It's me again and instead of boring you all with tasks I've been given at PPR, I thought I would use this blog post to discuss why organisations would outsource PR rather than do it themselves. This is a question that I had pondered since the start of my internship having worked on clients including McDonald's, Emirates, LandCorp and Dymocks. These are all large, established companies where image and how they look in the public eye is incredibly important to their reputation. At uni, James Grunig's Excellence Theory taught us that public relations was fundamental to an organisation and that it was a value-adding activity in terms of both financial and internal communication benefit. Public relations as a function belongs at the top of any organisation. Why would they not want to control their public relations activities themselves then?
It really was quite bazaar to me that they would do this; if PR was as important as I thought it was, why wasn't it an engrained department in these organisations much like how no-one questions the presence of finance, marketing and HR departments in companies of this size?
So that got me thinking, after reading Seven reasons why it makes sense to outsource PR & media relations, it made me believe that in some circumstances, it was beneficial for a company to outsource their PR function.
Accumulation of Expertise
Focus on Central Business Operations
Ability to Reach PR Objectives Better
All in all though, I believe the main reason why companies outsource the PR function is because it is a cost-effective way to manage the perception of your brand by using an accumulation of PR knowledge and expertise that in-house just can't compete with. A smart decision if you are in a management position within that organisation, however, as an aspiring PR professional, I would think it almost necessary to try and have at least one employee who understands the role of PR within the organisation to handle day-to-day PR needs and liaise with a consultancy to ensure a relationship exists where you can call on them when a larger issue arises such as crisis management or promotion of a large-scale event.
1 comment:
Hiya,
I really liked your post, made me think about the different roles PR plays when it is done from within the organisation and when it is outsourced.
At my placement we do our own PR and marketing and we understand the organisation very well, as well as the messages that are to be communicated and the channels through which it is appropriate to send them. We also feel we have stronger control over our public image and perception because we limit and monitor what is put out in the public eye.
However, with the more media-centric PR tasks, we actually outsource. We have a PR company that books international journalists, travel agents and travel bloggers in to stay at the Hotel so that they can give the Hotel some PR after receiving a free stay. As well as this, the external agency also assists with our brand identity. Whilst our brand equity and image is established, our brand identity with unique selling points and attributes need some assistance in being clearly defined as we have just refurbished and rebranded. These are tasks that two people also in charge of several other internal tasks could simply not execute. External agencies also have much larger networks and experience in these areas and can perform at a much more efficient level.
I think the 50/50 PR strategy definitely works!
Post a Comment