PR IS DEAD?

So where does PR stand today? According to the 2011 European Communications Monitor, 42 percent say that the term is discredited. It seems that even among PR professionals, there’s no real consensus. New technologies, new media, and new corporate thinking have caused even more confusion; it is said that the term “public relations” will continue to decline. According to an Iabc/ogilvy PR survey, 76 percent of the communication industry believes that by 2021, the term PR will cease to be used. Therefore, the industry is already identifying a shift towards a default term that reflects the broad range of disciplines provided for clients every day. No matter what you call it, great PR has always been built on great content and with content creation now a key, (if not the primary factor) coupled with Seo-building strategy, the line between content marketing and what we think of as traditional PR has blurred. Arabad wanted to explore the changing face of public relations with its dramatic shift away from the hoary concept of media relations into sophisticated marketing strategies. We asked the experts in varied PR set-ups--ogilvy PR, the PR unit of network agency Ogilvy & Mather; Orient Planet, an independent regional agency; Brazen PR, a Uk-based PR agency who launched operation only a year ago in Dubai; Noise, the Beirut-based PR agency serving sister agency Clementine; and an integrated PR department within Grey Doha-- to offer a no-holds-barred examination of what works and what doesn’t in the PR sector today. What follows is their take on the PR business and what they are doing differently.