Often times than not communication practitioners will set out to undertake stakeholder engagement but eventually find themselves throwing in a big chunk of public relations in the mix.
In some instances, practitioners may set out to manage a crisis but realise they need to undertake public relations and stakeholder engagement to get the intended outcome from the management of the crisis. Even though semantically diverse, this exemplifies the cross-cutting nature of these practices in the field of communication - there is a negligible divide in practice. For example, your Public Relations strategy may include advertising, events, media relations (news mentions, press release, etc) among others. In principle, these may be essential to your Public Relations strategy, but in practice they cut across all other components of audience activation and engagement, including stakeholder engagement, and crisis management.
Organizations allocate a good spend establishing teams to facilitate stakeholder engagement and build a customer centric mindset. Essentially delivering public relations with a personalised approach - in the process, ensuring issues are managed before they turn into crises, especially in the modern crisis prone business operating environment.
In addition, advances in technology have taken stakeholder or customer engagement practices to another level. The razor thin divide between humans and machine allows customers or clients to interact with Artificial Intelligence to get their inquiries delt with. Organisations have made it easy for themselves by allowing bots to muster and master their businesses and be able to keep customers updated and their problems sorted. However, many a time, bots are found wanting at a certain stage of the engagement, and that can be frustrating for a customer. This is why human interaction remains paramount in stakeholder engagement because of the emotional element that underlies stakeholder engagement, and the opportunity to establish a connection, a working relationship, and a human feel with your public.
So, what should practitioners do when engaging the modern consumer or customer? Well, methods may have changed and advanced, but the playing field remains the same – it is the same turf where strategies are commensurate with organisations strategic business goals. It is the same place where practitioners deal with customer or consumer emotions, in one way or the other, when handling customer issues. Successful engagement still exudes elements of human intelligence and public relations. Often, stakeholder engagement (and that includes infusion of Public Relations and in Crisis Management) is not devoid of emotional engagement and public relations– the how of dealing with these elements places practitioners apart from each other.
In the many years of practice in communication, I have encountered and observed practitioners resorting to straight jacketing stakeholder engagement into a logical exercise than an exercise of engaging with customer or consumer emotions. This is where I teach and inspire many practitioners to churn their engagement to achieve a seamless and longer lasting relationship with their stakeholders. Organisation ought to ensure their engagement teams are well rounded in the most important elements of stakeholder engagement, public relations, and crisis management for a positive customer experience and creating a community which is on your side.
It is important to craft a well thought out communication strategy that synchronises the arts of Public relations, Stakeholder engagement, Crisis management and any accessories to the delivery an effective communication for your organisation whilst fostering a positive emotional engagement with your audience.
When we understand your business, we at pjelwyns.com tailor these elements to suit your business objectives, and help you achieve your strategic goals.