Today, the heads of global communications at major companies have their hands full…it’s 24/7 3D chess. Technology is the primary culprit. The Internet flings news around the world in seconds and allows for content platforms that have marginalized traditional print and broadcast news outlets.
In my first public relations job, 38 years ago, we mailed our news releases to reporters. And there were fewer news outlets, many of which put out “the news” once a day. Under lower competitive pressure, reporters had more time to be thorough and accurate. Not anymore. Today, whether the news is coming from Hong Kong, Paris, or New York, scoops are measured in seconds and immediacy trumps accuracy and thoroughness. This requires communications professionals to rethink how they create “news” and how they distribute it.
Pre-internet, PR people relied almost exclusively on “earned” media (objective news coverage) to get messages to key audiences. Earned media is still important, but catching up quickly is “owned” media: producing one’s own content (marketing videos, commentary) and distributing it through websites and social media (YouTube, X, Instagram).
Earned media is still important, but catching up quickly is “owned” media: producing one’s own content (marketing videos, commentary) and distributing it through websites and social media (YouTube, X, Instagram).
Owned media disintermediating traditional media outlets surely excites PR people, as they can by-pass the long-standing news gatekeepers. I am sympathetic to this view; biased reporting has frustrated me for decades. But the public can suffer as the lines are blurred between corporate propaganda and objective news. More on that in a moment.
The challenge with earned media is getting a story in the first place, then hoping it’s accurate and balanced while crossing your fingers that the right people see/read/hear it. Earned media may be more authentic and objective, but you can’t control it. It’s risky.
“Owned” media, meanwhile, is lower risk: you create the content and send it to your targeted audiences. Two challenges: overcoming the inertia of boredom (most corporate content is dreck) and embracing objectivity while rejecting propaganda. To overcome these challenges, a communications head needs to be innovative and creative in producing content and still convince management and lawyers to sign-off. I recommend the “embrace incrementalism” approach. Innovate a little at a time, affording comfort to the powers that be, while moving toward owned content that audiences find compelling and informative, and maybe even humorous.
I espouse a “content is king” approach — meaning, I don’t necessarily care where content (earned or owned) appears as long as it’s on a legitimate platform (major newspaper, network news, YouTube, or trade publication). This has important implications for a modern communications shop.
Day in and day out you’re: writing original Tweets while judiciously responding to critics on social media; scripting and filming a series of YouTube short videos; drafting the latest Substack commentary for your CEO; and developing a new multi-media feature on your corporate website. That’s a lot, especially when audiences are large and stakes are high.
Hiring the right people for these various tasks requires threading the needle between the excitement of youth and the wisdom of age. At its core, though, is the ability to think and write well – sadly, that’s ever in short supply. Or you contract it all out to a “content” PR firm. But one-step-removed content production risks being safe and banal, because that’s what most PR firms produce. Whichever path a leader chooses, the content producers need a mandate and license to be creative, otherwise the status quo will prevail.
Leading a global communications team today is hard work. But with talented writers and thinkers, deep understanding of earned and owned media, a spirit of innovation, an ability to persuade, and the trust of the CEO, today’s communications heads can advocate well for their clients through the thicket of what technology has wrought on the media landscape.
Chris Ullman is Founder and President of Ullman Communications, a strategic advisory firm based in Alexandria, VA.