Today, you can find many agencies that only practice new media, but very few if any that only do traditional. And while Twitter may generate the buzz, corporate executives generally turn to the Wall Street Journal for validation. Despite the inroads that new media has made, traditional media rests solidly in their comfort zone. Social media continues to confound many of them, even as they admit that they should get it.
Corporate executives notwithstanding, is the distinction moot? After all, a growing number of readers go online for their news. (The Seattle Post- Intelligencer just did away with its print edition.) News outlets engage in blogging, rely on crowdsourcing (CNN iReport) or offer APIs (New York Times) that allow readers to mash content.
Have we reached that point that it's all just media as PR professionals like Hilary Mckean, partner and director of Ketchum South here in Atlanta contends? Or is it more the case that clients still want to keep new and traditional media separate as Paull Young, a senior account executive at Converseon has observed?
For me, traditional includes print and broadcast journalism as well as company generated materials like press releases, websites and annual reports. New includes blogs, social networks, user generated content and relies more on search than placement. Traditional means impersonal, formal and structured; new is intimate, casual, and interactive. New media thrives on breaking rules; traditional media strives to follow them.
Enter Blended Communication
Which is more influential? The verdict is still out, but for the foreseeable future blogs, press releases, newspapers, social networks and broadcast networks will all be around â€" feeding off each other for content and credibility.
Given the influence of new and traditional media, I prefer to focus on how to blend them. A blended PR strategy takes advantage of each allowing one to complement the other to build more relevant results. Placed in this context, we can begin helping reluctant executives to see social media more holistically. Otherwise they will continue seeing new media as gimmicks or something to be used on an ad hoc basis.
Blended communication is more than the sum of the parts. It brings complexity, increases options and eliminates binary thinking.
To be sure, sometimes, as in in the case of financial news, personal, authentic communication is inappropriate, and sometimes an objective approach doesn't hit the right emotional chord. You need both. And you need them to work together.
Next posting, I will offer some examples of how blended communication can work for you.
Let me get back to you.
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