PR what happened to 'spin - doctors'?

With the newspaper headline: Social media - the new frontier in reporting. One can sense that the impact of social media is very strong in the media and communication industry. In fact, the article on Business Day newspaper (www.bdlive.co.za), titled: Social media should not be reined in by the Press Code, say expert. May perhaps, be one of the recent examples emphasizing the power of social media and influence. Although platforms such as twitter have enhanced the speed at which news reach the public, it still remain a big challenge as to how crisis management is handled that is so often sparked by some 'unknown' individual on twitter. In the past, PR people would quickly put up a response release or holding statement after consulting their client and relevant parties, engage the specific print or broadcast media. And then be able to get their side of the story or response to the public. Whether the story will be spinned from negative news to positive?. That is besides the point, the reality is, a series of steps that is almost guaranteed is implemented and more often able to remedy the situation. Now, with the rise of social media, which is often an uncontrolled audience with a powerful voice. Managing a crisis for a corporate on social media can be challenging as it requires a different way of thinking and application of knowledge. It is nowonder some corporate organisations try to not engage with thier consumers through this new channel. They (corporate) hope that by not being visible on this platform, they curb the potential challenge and negative opinions that the consumers may post on social networks about the organisation. The truth is, social media does not create negetivity, it uncovers it. It is better for a corporate organisation to have presence on the social networks so to try and take the lead on the conversation that is taking place about the organisation independant of the organisation taking part or not. The PR industry has opportunity to first ensure that their clients particularly corporates understand the benefits of using this platform. In fact, social media should be the number one offering I would see to clients if I was a PR consultant. Think about it, this service if relatively cheap if not free to say the least. Unless you are running, promoted tweets or Facebook Adverts, setting up and gaining a following cost literally nothing. Now the new PR 101 1. Social media is all about manitaining a conversation with your followers (www.socialmediatoday.com). And if I remember correctly, one of the PR objectives from my 1st year PR class was: To build and maintain relationships. Social media allows you to do just that, build and maintain relationships. Even better, with social media, you are able to evaluate on an on-going bases if your messaging is relevent, creates conversation and formulate whatever response necessary for your audience. 2. For a long time, one of the major challenges of the PR specialists, was to quantify or attach monetary value to their hard work they put on different media campaigns. And social media allows this evaluation to be done without much effort or having to hire a research company to add up the data which may still remain questionable to other Executives within an organisation who are not of a communications background. 3. With social media, you can set targets and measure the number of followers. Measure engagement of consumers with the organisation, and lastly, you can measure the impact of the over-all campaign. The question still remains: Can PR people still spin today?. My answer is, Yes. However, the ability for one to gain credibility, confidence and a good reputation with your social media audience will have to be a process that needs to be worked at long before one hits a crisis. Does this sound familiar? My response is simply, a similar tactic that has always been there and used in PR. The only difference is the channel or medium used.