Editor’s note: The following is a guest post by Billee Howard, managing director of the brand innovation group and creative development officer at Allison + Partners. Howard has more than 15 years’ experience in brand development, strategic media relations, CEO brand building, corporate positioning, business-to-business strategy development and economic and investment promotion.

With experience emerging as the foil to technological innovation, communications continues to emerge as among the most powerful and potent tools in the CEO arsenal. As such, programs that influence outcomes and drive business performance trump those that merely illicit approved awareness. As the year unfolds we see all of these principles unfolding broadly across the business landscape. The commercialization of many leading brands is being driven by the notion of Art + Commerce = Innovation (and winning experiences).

In the recent months, we have seen a change in the business model from a product-centric notion to an experience-driven culture. Experience continues to emerge as the defining factor of competitive differentiation, and the new cornerstone of the supply chain, as the age of total experience management unfolds. We see this everywhere, with brands from McDonald’s (multibillion-dollar investment in complete re-design of restaurants) to eBay (pop-up stores aimed at demonstrating their role in overall next-gen retail) investing significantly in re-imagining winning experiences as much as innovating beloved products and services.

With experience at the forefront it is also important to acknowledge the growth on an innovation-centric corporate culture. The notion of specialization continues to sweep the landscape working to define more unique and memorable experiences in every way, from the proliferation of niche businesses to the emergence of specialty focused roles inside leading organizations.

Continue reading " A CEO’s Most Powerful Tool is Communications "

Editor’s note: The following is a guest post by Burghardt Tenderich, Ph.D., associate professor and associate director of the Strategic Communication and Public Relations Center at the USC Annenberg School for Communication and Journalism. Burghardt manages the development of the biennial Generally Accepted Best Practices for Public Relations study, which assesses the scope of the public relations industry.

Corporate public relations budgets are mostly up, and the scope of the profession is experiencing growth in areas such as internal communication, customer relations and social media. These are some of the findings of a new study published by the USC Annenberg Strategic Communication and Public Relations Center.

GAP VII, the seventh biennial Generally Accepted Best Practices for Public Relations, shows some of the most significant findings in the area of measurement and evaluation: On average, corporations now spend 9 percent of their total PR budget on research-related activities, a sharp incline from 4 percent in the previous GAP study. This pronounced rise speaks to widespread adoption of social media monitoring tools and increasing use of primary research in program planning and evaluation.

The GAP VII research team, led by Jerry Swerling, Kjerstin Thorson and me, surveyed 620 senior public relations practitioners. This makes GAP VII the largest and most comprehensive study ever of the most senior communicators in public and private corporations, government agencies and non-profits in the United States. USC Annenberg conducted the study in cooperation with PRSA and other professional associations: Arthur W. Page Society, Institute for Public Relations and International Association of Business Communicators.

GAP VII aims to provide PR practitioners with actionable information they can use to better manage the communication functions in their organizations; identifies best practices against which they can benchmark their own organizations; and pinpoints trends to be aware of as they plan for tomorrow.

Continue reading " What the USC Annenberg GAP Study Tells Us About Public Relations’ Success "

I wasn’t involved in the Occupy Wall Street activities, although I followed the movement closely and admired many of its ideas and ideals. As a public relations professional, however, I was increasingly frustrated by the inability of its participants to adhere to basic PR principles. If they had, I believe they would have made a much more powerful impact on the public, and the corporate and government leaders they were trying to reach.

I have been fortunate to have implemented some successful national advocacy communications campaigns. Usually the process takes months, sometimes years, for an issue to reach a level of national or international prominence so that major media and the public take notice. For the participants and organizers of Occupy Wall Street and the other cities across the country and around the world — it took a few weeks.

Beginning Sept. 17, 2011, thanks in part to the 24/7 news cycle and social media in particular, the Occupy movement grew quickly. Initially covered by the mainstream media as an oddity or fringe movement, by Oct. 1, 2011, network TV news was reporting seriously about a national movement with demonstrations in Los Angeles, Portland, Maine, and elsewhere.

Suddenly, OWS was a major story in top-tier media and was prominent online and with social media. The phrase “We are the 99%.” quickly became a part of the public vernacular.

Continue reading " Occupy Wall Street Abandoned PR 101 "

Editor’s note: In celebration of Black History Month in February, PRSA invited prominent public relations professionals to offer their views and ideas for achieving greater racial and ethnic diversity in the profession. This is the sixth post in the series. A compilation of previous PRSA Black History Month blog posts can be found here.

A major highlight of my Fleishman-Hillard career was the privilege of not only knowing our co-founder, Al Fleishman, but calling him a mentor and friend. He was a man of many gifts: A great instinct for communication. A sharp, strategic mind. A big, big heart. He, along with his friend and business partner, Bob Hillard, became a pioneering force in public relations.

But Al’s greatest passion extended well beyond our profession. He was a great champion of diversity in all its forms. He was recognized as a tireless fighter for human rights who devoted much of his life to supporting the less fortunate and to helping people communicate with and understand one another better. It was a commitment that played out in many ways — from Al’s relief effort with European refugees after World War II, to his lifelong involvement with the nation of Israel, to his work with at-risk young men and women on the streets of St. Louis.

So, when we needed a name for an ambitious new diversity initiative at our firm, we didn’t have far to look.  We were proud to announce earlier this year the launch of the Alfred Fleishman Diversity Fellowship initiative. Under this program, we are reaching out to both ethnic and non-ethnic colleges and universities to generate a pool of qualified minority applicants at the undergraduate and graduate levels.

Continue reading " Diversity Matters: Addressing Public Relations’ Diversity Deficit "

Editor’s note: In celebration of Black History Month in February, PRSA invited prominent black leaders in the public relations profession to offer their views and ideas for achieving greater racial and ethnic diversity in the profession. This is the fifth post in the series. A compilation of previous PRSA Black History Month blog posts can be found here.

Since the 2008 election of the first African-American president, there has been a constant drum beat about the emergence of a more tolerant and accepting societal construct where everyone is colorblind and the sophistications of race and background differences are just interesting side notes unworthy of further focus. Now if I had a nickel for each time I’ve heard someone say this, I would be a pretty wealthy guy.

While I would love nothing more than to live in a world that respectfully accepts individualism and uniqueness, I don’t think were completely there yet. That’s not to say we’re not making progress—we are. My trepidation, however, is if we buy into the notion that we’ve arrived at some magical “diversity” destination because we have a president that doesn’t look like those preceding him, it would be a disservice to those struggling and fighting to see themselves in boardrooms and halls of power. If anything, we’ve only just begun.

Continue reading " Diversity in the Age of Obama "