Preface

This book explores, investigates, and explains media relations. It is interested in the relationships that are built between all types of stakeholders within the public sphere, including corporations, communities, political candidates, individuals, governments, and not-for-profit organisations, but most importantly it is interested in the media. It explains how media relations theories are derived, and how they are linked to practical applications in the worlds of business and trade, society and community, health and education, politics and government. It advocates a practical application of media relations and shows why theory is important in underpinning practice.

The theoretical focus of the work is on framing and relationship building, two models widely used in Western and non-Western media relations. It provides an understanding of why relationship building and framing are important, and from where they have travelled, to be considered important. It discusses the valuable contributions made by a number of scholars, including Carl Botan, Robert Entman, Erving Goffman, Vincent Hazleton, James Grunig and Dean Kruckeberg. The theoretical argument is tied unconditionally to stakeholder case studies and profiles, revealing a wealth of information about how they develop successful media relations campaigns, how not-for-profit organisations-reliant on a finite pool of funds for their important and often life-saving work- construct media campaigns and build long-term relationships, how leading international corporations present an image of integrity and corporate social responsibility, and why some political candidates are more successful than others in getting their messages in the media.

The idea that a book with a focus on media relationship building can find a place in the literature of public relations, political communication, and corporate communication sets the stage for an additional investigation: the two part question of why we need to develop media relationships in both democratic and non-democratic states, and how the development can assist us and those who inculcate mediated messages. To understand why media relationship building has become important, indeed, crucial, to all types of organisations and individuals, the book begins with an explanation of how media relations fit within the wider field of public relations. We will use this as a basis for our understanding of the development of media relations as a subfield of public relations. Additionally, we will explore the future of media relations through a simple explanation of the argument put by German philosopher Jurgen Habermas: that the media have altered the shape of society and that the alteration has been advantageous. We will discover that with the emergence of the mass media came the need to present information in such a way that it would be persuasive and, in turn, influence stakeholders beyond the media. Theories of influence and persuasion thus play an interesting role in media relationship building.

The meaning of stakeholder

For the purposes of this book, the media are important primary stakeholders. They are the stakeholders that agents and other forces are interested in influencing and persuading. Beyond the media lie a vast number of other stakeholders, known variously as publics, audiences, listeners, readers, shareholders, communities, special interest groups, investors, citizens, and individuals. These stakeholders will be investigated after we have built an understanding of the relationship between our primary stakeholders: clients and the media. Stakeholder publics beyond the media are the reason we seek to build media relationships. Clients, whatever the nature of their issues or events, seek first to influence and persuade the media to report the importance of their issue or event. But reporting is not an end in itself. Clients do not invest in media campaigns for fun. They invest in media campaigns so that their stakeholders can form an opinion about the issue or event under discussion. Mediated communication is an important part of the opinion-forming process in democracies. It results in public opinion. Citizens read, watch, and listen to news differently than they do to advertising. Advertising provides information, but news and feature coverage frames an issue or event in a subfield an area within a field that is taken up by specific theories and practices. A story appearing in a newspaper or on television news has, in the minds of citizens, more validity than if the same material appears in a television advertisement or arrives in their letterboxes as a glossy flyer or leaflet. Glossy flyers and leaflets have their place as elements in campaigns, but they cannot compete with mediated material for validity in the minds of citizens. News captures citizens' imaginations. It reinforces or rejects already formed ideas and shapes them into opinions. Thus we have the term ‘public opinion'. Public opinion is the opinion formed by a majority after consideration of an issue or event. It is an attempt to represent a wider opinion about issues and events than the opinion held by an individual citizen. In the twenty-first century, it is most often informed by news and other information received from media sources such as television, radio, newspapers, the internet, and magazines. It is reinforced by personal communication between individuals. Public opinion is thus an expression of social, economic, and political will after the point of mediation. It is something that occurs because of, not as part of, media relations and media reporting. For this reason it forms an important part of the consequences of media news reporting and interpretation and, as such, is beyond the scope of this book.

The structure of the book

The structure and content of the book are intended for undergraduate students and, as such, assume no prior knowledge of media relations. But it has the potential to act as a resource for early practitioners and for others intent upon building and running media relations campaigns. It may also be a useful resource for reporters and journalists interested in gaining a deeper understanding of the subfield. The text is structured around the idea of a twelve week undergraduate program. It provides a theoretical theme based on media relationship building and framing. It develops links to additional theories of relevance and argues for a particular approach to theory and practice. An additional theme is the United Nations (UN) examples that appear within the work. The UN provides one of the most remarkable examples of an organisation dealing with widespread and complex issues and events that require even more remarkable and complex media relations strategies. UN examples are included to provide evidence of an organisation whose presence crosses all media relations boundaries.

