Media Intelligence

The “Convergence” of PR and Marketing: 6 Trends to WatchBy Fred Cook, Director of the USC Annenberg Center for Public Relations

All business sectors are subject to the inevitable changes that come along with advancements in technology, improvements in education or perhaps macro-economic disruptions. But every once in a while, an industry undergoes a major sea change that has the potential to redefine the category itself. This is the case today with the public relations profession.

The very nature of public relations and what it means to “do PR” is changing underneath our feet right now. Corporate clients are increasingly focused on executing integrated marketing campaigns that can be more precisely monitored, tracked and evaluated for direct return on investment. In the digital age, that has translated into blurred lines between previously distinct professional disciplines such as advertising, marketing and public relations.

The result is that we are now seeing “convergence” of PR and Marketing—

The idea that two previously independent disciplines are now merging into a single unified profession.

Monitoring this trend toward convergence, and understanding its implications, is one of the most critical issues facing the public relations industry today; if not identified and navigated pro-actively, it has the potential to diminish the role of the PR professional.

The purpose of this eBook is to document the convergence of PR and marketing, identify six specific trends for PR professionals to contemplate as they plan their response to this convergence, and then take a glimpse into the future to assess where we might be headed as an industry.

The Convergence Train

The PR/Marketing convergence train has been coming down the tracks for a while now. Those of us who study the public relations industry from both an academic and a practitioner perspective (in addition to my role with the USC Annenberg Center, I’m also the chairman of Golin) have seen it by the changes in the content used in RFPs, the eyebrow-raising conversations with clients, and the rapid transformation of the media industry from an easily defined world of print and broadcast to the vast digital landscape we have today.

In 2014, Weber Shandwick released a global study (“Convergence Ahead: The Integration of Communications & Marketing”) that explored the convergence phenomenon by interviewing chief marketing officers in companies of all sizes, from all industries

87%of PR pros

worldwide believe the term “public relations” won’t

even describe the work they will be

doing in five years.

and from multiple countries. They concluded that the dual-structure of corporate communications and corporate marketing was losing its relevance and efficiency in a digital world, noting “companies are responding by merging their communications and marketing functions to respond more quickly and strategically with one voice.”

In 2017, Nasdaq Corporate Solutions released its CCO Measurement Survey, which concluded that the metrics used by chief communications officers further illustrate the convergence of public relations, corporate communications and marketing. Specifically, the most frequently used KPIs were focused on marketing results, such as website traffic, search ranking and sales/lead conversion. Noticeably absent were traditional PR metrics—e.g., reputation, awareness, share of voice, etc.—let alone alternative measurements for PR outcomes related to government relations initiatives or other discreet efforts.

The USC Annenberg Center for Public Relations produced the most comprehensive research on this subject in 2017 with the release of our second annual Global Communications Report (GCR17),

a comprehensive survey of more than 800 public relations executives from around the world. The report also featured insights from almost 700 public relations and communications students, along with in-house marketing executives, to provide a more robust overall assessment of the state of our industry. This study delivered some startling findings, such as the discovery that 87 percent of PR pros worldwide believe the term “public relations” won’t even describe the work they will be doing in five years and that just 8 percent of PR pros believe that PR will be a distinct and separate function.

As the convergence train moves on full speed ahead, there are six key trends that PR professionals need to be alert for and be prepared to navigate. These takeaways are drawn from the GCR17 research published by The USC Annenberg Center for Public Relations.

Just 8% of PR pros believe that PR will be a distinct and

separate function in five years.

6 TRENDS TO WATCH

Mixing PR and Marketing

Almost half of PR professionals and more than 60 percent of marketing executives believe

that their two disciplines will become more closely aligned in the next five years. Some think PR will dominate. Others think it will be dominated. Perhaps the reality is somewhere in between.

How this trend plays out may be the most critical issue facing the PR industry. Currently, 55 percent of corporate communications departments report to the CEO/President, but 18 percent now report into marketing. If that number grows, will their influence decrease? Similarly, PR agencies now report into marketing 21 percent of the time. If that number grows, will their bottom lines increase?

