The changing face of modern PR

"The future is coming and will crush PR agencies unprepared to meet the advancing wave of change." This recent article by Todd Defren at PR Squared provides some interesting ideas on the 'evolve or die' and covers such interresting topics as Personal branding vs Company Branding and the move from reactive to proactive engagement.

He's been motivated to post his thoughts having read The Authentic Enterprise, a fantastic report by the Arthur W Page Society (a highly regarded association for senior PR and corporate comms people) . This report contains a lot of hard-hitting and useful facts for the senior corporate communicator, but I think this PR-focused quote sums it up:

The simple reality is that, like the journalists, analysts and managers who have been our main focus, we no longer have a privileged position in the areas that used to define our function.

However things *ARE* changing and PR has actually been awoken (in places), partly through the use of social media and a need to engage with customers rather than just communicate at them.

This article from Mr PR2.0 himself (Brian Solis) maps and explains the evolution (including the use of the Social Media Press Release)

Rumours of PR's death have been greatly exaggerated!
(That in itself is surely a bad piece of PR?)