The book is divided into the following parts:

Introduction: Building Relationships, Framing Issues and Events
Part 1: Theories and Campaign Models
Part 2: Elements of Media Relations
Part 3: Organisations and the Basis of Practice
Part 4: Evaluation and Assessment

Chapter 1, the Introduction, provides the foundation for understanding how theories and practices link in both the pedagogy and the reality of media relations.

Chapter 2 introduces the theories and arguments that underpin the actions of media relations.

Chapter 3 introduces the reader to the idea of campaign formulation; design and development.

Chapter 4 provides one of the most extensive lists of tactics available to media relations with examples of how they can be used in different situations.

Chapter 5 provides a broad understanding of the relationship-building process. One of the most important yet underrated aspects of media relations work is the writing process.

In Chapter 6 all aspects of this enjoyable occupation are covered.

Chapters 7, 8, and 9 elaborate and reveal the elements of media relations that exist in all types of organisations, including government and politics, business and corporations, community and special interests, health and education, trade and fashion.

In Chapter 10 the reader is introduced to the difficult and complex topic of budgets and timelines. To make the task more accessible, I have included case studies on how agencies go about constructing budgets for clients based on a fixed investment or on an idea.

Chapters 11 and 12 introduce the reader to the darker aspects of media relations: risk and uncertainty, evaluation, and, if conducted properly, the euphoria of success.

In Chapter 13, the Conclusion, I have attempted to show where the media relations subfield might be headed and the relative difficulties associated with the climb. The Conclusion also provides a ledge on which to meet and imagine media relations.

The book is structured so that cases and examples appear embedded in the text. The objective is to provide readers with seamless reference points that relate directly to the argument rather than waiting until the end. Cases and examples are identified throughout as Chronicles. Each Chronicle is a narrative, an account related to a theory or method. For simplicity, I refer throughout the work to all activities as issues and events. Similarly, the terms ‘media relations expert', ‘media relations counsellor', and ‘media relations practitioner' are used throughout the book. In practice, this may not be the case because different terms attract different levels of seriousness.

Nomenclature

We should not spend too long stressing about whether there is a point of difference between the names we apply to media relations: public affairs, investor relations, community relations, government relations, corporate communication, strategic communication. While all these names indicate specific areas, they take their existence from public relations. They all have stakeholder publics that they are keen to build relationships with, and they all use the same communication skills (media relations) to do so. What is more important is the ability to identify which skills are best suited to which campaign and how they can be used to the greatest advantage.

If we cannot survive without some differentiation, then the example provided by UN Under Secretary Shashi Tharoor would be a good starting point. For the UN, public relations is used to win the support of a target stakeholder, domestic or foreign, for the work or objectives of a specific UN organisation or project. Public affairs seeks to encourage domestic public understanding and support of government policies and activities, while public diplomacy is used to engage, inform, and influence foreign publics in order to promote sympathy and goodwill for a country and its policies. But according to Shashi Tharoor, the UN itself cannot afford to draw distinctions because it seeks support from a wide range of stakeholders as well as specific organisations for general principles. With this in mind, the book will show that the UN position is that most often taken by many other organisations in the pursuit of ethical models and practice in media relations.

A note on Western-ness

The analysis of the structure of relationships among and between stakeholders in the field of media relations as it occurs in this book is on theories and practices that occur in the West. But globalisation makes Western definitions difficult. There are clear delineations between the politics and governments of what we imagine as the West and their former political foes, the communist East. But the world is now defined by trade relationships and non-trade relationships rather than by the politics of capitalism. The significance of organisation-the European Union, the North American Free Trade Agreement, the Australia-China Free Trade Agreement-is what defines global media relations. All the strategies and tactics, all the campaign elements described in this book, can be used interchangeably across cultural, social, and language barriers. The political barriers are obvious. An environmental protest campaign against the building of a large infrastructure project in China, such as a dam or a tunnel, cannot exist. Citizen stakeholders in Iran opposed to that country's nuclear arms development are similarly thwarted, while in Turkey, organisations opposed to that country's inclusion in the EU will have difficulty developing and sustaining a strategic media relations campaign in opposition. But that does not mean that stakeholders in countries with suffocating political processes and policies should not attempt to use media relations campaign strategies and tactics to reach their objectives and goals. It just means that doing so will be a little more difficult.