Looking Ahead

Before I left for (a wonderful) family holiday, I compiled a list of some of the more notable social media and marketing predictions for 2009. It’s worth checking out here.

Separately, my friends over at PR Newser crowd-sourced their readers (à la Peter Kim) for some 2009 “PR Predictions.”

Here’s what I had submitted:

  • Twitter, and the countless applications and tools that sustain it, will gain even greater traction among agency and corporate communications professionals in the coming year.
  • The line separating bloggers from mainstream journalists will continue to blur, leading to one amorphous media ecosystem. The most authoritative bloggers will be compelled to adopt accepted journalistic standards and practices, i.e., checking sources, while the vast majority will not.
  • PR pros will continue to explore ways to build their clients’ branded presence on YouTube, Facebook, and elsewhere. However, achieving editorial coverage — both online and off — will remain, at least for 2009, the primary means by which the industry is measured.
  • The era of the “personal brand” will take hold. More and more companies like Ford, Dell, Pepsico, and Comcast will recognize the value of appointing and empowering individuals (versus faceless corporate entities) to engage on their behalf in the online conversation.
  • In spite of many media pundits’ dire predictions, the mainstream media, and specifically news organizations that create quality (eg, highly credible) journalism, will gain new currency and esteem in a post-Bush media environment. The PR strategists for the Obama administration will learn that direct communications to a base of supporters, while helpful, will prove insufficient for advancing policy.

Rachel Sklar, guesting at The Daily Beast, has more on what lies ahead for the media.

Happy New Year.

2 comments

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  2. “The line separating bloggers from mainstream journalists will continue to blur.”

    This is kind of a scary commentary on our society, that many of us take what is posted on blogs and random websites as being the truth.

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