reputation management strategies
We have clearly moved into the digital of all things space, but contrary to the larger public’s perceptions, traditional media still have their unique roles, despite them not updating and sharing their news and journalism prowess for free and more frequently on main social media platforms
Because of that, the public may form misconstrued ideas that their presences in these media will not reach more audience, since the more available news shared on social platforms by these traditional medias are often centred on politics, gory murders, bank heists, terrorism and the likes
Since the traditional media does not control the total eyeball and hence attention in these competitive digital media eras, their foothold in captivating the mass audiences may not be as big as before, but nobody can deny the quality journalism that can only comes with traditional media organisations, replete with photography, graphic artworks etc supports
But we have also seen more and more local outfits setting mini traditional media teams of their owns – with their photographer or videographer, script writer, director, art director or graphic artist, host and etc, though most of them do carry more than one jobs description aka tighter budgets and resources
But tighter budgets can also mean and lean ways of doing things, not totally inferior to bigger and more resource rich teams, reminisce of traditional media
What are we actually looking at here?
In not too distant yesteryears, I have often seen the importance of organisations to create or be their own story and news creator, to a certain extent. In yesteryears, while equipping or weaponising websites with abilities to store terabytes of videos, resources might be noteworthy, at the end of the day, it’s about convenience. And in these many instances, the conveniences of the consumers, future brand adopters or potential mouth to mouth if marketer or good/pleasant reviewer, commenders
PR can definitely benefit organisations big and small without doubt. If in yesteryears, having an interview in one or few of the mainstream traditional media might mean or translates to more recognition, publicities and potential positive reviews, the digital platform eras could exactly do that too
Compared to yesteryears, we have ample resources to distribute quality, strategic content out there, even without ad buys and pushes. Creating positive contents that extols one’s products virtues are refreshing but organisations must be more creative than that. There are times when the combinations of PR sense and content can create possible wonders
This means that, working to create positive perceptions through Public Relations, will still be ongoing, mostly because the benefits stays the same, and in this digital platform eras, done right, with a positive dose of luck, more reachs and shares could create enviable buzz that traditional media of yesteryears couldn’t replicate
Being savvy about using social media platforms doesn’t mean we can be lazy, nor neglect the power of traditional media that they still do possess. Implementing a well thought of plan, taking into considerations, organisation’s needs and current predicaments and challenges is the way to go
More so than not, looking at the biggest of pictures from the lenses of Public Relations will ensure we are not too caught up with not being able to come up with good ideas now, because small good enough ideas, if accumulated, in the spans of months, and then years, could spell not only consistency of the right messages but tenacity in reaching out to your target audiences
Great content, one way to look at new Public Relations strategies. Certainly not all and be all, but most certainly important enough that it can’t be ignored, nor left out of any organisation’s budgets and plannings