1 18% of corporate communications

departments now report into

marketing.

21% of PR agengies now

report into marketing.

Recently, two major holding companies “bundled” their PR agencies with their advertising agencies to provide clients with a more integrated solution. Internally, some companies are restructuring their marketing functions to include public relations. Will these changes expand or diminish the role of the PR professional?

Become more closely aligned with marketing

Play an increasingly important role compared to marketing

Play a dominant role over marketing

Become a distinct and separate function from marketing

Become a subset of marketing

45%

23%

12%

12%

8%

47%

29%

12%

7%

5%

PR Professionals Believe Public Relations Will...

Agency In-House

Redefine or Rename?

As noted above, 87 percent of PR executives believe the term “public relations” won’t accurately describe the work they will be doing in five years.

About half of them believe PR needs to be more broadly defined, while the rest think the name should be changed.

Who should answer this question? The Arthur Page Society is doing a heroic job defining the role of the CCO for its members. The PR Council and PRCA are trying to do the same for their agencies. But who is responsible for educating the rest of society?

2Fewer than 20% of students think the name “public relations” needs to be changed and most are pretty comfortable explaining it.

87% of PR pros worldwide believe

the term “public relations” won’t

even describe the work they will be

doing in five years.

Interestingly, not-yet-jaded students are far more comfortable with the current terminology than seasoned pros. Fewer than 20 percent think the name needs to be changed and most are pretty comfortable explaining it. Maybe we should all stop worrying and just get on with it.

Digital Storytelling

When it comes to trends that will be most important over the next five years, digital storytelling ranks above all others with PR professionals, followed

by social listening, social purpose and big data. The dynamic combination of these items illustrates the rapid change that the PR industry has seen in recent times. Fortuitously, these happen to be the same tactical initiatives that students are interested in pursuing.

For the uninitiated, digital storytelling is a short form of media content that allows people to share aspects of their story. The media used may include full-motion video with sound, still photos, audio only, or any of the

3“Digital

Storytelling” will be the most

important trend with PR

professionals over the next 5 years.

other forms of digital media that can be used to tell a story or present an idea. It is an innovative format for communicating a corporate narrative, which sits right in the wheelhouse of what PR professionals do best.

Interestingly, emerging technologies—such as virtual reality and artificial intelligence—are far down the list of key trends that PR pros believe will play a vital role in the coming years. And get this…fake news and Donald Trump are ranked at the bottom.

Important Trends Impacting the Future of

Public Relations

Public Rekations Professionals

Marketing Professionals

Digital Storytelling

Social Listening

Social Purpose

Bid Data

Behavioral Research

Influencer Marketing

Real Time Marketing

Branded Content

Live Streaming

Artificial Intelligence

Virtual Reality

Fake News

Donald Trump

80%

88%

73%

63%

51%

68%

69%

67%

52%

38%

26%

34%

39%

88%

82%

71%

70%

65%

64%

62%

61%

56%

43%

35%

36%

25%

Media Shifts

It’s hardly a professional secret that the amount of revenue PR professionals are able to generate

from “earned media” campaigns are in decline—this trend is likely to continue over the next five years. Meanwhile, revenue from “paid, shared and owned media” will likely increase. Corporate media budgets are moving even faster toward the “owned” and “paid” categories.

Supporting that direction, 60 percent of all PR executives believe that branded content and influencer marketing, which are both primarily paid and focus on the exploding channel of social media in particular, will be important trends in the next five years. This changing media mix creates an opportunity and a challenge.

460%

of PR executives believe that

branded content and influencer

marketing will be important trends in the next five years.

The opportunity is to move aggressively into paid content, an arena long dominated by advertising. This will require PR professionals to master media buying, which currently ranks last on the list of skills they think are important to the future. The challenge is that more than half of PR executives believe the consumer of the future will not make a distinction between paid and earned media, while another one-third disagree. The answer to that debate has profound ramifications for everyone in the industry.

Changing Metrics

In the USC study, we asked PR executives how they felt public relations could increase

its value inside the organization. Interestingly, measurement of results was not their top choice (34 percent). Overwhelmingly, they selected demonstrating how PR achieves business objectives (77 percent).

