Thumbs up for ‘Good PR’

It was the question that had been hanging in the air for at least five years during IBP’s ‘Meet the Editors’sessions – and it was finally asked, in all its brutal simplicity, at the forum held at The Building Centre in September: ‘Would it be better, worse, or the same if PRs did not exist?’.

The many PRs in the audience must have held their collective breath. But in the event they received a ‘thumbs up’from the majority of Editors present, the concensus views being that good PR fostered relationships with journalists, provided useful information and photographic services and facilitated meetings with key industry personnel.

But there were countervailing views which the PRs no doubt heeded carefully. In particular Giles Barrie, Editor of Property Week and Peter Bill, Editor of Estates Gazette, gave a definite ‘thumbs down’. Barrie said that, while the best PRs did a great job, too many got between the journalist and the story. Peter Bill felt even more strongly. It was better if PRs did not exist because he detected ‘a fundamental difference between what we want as journalists and what you want as PRs’.He could not see this situation changing.

The particular distinction he drew was between the quality of PR in the property sector , which he described as ‘alarmingly good’, and that in the wider construction industry which was frequently ‘’defensive and unhelpful’. Earlier the question and answer session, had been lively and cheerfully combative. Why were the Editors not out there selling the industry to the media? This brought a sharp response – we are out there, appearing on radio and television, getting articles in national newspapers and generally trying to promote the industry. Only Aaron Morby of Construction News sounded a warning note, saying it could be unhealthy for the media simply to talk to construction journalists instead of industry personalities. ‘This is just plain lazy on their part,’ he said.

Elsewhere the discussion took familiar turns with Editors appealing for more and better access to those closest to projects who knew what they were talking about; the development of more industry personalities who were good communicators; better targetting of stories by PRs who have researched where best to try to place their material. Above all, the Editors warned, PRs should not try to dissemble and Phil Clark, Deputy Editor of Building, had a heartfelt plea: ‘Don’t tell me that a story I put to you isn’t a story. That’s a red rag to a bull!’.

From the PR side the most powerful complaint was again that of negative journalism. Too often, it was felt, the journalists were only interested in ‘bad news’stories and ignored the many positive stories about the industry PRs had to offer. This met with a broad rejection from the Editors and it was clearly an argument that was not going to be resolved at this session .Finally an issue that had been touched on at previous sessions – copy checking where a PRs’ client wanted to approve copy before it was published – emerged with some force.

Editors were resisting this practice but were uneasy about its increasing momentum.This seemed one topic that should be firmly flagged up for discussion next year. Watch this space.

Earlier, Dominic Morgan, Principal of Tamesis Business Communications, presented a detailed study of the Chiswick Park ‘Enjoy Work’office development by Stanhope. The concept was to provide an enjoyable working environment backed up by lifestyle support services such as language courses and sporting facilities.The PR challenge to Tamesis was to try to get this ‘unprecedented concept’ to a range of audiences which reached well beyond the traditional property agency targets.

So their PR programme comprised a Workplace Satisfaction survey jointly with ‘Management Today’, a campaign to promote the Chiswick Park project as ‘Britain’s most enjoyable workplace’ in careers sections of the national press; exploiting the location for film, TV and advertising shoots and the use of the park as a venue for site tours, conferences and meetings.

The views of the Editors could perhaps best be summarised as ‘mixed’, but Dominic Morgan was at least able to set out his PR stall to a wide-ranging and clearly intrigued audience – an opportunity he simply could not get in any other industry forum outside IBP. As Patrick Gulley, IBP Chairman, said at the outset: ‘We have today a unique gathering of the Editors of all the main publications of the architectural, construction and property press (together with a wide range of PR practitioners) under one roof. To have so many communicators together is quite unusual and something I am convinced that only IBP could achieve.