Carl Asiedu reads PR Matters and has sent this question: There are debates in certain places that corporate communications is different from PR and all fall under reputation management. What is the difference between reputation management and PR?
There’s a merry mix up in Carl’s question, but let me attempt to provide clarity. In today’s practice, reputation management and PR are two disciplines that are under corporate communications—a cluster of communications offerings that help corporations tell a credible story repeatedly. It is also a means to project key message points that the company wants to get across to target stakeholders, including media. It is an outlook or a way of thinking that gives utmost importance to its power to raise the corporate umbrella and protect the company’s image.
Corporate communications covers PR (publicity and promotion, media relations and monitoring), crisis response planning, public affairs, reputation management, internal communications and other focused stakeholder relations.
Reputation management is a facet of corporate communications where PR plays a big role. PR is responsible for upholding—or creating—an identity for the organization or business. By having an identity, the organization is able to communicate with the world. Over time, the company builds relationships with several identified publics, utilizing a multiplatform media strategy. Reputation management takes on a public relations role, because it specializes in attracting consumers towards the company, hoping to make them stay loyal.
Reputation management, in its simplest form, is how people see you or what they think of you. It is the peak of several multifaceted branding strategies, interactions, media, communications, experiences, and relationships all boiled down into a very clear and very authentic estimation of you. It is often seen as new age, easy or smooth, especially in the business world.
Today the public has become disenfranchised. Millennials and Gen Xers, especially, have lost trust in business structures and messages. They are dependent on word of mouth, social communities, suggestions from people they have faith in, and sturdy linkages. The individual is now more significant than the group. What people think about you is now more significant than who you belong to.
American Internet entrepreneur and privacy advocate Michael Fertik said, “In reputation management, if you don’t have people coming to you on a regular basis, if they aren’t going to you regularly, if opportunities aren’t knocking down your door, then you are doing something wrong.” That’s the cost of doing nothing and what poor brand management and PR bring. It can amount to tremendous losses in status and cash.
Larry Linne and Patrick Sitkins, authors of Brand Aid: Taking Control of Your Reputation—Before Everyone Else Does, say, “You can’t fully control how others see you, but perhaps you don’t even try. That is, you don’t take a moment to think about how you want to be perceived, and then take a few steps to bolster that impression with purposeful action.” Linne and Sitkins share these hands-on strategies for creating and protecting corporate reputation:
“The way to gain a good reputation is to endeavor to be what you desire to appear.” (Socrates) When a company’s name comes up, people think of something: smart, adept with numbers, more reliable than a Swiss watch, people-oriented, socially responsible, and many other descriptors. People who don’t know your company, or don’t know it well, are looking it up offline and online. What they see forms a first impression, just as it would in a person. Your company is out there. Its success or failure depends on how its reputation is developed, nurtured and protected.
“Life isn’t about finding yourself. Life is about creating yourself.” (George Bernard Shaw). A company does a lot of communications. Unfortunately, as a public communicator, it is often misunderstood. As a result, the company’s stakeholders walk away thinking things about the company that might not be accurate: pretentious, arrogant, or uncaring. It should try its best to anticipate the ways its communications might be misinterpreted—and do its best to prevent the misperception before it happens. The company’s voice can be a very high-impact part of the company. It can create corporate opportunity or corporate damage depending on how it’s used. It must always be mindful of tonality, language volume, articulation and frequency.
“You can’t build a reputation on what you are going to do.” (Henry Ford) Once the company has its current and future positioning clear, it needs to develop its “build-and-break” plans. Identify the items that are needed to build the company up. Think of the three “S”—what you need to start, stop or sustain; determine what will enhance the company’s image or move it to its future state; list the items that will damage or deter its success, and establish some “have to” tactics that are nonnegotiable. It is crucial to be as detailed as possible, and every process is properly documented.
“Branding is about managing the company’s name in a world of misinformation, disinformation and semi-permanent Google records.” (Tim Ferris, author of The 4-Hour Workweek). Avoiding corporate damage requires keeping a “front page” mentality at the forefront of all the company’s thoughts, releases and posts always. Some suggested processes include: Ask before posting on social media, “How will this impact my company?” Review its traditional and social-media presence on a weekly basis, and don’t allow someone else to manage its reputation unless you have complete confidence in that person’s understanding of your brand. These action points are good starters, but the best way to avoid damage is to have a clear picture of what you want people to think of the company, and maintain an attitude that everything it does will communicate a clear and consistent corporate message. In the end, the challenge to corporate communications is how the company’s presence, in Facebook and other media platforms, is effectively and efficiently managed.
“It takes 20 years to build a reputation and five minutes to ruin it. If companies think about that, they’ll do things differently.” (Warren Buffett) The best offense is a good defense. The company must be in constant reinvention mode with its reputation management. What it’s doing today to manage it could be worthless and dead a year from now. It needs to be aggressive with what is available to communicate. It must be aware of trends and buyer behaviors to not get left behind.
“If I lose control of the business, I’d lose myself—or at least the ability to be myself. Owning myself is a way to be myself.” (Oprah Winfrey) When discussing reputation management, keep these realities in mind: Media amplify everything—missteps can be costly and it isn’t easy to undo the damage once it’s done; Context matters—a comment made or a statement issued to select company executives may not be appropriate to make in front of a large group, where the company’s best interests may be protected; consistency is everything—when it’s being pulled in many directions, connect with its core values and principles. These can guide the company to do the right thing; internal and external communications exist in a family context—how people regard it like a caring parent, a tireless advocate or someone who is always there.
“Character is much easier kept than recovered.” (Thomas Paine). Your company can reach farther than its presence. The online world has expanded your company to become accessible to anyone who wants to find it. You can create a company that can influence others, and can make a difference that can thrive for an extended duration. When the company realizes it has an opportunity to have a greater purpose, it will afford itself to create a bigger platform, to adopt a “never quit, total positivity, make the most of what life offers and inspire others” mentality. There are thousands of nonprofits out there, and your company can be extremely optimistic and powerful if it gets involved with them. It can pay forward through service to others, while having something exciting, fun to do.
“People will forget what you did, people will forget what you said, but people will never forget how you made them feel.” (Maya Angelou). Your company lives in a world where information is readily accessible. It used to be able to move on and live in small communities that agreed with it. But this isn’t how things work in today’s environment. Social media are expanding corporate footprints. Your company must do things differently if it wants to engage and make its presence felt with those in it deals with.
The corporate communications umbrella has become much more expansive and nimble. Its area of discipline cuts across various corporate divisions and requires from communicators a level-up commitment to cover what needs to be covered, and the agility to respond to your target audiences’ stipulations, issues, situations and people.
Other things your company can do: Realize that social media is bigger than it thinks, be updated with current events, get familiar with something regularly that has the opposing view, seek to understand before seeking to be understood, ask a lot of questions, continue to learn, tell its story because if it doesn’t, some others will, and remember that reputation is much easier kept than recovered. Your company must be upbeat, successful and joyous, and let others know it is upbeat, successful and joyous.
PR Matters is a roundtable column by members of the local chapter of the United Kingdom-based International Public Relations Association (Ipra), the world’s premier organization for PR professionals around the world. Bong R. Osorio is a communications consultant of ABS-CBN Corp., SkyCable, Dentsu-Aegis Network and government projects, among others, after retiring as the vice president and head of the Corporate Communications Division of ABS-CBN.
We are devoting a special column each month to answer our readers’ questions about public relations. Please send your questions or comments to askipraphil@gmail.com.