The industry of public relations has drastically evolved over the years as have many other industries as a result of politics and war as well as the development of technology and social change.
Over the past 100 years, public relations or PR as it has become known, has evolved quite extensively to become a staple in many businesses across all industries.
PR combines human experience and business science to affect public opinion in such a way that it has proven to affect the bottom line many times over. Let’s take a look at how PR has evolved over the years:
Public Relations are Born
During the early 1900s, John D. Rockefeller had what we can now call a publicist, Ivy Lee who advised Rockefeller to publicly show off his philanthropy by handing out dimes to the poor.
Additionally, he is also credited with creating the press release by distributing information and news for his clients. This is widely recognized as the birth of public relations.
A few decades later during the 1940s, following Hitler’s propaganda success, US President Franklin D. Roosevelt created a group called his “top men” that were employed to formulate an American propaganda campaign. This laid the foundations for public relations as we know it today.
The Introduction of Technology
During the 1980s, the fax machine became an essential item of office equipment, especially in a PR office. It was one of the fastest ways to communicate at the time. The 1990s then saw the introduction of the World Wide Web and email, making fax machines superfluous.
Email gave rise to sending press releases to multiple recipients in a fraction of the time. Nowadays, since the development of the smartphone, the practice of public relations has become much faster and is no longer office bound.
Emails, calls, writing and proofreading press releases can not only be completed much faster but can be done anywhere at any time.
PR Changes with 24/7 News and Social Media
Not having to wait a full 24 hours for the next day’s news bulletin created a huge change in the PR world when the first 24-hour news channel was introduced 1980. By the early 2000s we were introduced to social media, which has since become an indispensable tool for PR management.
News is shared across the world within a matter of seconds. The social media age also saw the introduction of a new concept in PR known as influencer marketing, making use of public figures and celebrities to endorse opinions or products.
Bringing in ERP Systems
The introduction of the ERP system (Enterprise Resource Planning) during the 1990s and early 2000s has created a great foundation for managing PR processes.
ERP systems can help PR companies by providing a single platform to collect, store and manage data to ensure all projects are managed effectively from pitch to delivery in a timely manner.
Integrated cloud systems also mean that information can be securely stored off-site. Additionally, a well-equipped ERP system can help to gain extra insights into customers and their purchasing behaviors and habits to better PR clients in their press release messaging.
The New Citizen Journalism
The internet and social media have further given rise to what is known as citizen journalism. This has created a massive effect on how the PR professional practices since they are now no longer fully in control of the information disseminated.
The powerful customer can share any message they desire about a company, making it the PR professional’s job to deal with after effects of poor reviews, comments and complaints made by the general public in the online space, especially when they go viral.