Week 9

I think the two key points to remember from this week’s readings were the importance of research before undertaking a project and the difference sponsorships and special events can make for a company.



The chapters relate the reason why PR practitioners need to be selective of the information gathered and the type of tactic they wish to adopt in order to successfully market the company.



The readings made me think more about public relations theory/practice in that a good research saves a lot of time and resources in planning a campaign. A review on existing literature helps PR practitioners to quickly identify developments made in the area of research that they are working on hence, there is no need to revise old studies which may become highly irrelevant. Current trends are what they should look out for so that the campaign is well-adjusted to this new world. New media has become an important tool in the field of PR, marketing, and ultimately business. It provides competitive advantage if used well. Tactics such as sponsorships and special events need such aids as the risk involved is relatively high. The Internet, for example, can help a social event to realise more objectives that the PR practitioners have in mind due to its timeliness and accessibility my many worldwide. However, the Internet itself may not be reliable because of uncontrolled incidents like power outage, server outage, etcetera. This will instead jeopardise the strategy. PR practitioners therefore need to be well-equipped with IT knowledge and work their magic (in this case creativity).