back to article PR people 'put duty to the public ahead of employers' interests'

Public relations professionals, often thought generally to lie on a spectrum somewhere between Edina Monsoon (Ab Fab) and Malcolm Tucker (The Thick Of It) are actually "fervent about serving the public interest", and typically place their duty to the public above any loyalty to their employers. We learn this from a press …

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  1. jake Silver badge

    ::snicker::

    Marketards have a strange understanding of reality.

    People with clues ignore advertising & marketing.

    From my perspective (after over a third of a century in the industry), does it work? Can it solve a current problem? If yes, we'll use it. If no, we won't.

    Problem sorted. How hard is it?

  2. Sorry that handle is already taken. Silver badge

    This just in

    Second hand car sales men and women are "swell people", according to second hand car sales men and women.

    Ambulance chasing personal injury lawyers "not so bad once you get to know them", believe ambulance chasing personal injury lawyers.

    Politicians "only interested in doing the right thing", reports politician.

    etc. etc.

    1. Intractable Potsherd

      Re: This just in

      But Human Resource professionals would never say that - they hate everyone. However, they are so inept they couldn't organise this sort of research anyway.

      Yes, I've had a bad week with HR.

  3. DF118
    Pint

    Anybody here work in marketing? Kill yourself. No, seriously, kill yourself. Do it right now.

    1. Silverburn

      A tad extreme, surely?

      Afterall, if all the marketards become extinct, who will:

      - you be able to dump some redhot "blame potatoes" on?

      - buy all the Porche Cayennes?

      - run the infomercial and shopping channels?

      - try their hardest to drink our EU beer and wine lakes?

      Marketards are underrated IMO. Though not as much as the old days when they were useful as "arrow fodder".

      1. DF118
        Gimp

        @Silverburn

        Not sure whether to upvote for content of comment or downvote for missing of Hicks quote.

        1. Silverburn
          Happy

          Re: @Silverburn

          Nah - I got it...I just couldn't remember where I first heard it! Now I know...

          1. Anonymous Coward
            Anonymous Coward

            Re: @Silverburn

            > Nah - I got it...I just couldn't remember where I first heard it! Now I know...

            https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UEnA29wK7uM

            Probably best not to play at full volume at work; it's a tad sweary...

      2. Rampant Spaniel

        I volunteer to deal with the wine lakes. If there's any blind folks willing to take on the cayennes we will be a lot closer to not needing pr bods!

    2. Ashton Black

      Upvote for Bill Hicks quote!

  4. Pat 11

    onion

    You sure the source wasn't The Onion?

    1. Alpha Tony

      Re: Pat11

      Onion sauce? Sounds delicious!

  5. Chemist

    Journal of Mass Media Ethics

    Good grief !

    A very slim journal published every 100 years?

    1. g e
      Joke

      Re: Journal of Mass Media Ethics

      Well, more of a pamphlet .. ;o)

      Do you have any light reading..?

    2. John Bailey
      Go

      Re: Journal of Mass Media Ethics

      With 100% advertising for other publications. And a huge pile of those little slips of paper that fall out of American magazines.

  6. frank ly

    It sounds like PR spin to me

    They're just doing their job as best they can. They can't help it.

  7. Pete 2 Silver badge

    File under: Laughable

    > your typical PR type is in fact a selfless crusader for truth and justice

    Old joke alert: What's the difference between a car salesperson and a computer salesperson? The car salesperson knows when they're lying

    The moral being that it's possible to believe you're telling the truth - especially when you don't have the foggiest idea about the technology, the principles or the theory of what you're trying to flog. Alternatively if you're easily convinced (or want to believe) that a certain thing is true you can then become a fanatical proponent of that - even if everyone around you think it's complete bollocks.

    So, a good PR person will believe whatever story it is they're trying to foist on the rest of us. They cannot therefore be blamed for thinking they're doing the right thing, or that their evangelical energy is misplaced. We should feel sorry for them (while patting them on the head and saying "yes, of cooooourse it does") rather than lambasting them. Just don't be taken in by their patter, no matter how convincing it may sound.

    1. JimC

      Re: File under: Laughable

      As a young industrial chemist I remember being told never to tell our sales force anything we wouldn't be happy with the competition knowing. Doubtless the same applies to PR types.

      In other news, the ghosts of Mao, Pol Pot and Stalin have been heard saying "we always had the long term best interests of our people as our highest priority"

  8. ratfox
    Trollface

    "I can't afford to lose my credibility ... As PR professionals, it's all we have"

    Well, in that case I have bad news for you…

  9. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Uh, no they don't

    That's all that needs to be said.

  10. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    PR people inhabit a different world...

    ... somewhere near Oz.

  11. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Journal of Mass Media Ethic

    to repeat:

    Journal of Mass Media Ethic

    a couple of thin jokes: why is it the lightest journal in the world? Because it only has a cover+backpage.

