Who we are

Newsroom

Current News Releases

Be Nimble or Be Gone: Worldcom Execs Pinpoint Coming Global PR Trends — and Top Service Areas to Tap Now

Roxanna Guilford-Blake's exclusive interview this week: Chief Operating Officer Daisy Guthin, Americas Board Chair Stefan Pollack, Americas Board Chair-Elect Virginia Sheridan, all of Worldcom Public Relations Group

NEW YORK – August 4, 2010

What are you doing after the recession? Perhaps an overly optimistic question, but one serious PR professionals ignore at their own risk. Worldcom's leadership has been talking to agencies—and companies that hire agencies—here and abroad. And what they are hearing is that while companies are hiring firms for one-off projects today, what they want for the long-term is a serious partner—one who can move beyond the traditional PR functions.

It's not just what they are hearing anecdotally. Worldcom—the world's largest partnership of independently owned public relations counseling firms, with 104 offices in 91 cities worldwide—recently conducted a survey of its partner offices around the world. Among the headlines was that respondents expect a rise in social media and research and a decline in media relations and advertising services. More specifically, services that respondents expect the decrease to include: media relations (19 percent), advertising (17 percent) and direct mail and marketing (11 percent). In general, the majority of firms are optimistic about business increasing in the next three to five years.

Here, Guthin, Pollack, and Sheridan talk global PR, the opportunities emerging in China and the Middle East, and the importance of being nimble:

What are some of the emerging global communications trends my readers should be monitoring? Emerging business trends?

Pollack: Everybody should be watching China. The other area everybody should be looking at is the Middle East. Communication walls are coming down in that part of the world. That means new communications challenges, greater opportunities for engagement. Really, the world's a stage. We need to be thinking about every aspect of business. Where business is engaged, so should one's communications function.

It's an exciting time.

Earlier this summer, you held your global meeting in Shanghai. So let's focus more deeply on China. What do U.S. PR professionals need to understand about China?

Pollack: I found China both personally and professionally fascinating. What China is going through is clearly transformational change. It is experiencing , in a 10-year period, what the U.S. did from the 1920s-1960s.They are moving from low-cost manufacturing companies into branded companies in their own right. They are now starting to explore the use of professional service firms. They are hiring attorneys, PR and marketing firms, and branding experts. For many Chinese companies, it's a first-time occasion. We can expect to see Chinese brands doing business in the U.S. in a stronger, more impactful way.

From a PR perspective, U.S. agencies can expect to have Chinese companies as clients, especially as these companies are unaccustomed to the transparencies of doing business in western societies.

Service firms will need to understand where Chinese companies are in a given lifecycle. It may not be comparable to other clients'. They will require much more handholding. Agencies will need to have a greater cultural understanding in order to do business with Chinese clients.

Sheridan: We saw examples of Chinese companies already making entry into North American markets. Potential Chinese clients are looking at these models very carefully too. They already make good products, but they face challenges in terms of cultural differences. A new avenue of work for PR is helping those companies make smooth transitions and start to operate in this marketplace at a comfortable pace.

Guthin: Companies not in China that are trying to work with Chinese companies will need partners in China who understand the culture and help them manage these relationships. That's the value of having a network like WorldCom.

Can you give me examples of some of the differences?

Pollack: Most Chinese companies have zero relationships with editorial media. Clearly, it's a big controlled media environment in China. Traditional media relations is a new world to them.

It's so important to understand the cultural differences. The biggest thing I learned is that Chinese companies are going to trust their own first. Trust is a huge factor in relationship building.

It sounds like you are talking about firms being business consultants that handle much more than just PR.

Pollack: In many cases, yes. If you gain a high level of trust, you'll be able to offer greater levels of service.

Sheridan: The stakes are very high for Chinese companies doing business in the United States. Our firm, for instance, works in international travel and tourism, and we see that with companies coming out of South Africa or the Middle East and entering the North American market for the first time and while they are cautious, they are much less so than the Chinese.

The Chinese want to do business the "right" way when they come to the North American market—they're a lot more sensitive than Americans are when they do business abroad.

They are very mindful of being able to understand the local marketplace.

Are we emerging from the recession yet, based on what you're you're hearing from your partners? What's the outlook for the communications industry over the next year?

Pollack: We conducted a quick three-question survey of our partners, and about 65 percent of our respondents indicated that business was starting to pick up, and now, at the middle of 2010, we expect that to continue to increase.

I don't think it's full blown, "agency of record" type of work—although there is some of that. It's a lot more, "I've got this amount of money in my budget, and I'm ready to unleash a project." Many of those engagements have had good healthy budgets, but they are more short term in nature.

Do you expect the budget-rich, short-term projects to continue?

Sheridan: I think what they'll do is set a pattern. These projects are a bit more open ended, more defined with more caps. Projects have the potential of unleashing a considerable amount of work on more diversified levels. I think there will be more multiple one-offs. Also, as trust and results build, these companies will continue a flow of project work that can be quite lucrative and energizing for PR agencies. Of course, this requires nimbleness on the agency's part, but that's to be expected and welcomed in this economic environment.

Pollack: This is the third recession I've seen in my professional career. This is the first time that clients have found a way to try to keep their PR firm and their PR programming engaged and ongoing. So there's a great kinship between agencies and clients as they slug it through together. As a result, the relationship grows. Coming out on the back end of the recession, that agency/client relationship is stronger than ever before.

I think that is unique to independent firms, though: It's really that much more of a partnership. To me, that's a huge differentiating factor.

Sheridan: Our international partners are telling us the same thing.

Tell me more about this move to being partners.

Pollack: Because of this greater level of trust, clients are turning to agencies, asking them to do more. PR agencies are doing everything, from SEO to direct marketing to digital PR. Our own Worldcom PR Group survey found 93 percentexpect social media work to increase and 73 percent anticipate interactive Web development, 61 percent for SEO.

PR is getting a seat at the table that it didn't have before the recession.

Sheridan: It's a great time to be in PR. You are really getting inside of a business more than ever before. You can immerse yourself as deeply as the client will allow. It's a very intellectually engaging time.

Some of us are also seeing a greater role in the overall marketing of a client. PR is driving other forms of communication. Both on a concept basis—like in building platforms for advertising, digital and branding—and also, obviously, from issue management and image recognition standpoints.

We need to train ourselves and our staff to function in those different levels of influence.

What other insights do you have for readers?

Sheridan: It comes back to something we all talk about and dance around, but I hear more and more about real measurements, real ROI. We're all trying to determine the best ways to connect social media to that process and see how it connects the dots in client work.

PR has shied always from certain types of measurements. We'd rather not have the advertising clipping book as evidentiary examples of our value, but have clients value our work in terms of customer influence, impact on sales, brand development, and image.

It's very much a moving target.

Pollack: PR has moved multi-channel. That is a direct result of the growing of services that PR firms are offering clients. That has fueled growth—and a broadening of service offerings. Clients are no longer in your own back yard. They now come from anywhere—all over the world.

Guthin: These trends are from all over the world, too, and they unfold differently in different markets. This is especially true in social media.

For instance, in Asia and Europe they have created multiple social media platforms because of language differences, media clampdowns and other issues. In China, individuals may not be able to use Twitter or Facebook for long periods, so they are very adept at creating other channels, other platforms.

Anything else?

Guthin: To be working in this industry, you have to be sitting at the edge of your seat. It's a light-speed time.

So agencies need to be nimble?

Guthin: Be nimble or be gone.