Understanding Public Relations Digital and Social Media

Question: Describe about the Understanding Public Relations for Digital and Social Media. Answer: Part A: Essay (Draft) Introduction Digital and social media is a new computer mediated tool for social interaction. Through this tool two or more person can interact with each other at the same time. Social media can form virtual community and configure network for people of similar mentality and area of interest. This media can help in marketing and corporate communication too. Company can have its own social media account through that it can communicate B to B, B to C and also B to P level. B to P indicates business to people. Public Relation or PR is the way of communication for the organization with people (Mangold, and Faulds, 2009). The major intention of PR is to develop a positive public image for the organization. In contemporary time digital social media is also getting accepted as effective tool for public relation. Social media can cajole grater audience to take part in an interactive communication process. Corporate houses are trying to exploit that attribute to gain a strategic leverage through communica tion. This essay will make an attempt to trace the influence of social media in contemporary PR practice. Main Body Media relation is the process of responding to press and media. Company offers its responses through the press releases. Fundraising is the process of raising fund to address any demanding social need. Sponsorship is the process to gain financial back up for a specific activity. Advertising is the process of dispersing the massages to the grater audience. Marketing is the process of creating communication and delivering the offer to the interested customer. The new media called Digital and social media offers an interactive mode of communication and patronized individuals involvement to facilitate decision making. Social media sites have been considered as the most frequently visited sites in the world. The potential of these sites has already been realized by the PR professionals and digital social media has become the most effective toll for contemporary Public Relation (Rice and Atkin, 2012).The term digital and social media indicates the interaction among the people through digital platform and social media are certain websites that facilitate these interactions. Site such as Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Foursquare, YouTube and Vimeo accounts are falling under this category. Blogs also can be treated as part of it. This digital tool has become important part of contemporary PR practice. For an example it can be said that noted sports channel ESPN broadcasts live sports events at the same time they offer exclusive feed to digital so cial media site such as Twitter. Co creation value is one of the major influences of PR received from digital social media (Edwards et al 2013). Digital social media is offering the accessibility with the present customer and potential customer for the future. Company can gain leverage of value creation from the contribution of these people through social media. One of the major contributions of the social media is transformation of the PR communication process done by the social media. Through this the PR communication has become two way communications. It helps the marketing process by developing between consumers and manufacturer or seller. The product promulgation by the manufacturer can invite the feedback from the existing or potential customer will help that to get involved in co creation process of the product that can enhance the credibility of the value proposition of the manufacturer and can address real life demand of the customer. This practice will lead the firm to go towards enduring relationship with customers for future sustainability. Customer interaction through digital social media can help to improve the post purchase service of the company that can enhance the effectiveness of the PR communication for the purpose of marketing (Mangold and Faulds 2009). Apart from the B to C communication social media has also been generated influence over B to B communication. The propensity to developing connectivity with social media sites are getting enhanced day by day among the FTSE 100 companies. Companies are making their corporate website connected with social media sites. Three years ago only 35% companies were offering this facility but today it has become 72%, this statistics can indicate that the process of the corporate communication is gradually stared to realize the effectiveness of the social media. Social media tactics such as media optimization, branded page creation, user determination, frequent posting, photo sharing, has become part of the corporate communication now days. Digital social media is getting i nvolved effectively with crisis communication. Crisis communication is a type of communication needed at the time of crisis such as any accident or mishap of an aircraft. In contemporary crisis communication social media channels have become integral part of the whole communication process (Starbird and Palen, 2011). According to diffusion theory of Public Relation in order to adopt an idea people follow five discreet steps (Guth and Marsh, 2011). These are awareness, interest, evolution, trial, and adaptation. Social media can help the corporate to initiate first two processes because people are frequent visitors of digital social media sites. Regular visitation enhances the possibility of the engagement. Uploading new information on the daily basis will enhance the possibility of active engagement and that can lead towards involvement or farther relationship. Acceptability of any corporate brand emerged from brand evaluation made by the people. Perspective towards certain company is always getting underpinned by its corporate image, some time it worked as a representative symbol for the company. Brand community is user groups of consumer admiring a specific brand these people share some homogeneous value and sense of responsibility also act behind. These user groups of any particular brand beco me accessible through social media. This community manifests as a credible source to the individual (Kaplan and Haenlein, 2010). The perspective development for the corporate communication process has been done through this way. Social learning theory of Public Relation is relevant to describe the situation in this regard. According to this theory mass media can become very important for the acquisition of the new behavior to the mass. The adaptation of the new consumer behavior or new brand preference can get possible through ever alive and ever active social media (Wright and Hinson, 2008). Conclusion The aim of this essay (draft) is offering an idea regarding the influence of social media over the contemporary PR policies of the corporate. The essay has describe the relevance of the digital social media is increasing not only for the B to C communication but also for B to B communication and the brand building procedure of the corporate houses. Worlds most frequent visited sites digital social media has manifested as a future tool for Public Relation. Reference Edwards, A., Housley, W., Williams, M., Sloan, L. and Williams, M., 2013. Digital social research, social media and the sociological imagination: Surrogacy, augmentation and re-orientation. International Journal of Social Research Methodology, 16(3), pp.245-260. Guth, D.W. and Marsh, C., 2011. Public relations: A values-driven approach. Pearson Higher Ed. Kaplan, A.M. and Haenlein, M., (2010). Users of the world, unite! The challenges and opportunities of social media. Business Horizons, 53, (1), 59-68. 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