Is PR today a different service now that the internet has changed media and points of influence?

Yes and no. Yes in that truly effective PR teams today must be sharper and faster to react, with much broader skills. No in that it is the creation and careful dissemination of compelling content that makes the difference, driving brand value and creating sales opportunities.

In today’s competitive and fast-moving markets though, in which reputations can change in a flash, few clients want to make massive increases to their PR budgets to accommodate an increasingly diverse media. Instead, they look to PR agencies to work closely with them to identify the best outlets and prioritise their approach.
  
Yet the fundamental reasons for purchasing – competitive advantage, cost rationalisation, restructuring, because these gadgets are cool – have changed little. The ways to influence the purchaser and sales channels have though, and clients need to tap into the best routes to this influence in order to drive sales and develop their brands.

Speed is critical. There are still monthly trade magazines that appear in print and work to monthly deadline cycles, with in-depth articles. Equally, there are many highly influential online news that work to deadlines measured in minutes. The explosive growth of the volume of news stories written each day to feed a hungry and diversified media means that PR teams need a grip on how best to create and divulge their news.

It all comes down to good advice on how to do this, expert writing of the right content, and then a proven ability to deliver through media channels.      

Some PR agencies will tell you they’ve started a new digital division, or a new focus group on social media. How innovative…! All agency staff should be able to deliver to all types of media, not just a bunch of people in the corner. Rainier PR has been dealing with blogs and social media forums since 2002. We’re not blog-crazed revolutionaries, we’re pragmatic PR people with a big enthusiasm for news and content delivery, regardless of the media mix.