INTERNET PR - A GLOBAL CLIMATE CHANGE
By Terence Fane-Saunders
This article was written in early 1999, and in some ways shows its age. But the fundamentals remain just the same today,  and I'm very pleased that the years since then have more than justified the position we took at that time.
Chairman and Chief Executive, Chelgate Ltd

I would have thought you mad, or at least in need of a little rest in the shade, if just five years ago you had told me that the end of the last tired century would see the business of public relations transformed utterly, fundamentally and for good.

But this is what has happened. Of course, this doesn't mean that every PR practitioner has abandoned his or her old ways and taken the leap into the new PR. The dinosaurs still have a few shrinking pastures to graze. But look ahead.

PR has to be where business is happening. That place is the Internet. A VISA International survey recently predicted that by 2003 e-commerce will make up 80% of business-to-business volume in the U.K. Globally, Goldman Sachs are forecasting that by 2004 e-commerce will be worth US$1.5 trillion. Corner half a dozen trade journalists and ask them how important the Internet has become in their lives, and you'll be left under no illusion : for many journalists now, the Internet is quite simply their primary research tool. If you're not meeting their needs on the net, then you're not meeting their needs, period.

But surf the net for an hour or two, and you'll see that most businesses simply are not ready for this switch. Many still have no Internet presence whatsoever ; but that's their business. There's no law against corporate suicide.

Let's just consider those that have got themselves a site. In the great majority of cases, they might as well not have bothered. What they have settled for simply can't do the job. Looking at the sites, I think I know what happened.

The Chief Executive read somewhere that successful businesses now have websites. So someone was dispatched to bring in "one of these Internet people" ; probably a firm called Webspawn or Satansurfers . (My limited apologies if you actually run a real firm blessed with either name ). These firms were handed the corporate brochure, the annual report, maybe a newsletter or two, and told to get to it.

A couple of years back, the result might have induced permanent eye irritation. Web design was in the hands of technical wizards and looked as if it was. But then graphic designers - who know a good thing when they see it - arrived on the Internet scene. The result, today, is that many (though by no means all) websites are things of beauty and elegance. But still the opportunity is missed. What results is beautiful but lifeless. There is no engagement with the visitor, no relationship, no public relations.

A website is not a corporate brochure on the net. Think of it more as a corporate doppelganger - the opportunity to replicate the full, complex personality of your business, in all its facets, and to build and sustain relationships with each of your key publics.

None of these facets, none of these relationships need to tangle and trip over any of the others. Over here you can have an entry point for kids, (who may buy your products, live in your neighbourhood, belong to the families of your employees, whatever) with games, jokes, puzzles and rude noises. Across the way you can offer a straight-faced welcome to the financial analyst or investor, and take them through level after level of information and financial data. At another access point you may have restricted information and news for employees, perhaps with a discussion board for better communication. And through another access path, you can communicate with the buyers of your products and services. You want a press room, with restricted access for accredited media ? No problem. Journalists just click here. No annual report, no corporate brochure can sustain this range of interaction. The tones would clash ; the sheer quantity of irrelevant material would daunt and deter each audience sector in turn.

But the good website offers much more than the opportunity to speak to your different audiences. It offers the opportunity to listen, to communicate, to respond, to build relationships through interaction. And where the corporate brochure is leafed through once, and never referred to again, the website will offer live, changing, fresh reasons to visit and revisit, time after time; in short, to sustain the relationship.

But it still is not enough. You have created this wonderful web-site. It's a thing of beauty. It's responsive and informative, and multi-faceted. And yet, if it blooms unseen, it might as well never exist.

Netcraft report that there are 235,000 new sites a month, and that number is going to grow. So, how will you ensure that your needle will not be lost in this mountainous haystack?

Thank heavens for search engines. Eventually, some of them will track you down. So, when your business contact types in the magic words Bogg's Bottles in his favourite search engine, tra la, there will be details of your web-site. One click on the words underlined and he has arrived at your site.

But what about the bottle buyer who has never heard of Boggs? He wants to place a big order for big green bottles. Where to look? Being not yet 30, his first thought is the Internet. "Big green bottles" he writes.

