Ronn Torossian - For Immediate Release

Great public relations \grt publk r-lsh ens\ n pl:

helps make the impersonal personal. bridges divides. creates excitement and builds equity for businesses, personalities, politicians, and others. manages crises and catastrophes. about telling stories, having conversations, and making impressions. needed by any businessor anyone with a pulse, for that matter.

This book is designed to provide accurate and authoritative information about PR and marketing principles. The publisher is not engaged in rendering legal, accounting, or other professional services by publishing this book. If any such assistance is required, the services of a qualified financial professional should be sought. The publisher will not be responsible for any liability, loss, or risk incurred as a result of the use and application of any information contained in this book.

For Immediate Release copyright 2021 by Ronn Torossian

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles or reviews.

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First E-Book Edition: February 2021

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data is available upon request.

ISBN 9781953295095 (trade paperback)

ISBN 981953295477 (ebook)

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In memory of Penina (Penny) Waga. My mother, my hero,
who made everything possible.

In honor of my daughters, Rafaela and Emanuela.

Life isnt about finding yourself. Life is about creating yourself.

George Bernard Shaw, Irish playwright and political activist

O ver the last several years, the shift in the ability to communicate potently and persuade effectively has accelerated away from a centralized group of elites that includes business titans and politicians, toward a decentralized group of people who lack the conventional trappings of power and influence, like money, infrastructure, and access to boardrooms and the halls of justice. The old power elite continue to access and sway people indirectly through traditional and indirect media like television, radio, and print advertising and distant pronouncements from experts and institutions. New influencers reach people directly and personally, through personal stories and various social media platforms and grassroots or seemingly organic hashtag movements, and also use traditionalized forums. The world is, of course, forever changing.

The result is that the control over narrativesideas and opinions the public is willing to accept as reasonable and actionablehas been taken out of the hands of a few and given to many highly fragmented people in unrelated groups. Im not saying that people cant be manipulated anymore. They can be. But the manipulation and persuasion are being done by a more diverse range of players. The shift in influence has changed forever.

My goal in the updated and revised edition of For Immediate Release is to demonstrate that public relations (PR) remains one of the most relevant and effective tools for entrepreneurs, emerging brands, Fortune 500 companies, personalities, and politicians to exploit this power shift and increase market share, recognition, value, and influence. PR can and is a powerful change-making business that still enjoys a well-deserved and not unexpected growth stage. Since 2010, PR spending has gone from $9.73 billion to more than $19 billion in the US. A greater portion of communications budgets is given over to public relations because it is better at exploiting the power of digital media, and it is expert at effective story-telling.

PRs significant advantage over marketing and advertising is its ability to create independent third-party recognition and endorsementan incredible asset in a crowded, distracted, and confused world. Understanding this point is critical, because the right publicity has profoundly more credibility than ads and marketing campaigns. The public feels that when a third partya YouTuber, influencer, personality, celebrity, journalist, bloggerfeatures something in a positive light within a compelling and personal story, that entity earns an authenticity and prominence ad campaigns cant buy. Even when a brand or an entrepreneur engages people directly from their own platforms, a version of PR, valuable connections are made. However, the constant noise of social media news feeds, influencer posts, citizen journalist videos, fake news, unauthorized content on digital platforms, not to mention old-school cable and network news, has created new hazards and challenges for brands, businesses, and people. Theres a lot to keep track of and respond to.

Perhaps most important, PR can help enhance your credibility and relevance in a world where the lines between truth and fiction are continuously blurred, and where there isnt just one soapbox or podium, but many to choose from. This book is about how to navigate a landscape of communication and public relations that has experienced a seismic shift in the last decade. Why? Well...

Politics and elections have changed. Look at the 2016 election of Donald Trump. Whether you love him or hate him, one must recognize the fact that he was elected by taking a different approach to campaign politicsand appealing to many people who felt disenfranchised by politics as usual. On the flip side, in both 2016 and 2020 Bernie Sanders used a similar method, including crowd funding and enlisting grassroots supporters to create on-the-ground, local campaigns. Trump and Sanders didnt rely on conventional modes of communication. Trump went directly to social media and created a groundswell of enthusiasm and support from a vast number of unorganized individuals that the mainstream media and traditional polling firms completely miscalculated. Ditto for Sanders. As I write, we are in the midst of a pandemic, which has created more changes to the way the world communicates. By the time youre reading this book, politics, social conventions, and communication methods will have shifted again.

Power now lies in the hands of whoever or whatever can mobilize and move people.

The way we think about race relations has changed. Black Lives Matter (BLM), the organization founded in 2013 to advocate against police brutality against African Americans, gained prominence and power in 2020 because of the new power of crowd communication and activity in the wake of George Floyds death in May 2020, while being pinned down by a police officer in Minneapolis. Protests all around the country and the world followed suit, with people gathering in large demonstrations, often spontaneously. Not all of these gatherings were organized by BLM, but they were most certainly inspired and motivated by the movement. Companies quickly issued public statements in support of the Black community specificallysomething that was unprecedentedfrom resale app Poshmark to footwear company Vans to search engine Bing to lifestyle gurus Magnolia Home, and many, many others. In June 2020, the Ad Council, a nonprofit that creates public service messages on behalf of a variety of sponsors, launched a campaign to inspire Americans to fight for racial equality.