Everything You Need to Know About Working in Public Relations

You’ve definitely heard the term public relations, but do you really know what it means?

Virtually all industries can use PR, though some use it more than others. Business owners of all kinds — whether they're selling clothing, jewelry, home products or something else entirely — use PR to pitch their products to media companies. Anything you see on a television commercial was probably put together by a PR team — cars, travel destinations/tourism boards, insurance companies, retailers, etc.

As of now, LinkedIn lists more than 12,000 PR companies in its U.S. database, and IBISWorld estimates that nearly 100,000 people are employed in the PR field. There are about 120,000 marketing firms in the U.S. and 500,000 worldwide, which includes ad agencies, design studios and research companies — but not all of them are solely PR agencies. Only 10 percent of U.S. agencies focus exclusively on PR.

That said, a 2017 USC Annenberg Global Communications study suggests that 87 percent of professionals believe the term "public relations" won't actually describe the PR work they do in five years. In fact, 60 percent of marketing executives believe that PR and marketing will become way more aligned and involved. And the PR industry grew 7.4 percent in 2016, according to the Holmes Report — the industry is worth $15 billion today and is expected to close in on $20 billion soon.

This means that getting into PR may soon require a deeper understanding of the industry in which you're working, as well as different credentials and evermore resume skills.

A PR professional is most likely to major in communications. They should know what consumers want and how they want it because, after all, their job is essentially to communicate the benefits of a product or service.

That said, a PR professional might have any type of background. For example, they might have a degree in the sciences and work with PR in the pharmaceutical world. Likewise, they might have a background in engineering and decide to work with PR in the auto industry.

"No PR major? No problem," writes AdWeek contributor Ilana Zalika. "Being successful in PR requires a lot of different skills – you need to be analytical, a great writer, have a grasp of consumer psychology, understand how business works, and more. In fact, majoring in something other than PR gives you a fresh perspective to bring to the table. I was an English major, my co-founder was an Economics major."

Outside of an education, you'll definitely want to get an internship that could set you up for success.

"This is an often-dispensed piece of advice that should not be undervalued," Zalika added. "When faced with a decision, I will almost always choose the applicant with relevant internships. School teaches you a lot, but there is nothing like on-the-job experience — especially in PR. No class can prepare you for what you’ll face in an agency or in-house PR environment. It’s fast-paced and requires multi-tasking, quick thinking, and accountability."

"Disciplines in PR are wide-ranging: content creation, corporate communications, events, executive coaching, internal communications, promotional asset production, media relations, multi-media, social media, reputation management and more," wrote Forbes contributor Glenn Gray. "Job descriptions for PR professionals include technical abilities like strategic communications, research, writing and creativity, but also of importance are campaign development, social integration, keynote presentations and other tasks. Gone are the days of writing and distributing news releases, then pitching media. While this process is important and still relevant, incorporating creative visuals and video in the delivery greatly increases the success rates of placements. If the client doesn’t have these assets, it becomes imperative for firms to develop them."

Nowadays, PR professionals need to know how to do a multitude of tasks like the following.

These tasks involve certain skills like following.

While a job in PR can be a fun and creative job, there are some challenges that come with the role of being a PR professional.

"Public relations has been somewhat reinvented in the 21st century — the internet has made it easy to put out a message and at the same time, has made it hard to be heard," writes Chron contributor Kevin Johnston. "The clutter of PR messages can desensitize readers and viewers, but a message goes viral often enough to make the possibilities intriguing."

In other words, there's more background noise, which makes it harder to impress journalists. There are also several channels through which to stream PR messages, so PR professionals need to choose how they're going to send their messages and learn what the most effective avenues of communication are. Of course, as technology changes, the avenues of communication are changing, too.

Likewise, social media platforms tend to change their algorithms a lot, which means that PR professionals need to stay abreast of any changes. While using text statuses on Facebook used to reach a large audience, now video is distributed more widely, for example. The metrics used to measure the success of a campaign, however, might be altered by these algorithm changes that are outside anyone's control.

Despite the challenges that PR professionals face today, there are some steps you can take to succeed in PR.

The more you do your research on the industry and keep on top of any news or trends that may affect your client(s), the better you'll be able to service them. Likewise, the more you understand avenues of communication like social media — including any changes to social media and forecasted trends for social media — the better you'll be able to help your client(s). 

Of course, finding a mentor in any profession who can help you hone your skills and be an advocate for you is always a benefit.