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Date: February 17, 1993

Title: Focus/Corporate Communications/Advertising and Public Relations Play Different Roles in a Media Mix

Author: George M. Taber

The chief executive of the Central New Jersey construction company was a man of firm ideas about many things, including advertising and public relations. “We don”t believe in advertising. We never do it,” he proclaimed dogmatically. “We only do public relations because it has more credibility.”

Advertising executives say almost uniformly that one of their hardest jobs is to convey to clients the difference between advertising and public relations. Many confused executives think that they are the same thing. Many others believe that you get good public relations by buying a lot of advertising. Advertising is not public relations; and public relations is not advertising.

Chuck Rose, the head of Strasser & Rose & Associates in North Brunswick, speaks of the difference between the two from a special point of view. He once taught both courses at Drake University. Says he: “Advertising is a shotgun; public relations is a rifle. Advertising is a mass medium and goes to everyone, while public relations is a specific, targeted approach to one of your publics.”

Jeffrey Barnhart, head of Creative Marketing Alliance in Princeton Junction, has another definition. Says he: “Advertising is bought space; public relations is earned space.”

While advertising is an ancient craft, public relations is a relatively new one. Media historians generally consider Ivy Lee, who started working in the 1930s, to be the first practitioner of modern public relations. Among his clients was John D. Rockefeller, and it was at Lee”s suggestion that Rockefeller started handing out dimes to little children. That gesture helped change Rockefeller”s image from that of the stingy billionaire to that of a kindly old man who liked children.

In the early days public relations and advertising were separate. Firms like Hill & Knowlton grew up and specialized strictly in public relations. At the time, it was felt that mixing advertising with PR would be detrimental to both. In more recent years, however, many, if not most, advertising agencies have added a public relations wing in order to offer clients a total communications package.

Some people still think the two should be separate. Jack O”Leary is a one-man public relations shop out of Clinton and Princeton, who advises just seven clients and says with that he”s “maxed out.” Says he: “Putting advertising and public relations under the same roof creates whore publications who just do stories to sell ads. I have seen letters at advertising agencies where they promise to get so many public relations articles and call it free publicity. It”s not.”

O”Leary says that a public relations advisor should act at a senior level in a company, where he can be concerned about the total image of a company with its various publics. He adds that his role is to tell the chief executive “what he ought to hear, not as a critic, but as a constructive advisor.”

Independent public relations advisors, though, are rare in Central New Jersey. Only a few big companies like Johnson & Johnson and AT&T have political heavyweights either working internally or externally for the company advising on public relations.

In most cases, public relations is part of the media mix that an advertising agency puts together. Says Barnhart: “We like to marry the two together. The one reinforces the other.”

Pam Krol, a partner in Zusi & Krol in Princeton, agrees that the two work together. “They take the opposite approach to the same end. The tactics may be different, but the goal is the same.” She cites Waste Management of Pennsylvania, one of her clients, as an example of using both advertising and public relations to their best advantage. Advertising reaches a broader audience with general information. But at the same time Zusi & Krol hired a part-time writer, who was versed in the complexities of environmental issues, to write stories that it gives mainly to trade journals. Sometimes the articles are used exactly as written; sometimes they become background material for other articles. It is rare for a publication to run a public relations-written article, and journalism watch dogs are quick to criticize those that do.

Michael Prewitt, a partner at Dana Communications in Hopewell, draws a clear distinction between the best time to use advertising and the best time to use public relations. Advertising, he says, is effective with products that are well known and fighting for market share. Example: an established brand of toothpaste or soap. But public relations is more effective in promoting a new company or different type of product. “Public relations can create credibility and awareness in a market jaded by advertising,” he says.

Prewitt adds that public relations is particularly effective with a complex, new product, when the company needs to educate the customer. Dana has been working with the regional AT&T companies to market Voice Mail. “For beachhead brands like that it is very good. Voice Mail is more than an answering machine, and you have to explain how it works.”

The little-discussed conflict between public relations and advertising is the quid pro quo that some companies expect when they advertise in a publication. Large, established publications know that this is a slippery road to oblivion because it means that the credibility of articles in the newspaper or magazine will soon be lost since readers will quickly learn that the stories are only disguised advertising. Smaller, younger publications may resort to the quid pro quo, but that usually only guarantees that they stay small and young forever.

Advertising and public relations officials agree that the quid pro quo is self-defeating. Says Barnhart: “The recession may have had something to do with it, but we see more of it than we used to. If a publication says that they will do a story if we run an ad, we don”t hold them in high regard.” Adds Krol: “A story should only come out if something is newsworthy. You must have news to get press.”

In the end, each form of communication has its own strengths and weaknesses. Says Rose: “Public relations can”t take the place of advertising because you don”t have control over it. There”s a good chance that a public relations article you write will not appear at all. Advertising appears when you want it to and exactly how you want it to. A good communications program has both, and each has its role.” v