Online PR

Public Relations in General

Public Relations (or PR) is the practice of managing communication between an entity (person, organization or thing) with its publics. Often Public relations' goal is to gain exposure through third party outlets. Because public relations generally rely on third parties to gain exposure, public relations does not pay directly for exposure like advertising.

Advantages and Disadvantages of Public Relations

Generally, the main advantages of public relations over advertising are cost and legitimacy (because the information comes from a third party.) Public relations also is associated with a couple catches as well, specifically a lack of control and difficulty.

Online PR

Online PR focuses its efforts on gaining exposure and promoting positive public opinion on the Internet. Although many of the same principles and strategies exist between offline and online PR, online PR contains a new set of mediums that traditional PR does not cover. Some of these new mediums include search engine optimization (SEO), blog marketing, social network marketing and online reputation management.

Public Relations not being offered by PR Firms

Although PR Firms are generally sought out for offline PR, they are not sought out for online PR because of a lack of service or satisfaction (source). This late adoption from PR Firms could be from ignorance, stubbornness or laziness, however, no matter what the reason they will have to make some big changes if they wish to capitalize on one of the most important PR areas: the Internet.

Benefits of Superior Online PR:

• Communication based on brand image, which builds brand awareness
• High volume of targeted traffic

Related Material on Online Public Relations

Web:Online Public Relations
Book:The New Rules of Marketing & PR