In this chapter, I learnt about the effects of technological advancement on the relationships and communication between organisation and publics, and audiences and communities. With the rise of new media, public relations practitioners have more options when attempting to disseminate its intended communication message in a campaign.
The Internet has become a useful medium in many public relations campaigns. Several online public relations campaigns have enjoyed success in the recent years. For instance, IKEA’s public relations campaign on Facebook not only managed to reach out to international audiences, it also drew praise from many. The campaign utilised one of Facebook’s basic functions: adding tags to photos. Photographs of IKEA’s showrooms were uploaded to its Facebook profile and users were encouraged to tag products in the photos with their names for a chance to win that item. This promotional campaign went viral and Facebook users promoted it through their news feed and profiles.
I was particularly impressed with this campaign as it did not incur high costs and took relatively little effort to implement, but it successfully managed to grab the attention of netizens worldwide. From this, it is evident that new media can be a powerful tool for public relations campaign.
However, the rise of new media has also created more ethical and legal issues for public relations practitioners to consider. The anonymity of the Internet makes it easy for users to fall prey to unethical or even illegal practices. For businesspeople, also increases the temptation to engage in unethical behaviour to reap more profits.
While it can be lucrative to utilise the Internet to promote a public relations campaign, I feel that it is important for organisations and practitioners to ensure that all aspects of their campaigns are above board, even if it is at the expense of some benefits.
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