Of course, this requires measurement, but a more sophisticated variety that focuses on less-tangible variables, such as brand reputation and purchase intent.

Meanwhile, at the other end of the value spectrum, PR executives also rank leadership (52 percent) and creativity

577%

of PR executives believe that demonstrating

how PR programs achieve measurable

business objectives is the best way for PR to

increase its value.

(38 percent) above basic measurement. These territories provide fertile ground for future growth, but they are even harder to quantify. In the years to come, convergence of PR and marketing is going to force us into some difficult conversations about the most useful metrics to measure the effectiveness of what we do.

Effectively Demonstrate the Value of Public Relations

Marketing In-House Agency

Demonstrate how PR programs achieve measurable business objectives

Deliver creative solutions

Work across all departments and business unit

Address the wants and needs of all stakeholders

Improve measurement of results

Improve measurement of results

89%72%

80%

33%

44%

17%

30%

42%

32%

43%

33%

32%

53%32%

46%

48%

36%

60%

The Client-Agency Dynamic

Looking to the future, PR agency leaders are much more optimistic than in-house

executives. Almost all (92 percent) of agency executives predict some growth in the next five years, while 70 percent of in-house communicators predict an increase. A mere 43 percent of marketers predict any sort of growth in PR spending.

At the same time, the number of clients who rely on a single agency of record continues to decline and is now below 20 percent. Thirty-eight percent of in-house PR leaders say they will use more agencies in the next five years, while 34 percent of in-house marketers say they will use fewer.

6Almost

of agency executives 92%

predict some growth in the next five years.

Creative thinking and strategic insights are top reasons clients hire PR agencies, while research and analysis is last. Almost everyone agrees the PR industry will continue to grow, but these apparent contradictions make it hard to plan for the future.

Clients are relying less on a single agency of record and expect to use

more agencies over the next 5 years.

So Where Are We Headed?

The past year has given us more reason to reflect on the financial implications of these issues. As an industry, we experienced a slight dip in spending on “marketing services” in 2017. This was no doubt influenced by macro factors such as the ongoing disruption caused by direct-to-consumer e-commerce and renewed questions about how to quantify the bottom-line value of media coverage generated by PR campaigns. But perhaps the most important factor was the even greater scrutiny of the return on investment for every dollar spent on corporate marketing of any kind—and this is where the convergence trend is playing out in real time for our industry.

The proliferation of social media, dynamic websites and innovative digital media platforms provides us with an abundance of channels

that can be used to directly engage with consumers in ways that were never before possible. With this wealth of communications avenues,

however, will come a growing insistence by corporate marketing executives that we deliver more precise and measurable results for their investment in our

services.

One way that information service providers, such as LexisNexis, are collaborating with PR professionals to help rise to this challenge is by leveraging the power of

technology to improve how we monitor, track and report the results of our work. For example, some new tools allow for monitoring and analyzing

both “traditional” media and digital media in the same platform. Other new tools in development will help us report performance

in formats that are based on the evolving responsibilities spanning across PR/Marketing/Advertising, a reflection of the fact that those

roles are becoming less siloed and more integrated.

In the end, there is no point in wasting our time with hand wringing about whether the public relations profession will retain its historic distinction as a stand-alone discipline. Convergence is happening, like it or not. The question is whether we will evolve our thinking fast enough and develop new skills successfully enough to help lead this change or to be run over by it; and whether we will place ourselves in the driver’s seat to access much deeper corporate marketing budgets than we could in the past or be swept up and relegated to the budget allocation appropriate for a bit player on the team.

These are some of the critical questions about the future of communications and the role of the PR professional that will be answered in the next five years. But one thing is perfectly clear:

There’s never been a more interesting time to work in public relations…or whatever we will call it in the future.

About the Author

Fred Cook is director of the USC Annenberg Center for Public Relations and chairman of Golin, a global public relations firm. He is one of the leading voices in both the academic and professional communities on the subject of PR/Marketing convergence and its potential implications for the public relations profession. For more information, please go to www.annenberg.usc.edu.

About LexisNexis®

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01/2018