    Why is it most eco-friendly journal in the world? Same reason and no print inside.

    Why has no one heard of this journal ever before? Well, pretty obvious

    etc.

  12. Christoph

    Odd that

    I wonder then who does write the reams of meaningless management-speak babble that appears every time some company gets caught out, explaining how lessons have been learned and anyway it was all a long time ago (because the company has been delaying the enquiry until everyone has forgotten about it).

  13. smudge
    Angel

    What el Reg didn't tell you...

    ...is that the researchers are from a private Christian university in Waco, Texas.

    I'm sure that's not relevant, but there, I've told you anyway.

  14. PositivePaul on Skype
    Unhappy

    Giving Puffery the 'oxygen of publicity'

    Thanks for adding some editorial context

    This is a well-written dissection of some poor PR, albeit transparently crap PR by the PR industry. For that reason, let's celebrate the journalistic scrutiny of this 'news' which can only be called 'puffery'

    Slightly different point - but to redress the cowardly (i.e anonymous troll) slagging of the tech marketing profession.

    Make no mistake, IT users in B2B as well as B2C are quite competent at buying second rate products without much help from PR but a lot of help from publications (not the The Reg of course) who chase eyeballs with linkbait stories around iPhones and Facebook and other 'technology' stories. Read the 'Business' sections of any national newspaper for proofpoints.

    Then let's remember without PR people promoting rival technologies day after day, we would all be buying the same crap as last year, we would have a much smaller, slower growth, less interesting industry and you could substitute the words 'Apple' and 'Cloud' for technology in every publication.

    Net of nets - by all means call out moronic, self-serving pap but if you want to be proud of what you do for a living, is there much point in slagging Tech marketing?

    Hideous Cayennes are a different story................

    1. Martin 47

      Re: Giving Puffery the 'oxygen of publicity'

      Think you are confusing PR types and marketing types.

      Is easy to tell the difference, marketing types are the ones you shoot first.

  15. Trollslayer
    Mushroom

    30?

    We need a cull.

  16. Graham Marsden
    Devil

    Howls...

    ... of derisive laughter, Bruce!

  17. teebie

    "I can't afford to lose my credibility ... As PR professionals, it's all we have".

    PR professionals have nothing?

  18. Sandman619o1

    PR

    Those nasty 'white papers' & similar trash are paid placement, which means the site is being paid to offer this trash to its readers. Paid placement is either a marketing function or their advertising firm. Either way, that stuff is annoying. PR people help connect writers with leaders of industry for fresh quotes to make their stories shine. Writers don't normally have the ability to call a CEO & get a quote to help lend authenticity to an article. Instead, their contact is the PR staff or firm for that company. Even the major news media work this way. A good PR effort will never be noticed in the story. Bad PR efforts are like getting root canal from a used car sales man. If I was stranded on an island I'd rather have the company of a good PR person than a salesman any day

    Cheers !

    1. Steve the Cynic
      Joke

      Re: PR

      "If I was stranded on an island I'd rather have the company of a good PR person than a salesman any day"

      Why? Do they taste better?

      1. John Bailey
        Angel

        Re: PR

        No..

        But there is no guilt, so less need for counselling once one gets rescued.

  19. fung0
    Angel

    Ha Ha

    Good piece - it's rare to see such unintended irony. But of course, you could do a similar study about any profession and come up with the same, equally ludicrous result.

    Obviously, everyone thinks they're the "organizational conscience." In practice, however, it turns out that everyone's morals are tempered by pragmatism, expedience and the herd instinct. Most of us do the best we can in an imperfect world. Some do better than others.

    I've known a surprising number of PR people who were honest and hard-working, who made a strenuous effort to pick clients who let them be that way. And I've known masses of journalists who were happy to go with the flow, to write what they were supposed to write, and, above all, to believe what they were supposed to believe. It's relatively rare to hear an editor flat out say: if you write this, you're history. But it's commonplace to see journalists just sort of accidentally not get promoted, for trying too hard to be the "organizational conscience" - espousing unpopular points of view, or speaking out just a little too frankly about an advertiser's product. Most journalism, is, after all, paid for by advertising. In fact, most of us earn a living, maybe indirectly, by flogging a 'product.'

    Bill Hicks certainly wasn't wrong to rail against "marketing and advertising." But PR didn't create the idea of self-serving dishonesty; PR was created by a civilization that values honesty far less than ambition and profitability. The worst excesses of PR truly have been ludicrous. It's useful to ridicule such obvious failings of other professions. As long as we don't forget to be embarrassed at the frequently low standards of our own.

  20. peter 45
    Happy

    Wow

    Its almost as if they actually believe what they are spouting.

    PR expertise at its best.

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