This week in PR (16 April)

Author: Richard Bailey, Editor
16th April 2021 14 min read

About the author

Richard Bailey Hon FCIPR is editor of PR Academy's PR Place Insights. He teaches and assesses undergraduate, postgraduate and professional students.

'London, it's been a long time' Tiffany Burrows @tcaburrows on Twitter
'London, it's been a long time' Tiffany Burrows @tcaburrows on Twitter

It happened this week

Academic and education

https://twitter.com/lucy_chaps/status/1381533499962822656

Ethics, sustainability and professionalism 

  • Dan Gold: Truth Be Told with Omnicom’s David Gallagher [podcast] (14 April)
    ‘I’m quite optimistic and saw this as an opportunity: if brands get this right, they can attach their story to a sense of purpose and do better and outcompete their competitors.’
  • Louise Nicolson: Don’t Count On It (12 April)
    ‘British American Tobacco’s triumphant bronze medal as the third most environmentally and socially responsible companies in the FTSE 100 should stop us in our tracks.’

Consulting, teams and careers

  • Ben Capper: Emerging into the sunlight (15 April)
    ‘Another reason it feels like I’ve fallen off a cliff this last few months is that I made the decision to come off Twitter entirely.’
  • Shaifali Agrawal: Taking control of your PR career (12 April)
    ‘A good way to grow your career in PR is to be proactive about it. If career growth is important for you, you can start by building a personal professional development plan for yourself.’

Wellbeing, gender and diversity

  • Nafisa Shafiq: Ramadan, demystified (13 April)
    ‘For me, explaining why I fast has always been hard. At times I have felt silly; like I am telling you something from a different era. It’s therefore easier to treat it like an event or day that we are more aware of in the western world, and to focus on what many Muslims do and don’t do during Ramadan rather than explain why.’

Public and third sectors

Politics, public affairs and public sphere

https://www.linkedin.com/embed/feed/update/urn:li:share:6787281034749714432

  • Mark Glover: Shirley Williams – remembered (15 April)
    ‘Shirley will be missed in politics now not only as one of those politicians who played an important role in progressive politics, and changed Britain for the better, but also as a politician whose decency and intellect was appreciated and admired beyond the confines of her party.’
  • Michael Hardware: Local Elections (no date)
    ‘These elections are the first to take place since the December 2019 General Election, so they are the first opportunity for the population to express their views on Brexit and the handling of the pandemic. These national issues are dominating in most areas irrespective of what elections are taking place.’
  • Francis Ingham: It simply won’t do that Cameron wasn’t covered by lobbying rules that he himself introduced (9 April)
    ‘The recent media coverage of David Cameron lobbying Ministers on behalf of Greensill show us one thing: that the Lobbying Act he introduced is unfit for purpose and needs fundamental reform.’

https://twitter.com/kat_isha/status/1380942533556064261

Risk, crisis and reputation

Brands, storytelling, and influence

  • Scott Guthrie: Influencer Marketing Show round-up day 1: Peer-to-peer, community-based and creative (14 April)
    ‘Imogen Coles, influence programme director and creator at Ogilvy, explained that working with the same influencer over the long run reduces agency hours by up to 60% compared to working with an influencer on a one-off, transactional basis. Other benefits of long-term relationships include removing the time and cost associated with the identification, vetting and selection phase of the workflow.’
  • Gemma Storey: Why brands need to focus on advocacy through action (12 April)
    ‘No matter how stunning your creative campaign is, it’s always better when you’re also making lasting changes.’

Planning, insight, measurement and evaluation

  • Paul Sutton with Gemma Moroney: Is Comms measurement finally coming of age? [podcast] (14 April)
    ‘For me, an organisation that does an amazing job of planning, measuring and evaluating comms in the round is the Government Communication Service. I think they do an absolutely fantastic job in having one standard for everybody, getting people up to speed on it, with consistent best practice across departments and colleagues.’

Internal communication

  • Katie Macaulay with Jenni Field: Influential Internal Communication [podcast] (14 April)
    ‘The model I created starts with insight; it involves understanding how the business works; then you’ve got the principles and strategy; then communication (the tactical bit) and finally measurement.’
  • Rachel Miller: How to start out in internal communication [podcast] (11 April)
    ‘I remember discovering internal comms and being amazed the profession existed because I’d never heard of it. Lots of us started in the world of journalism and moved into the world of corporate or internal communication.’

Technology, media and digital

  • Gemma Clay: LinkedIn Headline: How To Write Yours In 4 Easy Steps (no date)
    ‘Using a well-crafted Linkedin headline (profile) you can position yourself as a thought-leader and industry expert, right in front of your target audience.’
  • George Esmond: LinkedIn’s legitimacy is the solution for social media (12 April)
    ‘Trust – in the age of data harvesting, dark adverts, and fake accounts – is hard to come by. The LinkedIn model offers a starting point in aiding professional connection and collaboration that can also be adapted on other social sites.  Tech competitors should follow its model before governments have no choice but to determine the changes for them.’
  • Stephen Waddington: Characterising the COVID-19 PRstack (10 April)
    ‘Revisiting the PRstack project seven years on there are some emerging themes. It shows how the tool market and practice has changed.’

https://twitter.com/Welsh_PR/status/1382780582095163393

#prstudent #bestPRblogs

  • Emily McCann (Ulster): Influencers or Brainwashers (13 April)
    ‘It has been proven that 70% of teens would trust social media influencers more than traditional celebrities. Teens are more likely to follow advice from influencers over conventional TV and sport celebrities, evidently indicating how influential these influencers can be on younger generations.’
  • Elise Ralph (Ulster): Cancel Culture and PR Scandals (9 April)
    ‘Cancel culture or being “#cancelled” is essentially an online punishment given to influencers, creators, celebrities, brands (etc)  after unforgivable mishaps in the form of mass public shaming.’

Related topics

#bestPRblogs #prstudent #ThisWeekinPR