In a trice, his friendly search engine will offer him details of suppliers and purveyors of big green bottles by the score. If you are lucky, you may be listed. Just as likely, you may not. But even if you are, there may be one hundred and eighty three bottle makers listed before ever there is a mention of Boggs, and the buyer may never look past the first ten.

What to do? Well, shortly after your site opens for business, you will receive approaches from a number of firms offering to register your site with all the major search engines, for a small fee.

Is it worth it ? Yes -ish. Certainly, if you are planning to do nothing else, then this is worth doing. But there are drawbacks. First, you need to know that the Internet search services (search engines, and directories like Yahoo) do not apply identical criteria when they prioritise their listings. So, a general , identical submission to the long list will have varying results to say the least.

Then, to make matters even more tricky, things change constantly. Search engines adjust their criteria, and next day you have dropped out of the top twenty on their listing.

Of course there's a lot you can do, starting with a review of key words and phrases in the structure of your pages. You can also take steps to maximise your impact for each different major search engine.

But search engines are by no means the only way that visitors are delivered to your site. At Chelgate we give almost as much emphasis to the other points of reference, both on and off-line, and just as with the search engines, we approach it as a continual process, rather than a one-shot inoculation.

It would be a mistake, though, to think that Internet PR was all about websites. At the simplest level, Internet news releases are becoming one of the most effective means of delivering news to your media contacts. But here again, the PR practitioner who thinks he can simply email copies of his off-line news release would do better to stay clear of the Internet altogether. At best, he risks being ignored ; at worst, he will irritate and alienate the very people he needs to approach.

In fact, the old PR dinosaur may need a brain transplant, or at very least a fundamental change in mindset. Traditional media relations has tended to be a "push" discipline. You had the information; you got it out to the press. Now media relations - and PR in general - is shifting to a "pull" approach. You need your publics to come to you. They need a reason to do so, and a reason to come again and again. Even the new Internet "push" technologies won't really change this. We don't assault our targets with our message. We lure them with the quality of our information. We are fishermen now, not hunters.

Crisis and acute issue management are one of our most important areas of business at Chelgate, and the Internet has re-written the way we work in this area, whether in terms of techniques for getting information out, or for monitoring, listening and responding.

The Internet itself has created its own areas of crisis and acute issues . Rogue sites and hostile sites can do enormous damage. Increasingly, too, gossip in "chat rooms" and news groups can have direct and damaging market impact. Just this month, the price of a small British firm, Silver Shield, jumped 50% on the stock market because of chat room gossip. Other cases abound.

Grotesque rumours and accusations can spring fully formed from Internet news groups and quickly establish themselves in urban mythology. Layers of anonymity and the limitations of libel legislation on the net can leave the victim both damaged and powerless to prevent further pain. The techniques of monitoring, prevention and response on the Internet form one of the most important new disciplines that the public relations community must learn to master.

The fact that the Internet has become a vital tool in issues management means that it has already become a potent political instrument. For the modern lobbyist the Internet has quite simply opened a new world of possibility. The numbers are irresistible. Andersen Consulting estimates that in Western Europe alone there will be 170 million users by 2003. Politicians will now be able to reach huge numbers of voters instantly, and at almost no cost. And in the same way, great armies of voters can make their voices heard among the politicians. Campaigners, pressure groups, media comment, conflicting interests, all can be monitored at the touch of a button. Alliances can be formed, strategies and information shared, research conducted, support won and registered, media contacted, statements issued. Politicians, spokesmen and celebrities can make on-line appearances . When a campaign breaks, the Internet network can unleash an instant , artificial "grassroots" campaign ( "astroturf" , it's called), both on and off-line. Already campaigners and activists are making use of newsgroup discussions to foment debate and direct action.

With almost shocking speed, there has been a global climate change in the public relations industry. Some species of PR professional will be unable to adapt, and future generations will examine their fossils. Others will recognise and respond to the opportunities, dangers and challenges of a landscape where everything is changed, utterly. A terrible beauty is born.

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