Social Media for Communicators

By İçerik Ustası

Friday, September 22, 2017

Conference Held for Public Relations and Marketers

Public relations professionals, marketers, and others working in or with communications convened at a conference to learn about the current proliferation and future of social media.
The big news - social media is considered a viable and necessary communications resource. The surprising news – social media is retro with storytelling opportunities.

Social Media News

The event was hosted by Ragan Communications and the Public Relations Society of America and was held in Las Vegas, Nevada. According to Jim Ylisela, president of Ragan Consulting and Mark Ragan, CEO of Ragan Communications the need for such a conference has grown.
Ylisela said, “We have a lot of contact with our customers and since we are reporting on the industry it is a good way to spot what the trends are. When social media came about not only did we see that as a hot trend that when talking to our customers we realized that nobody knew how to use the tools.”
With companies all over the country slashing their travel budgets, attendance was down from last year.
Ylisela said, “This year travel budgets have been cut. No question that the economy has had an effect.”
Ragan added, “The amazing thing about that is the power of social media as a topic that even in this recession so many have attended. I have never heard so many people being held hostage because of travel budgets and yet we got over 370 at this conference. It is a testament to how vital organizations view the topic of social media.”

Social Media Growth Areas

The surprising superstar of this year’s conference seemed to be Twitter and how it can be used to communicate internally and externally.
While everyone was discussing Twitter this year, Ragan said, “Last year with 700 people we asked who was using Twitter and only about 15 people raised their hands.”
Presenters throughout the conference provided many case studies of how Twitter can be used for good communications but how it can also create unpredictable results.

Social Media Grows Need for PR

The need for professional and experienced communicators has never been greater.
Ragan commented, “I would say that never before in the history of communications have communicators been more important to their organizations. Communicators before the age of social media occupied the lower realms of the food chain, and very quickly communications is being recognized as being perhaps one of the most important departments in the organization and that is because of social media. Because of the damage social media can do to an organization and also the tremendous benefits social media. Communicators have been the people to stay on top of this.”
Ylisela added, “As we go around the country with workshops and consulting, there has never been a better time to be in communications. With what is happening in the economy, now is the time for communications people to step and say I can help. There are real measurable ways to do that with social media.”

Public Relations Tells the Story

While public relations intent has been to get the company or organization’s message out and heard by all intended audiences, the profession has served many different purposes over the years.
Ylisela said, “Social media is sort of retro. It’s brought back feature writing and feature storytelling. We had reached the point in corporate communications where we just stuck in these old, boring, and stilted ways of trying to describe what was happening in our organizations. Social media has opened it up again so that we can tell those stories in an interesting and captivating way.”
Surprisingly, social media seems to be returning public relations back to its roots of sharing real-life stories that make any company thrive.

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