PR agencies take blogging seriously. Should they?

About 3 years ago, I came across a PR agency in the US talking about "Blogger Relations"...and it was an early recognition of the emergence of bloggers as influential people, somewhat like traditional media. PR agencies are recognising this and today's survey by Text100 confirms that one of the world's leading PR agencies is taking bloggers seriously.
I have my doubts on some issues. I am concerned about misuse of blogging but you cannot stop it anymore than you can stop abuse of conventional media. It is more difficult. But it is clear that blogging, or what I call "micro-publishing" is a fact of life.
I have said this many times: Random writing is not blogging -- and certainly not the type media or PR practitioners should take seriously

Here below is the release from Text100 on the issue.



APAC bloggers call for PR people to get online and blog
Text 100 asks 153 predominantly business, technology and news bloggers across APAC what they want from PR and corporation

Text 100 today announced the results of the Text 100 APAC Blogger Survey a new survey aimed at helping the PR industry and its clients better understand bloggers in the Asia Pacific region.

Key Points

In what is believed to be the first survey of its kind conducted in Asia Pacific, this survey highlights the similarities and differences between bloggers across APAC and their preferences for working with corporations and PR agencies.
In a positive sign for the communications industry, 84% of respondents welcome contact from public relations practitioners and the corporations they represent.
Electronic communication is king for APAC bloggers: 58% preferred email, followed by online comments on their blogs, as the preferred means of contacting them.
Similarly, emailing of press releases and interviews or discussions ranked in the top two as the preferred formats for receiving content (67% and 60% respectively).
APAC bloggers are not particular about who they engage with, but prefer to talk with active bloggers and whoever is closest to the story – not necessarily the traditional spokespeople.
Two thirds (67%) of respondents spend less than 8 hours of their working week on blogging.
Bloggers concerns included receiving unsolicited spam from PR agencies, and were frequently critical of the content they received, feeling it was inappropriate and unusable.
While most bloggers ignore traditional press releases, 88% were aware of so-called Social Media Releases and indicated they were in favour of using elements such as videos, quotes, pictures and links from these releases in their posts.
Text 100 surveyed bloggers it knew and those referred by friendly bloggers, not wanting to spam people it didn’t have a relationship with. Text 100 feels the views of the survey’s sample pool are a fair reflection of influential news, technology and bloggers across Asia Pacific.
Text 100 intends to conduct this survey annually across Asia Pacific and to potentially involve other regions over time.
Note: 153 mainly business, news and technology bloggers from eight countries across Asia Pacific responded to the survey. 125 bloggers completed the full online survey, and results were analysed by Hong Kong-based research company, Aha! Research.

Quotes

"The survey showed that effective PR agencies need to make social media part of their DNA. Understanding the nuances of bloggers, for example, should be part of every PR person's toolkit, and not simply relegated to a 'digital group' or 'online team'. To succeed, PR professionals must increasingly become grounded in social media." "It was also interesting to see two quite distinct 'flavours' of bloggers across Asia: those who took a commercial, publisher-like mindset to their blogging, and those who proudly retain their amateur status."

—Michael A. Netzley, PhD Practice Assistant Professor of Corporate Communication Singapore Management University

"The survey was well conducted and is representative of bloggers from across Asia. It's interesting to see Malaysia appears to be ahead in terms of PR/Corporate and blog collaboration. The salient points are distilled and valuable; know your audience, be well informed, be familiar with their blog and blogs in general and most importantly - respect bloggers."

—ShaolinTiger, (www.shaolintiger.com)

“This survey showed that though bloggers in Asia Pacific have some parallels with their counterparts in Europe or North America, there are some differences that communicators should consider. Encouragingly, Asia Pacific bloggers on the whole welcome interactions with PR companies and their clients. But they are mainly part time bloggers, so agencies must take care to contact them outside of business hours and ensure content is relevant. The key learning is to get to know the bloggers and their blogs before picking up the phone or sending that email.

“If I was to use this survey as a baseline as to where the PR industry is at in terms of its success and relationships with bloggers, I would hope that the results of next year’s survey show a far deeper and more connected PR industry that is using the social media tools far more effectively to listen, prepare and engage with the APAC blogosphere.”

—Jeremy Woolf, APAC Peer Media Lead, Text 100 APAC

“The ‘perfect storm’ of technological, business and societal change means the way corporations must communicate has changed forever. At Text 100 we have worked hard to stay ahead of these changes and interpret what they mean for our clients.”

“This survey was designed to provide our teams and clients with greater insight into what is fast becoming one of Asia’s most influential media groups. To me, the results show a community that wants to engage with corporations in our region and presents a great opportunity for PR agencies and the companies they represent to forge very powerful relationships.”

—Ava Lawler, Regional Consultancy Director, Text 100 APAC