I have been asked to write on my top five favourite topics we learned about in my public relations class this semester. Those top five would have to be…
- crisis management
- ethics
- public opinion and persuasion
- writing
- Marketing vs. PR
I thought crisis management was very interesting because of the diverse range of ways to handle and plan for when crises arise. It was surprising to me that many companies don’t prepare ahead of time for possible conflicts. I really enjoyed reviewing recent issues such as the BP oil spill and Maple Leaf meats to see how important it is to have good PR.
Learning about ethics by having to solve an ethical problem in groups was very informative. It is one of those topics that when just reading about, or taking in a lecture, you can say “easy peezy, I know what I would do.” But when actually handed a situation to solve you realize all of the intricacies and how many people need to be taken into account. These scenarios also showed how differences of onions can prolong the decision process as well as bringing forth the various angles one situation can be looked at.
Public Opinion and persuasion was where I began to discern public relations and marketing. You started to see how PR was really about creating and maintaining relationships–ergo, publics are extremely pertinent in the world of PR.
It was made known that writing in the world of PR is of very high importance. I loved making the time to write this blog (unfortunately, one week had to be sacrificed) and stretch out my three-quarters-of-an-English-degree skills. Blogging really allows you the freedom of opinion as well as the chance to explore language and your own personal writing style. Sometimes I’m not sure if Camosun marketing students are given enough opportunity to exercise/improve upon their writing skills which, as shown in this course, is much needed.
Lastly, I appreciated the lecture on the difference between marketing and PR. Taking a course in PR and marketing communications at the same time made it easy to confuse the two. from this lecture I learned that PR focuses on relationships and decreasing costs while marketing focuses on making/creating profit. With PR, you can renew a product using the power of messaging and the legitimacy created by the media, where marketing does not necessarily do this.
At this point, I can’t really decide whether I like public relations or not. For now, I think I wouldn’t mind doing a job where PR is necessary from time to time, but not as my main function within an organization. I still have some time to think and explore on that anyway.
Thanks for an interesting semester!
Sara