"PR is still in a nascent state." Well, when is it expected to mature? I've been hearing this for over 6 years now and given the rapid progress that the country is witnessing, one can be confident in pointing out the enormous contribution made by PR. Many PR practitioners still flay journalists, getting back the same from them. They belittle clients and the point of contact. Why does this repeatedly happen? I had the privilege of working with a veteran marketing wizard who once told me that,"you create what you think." I think, it holds true for PR as well. No, I don't think but it is indeed true. Indian PR practitioners try and target only one application, and that's invariably the media - print media, 99.9%. They (ideate, conceptualize) dissect client organization and it's departments for possible news stories getting 1-30 clips of print. Is it a one time effort? Do they broadly think of setting of a campaign. The answer is no. Most of the practitioners try and work out one month or one day PR solution - be it a launch or corporate results. There is absolutely no objective behind any exercises.

I think, practitioners of this trade will have to come out of the "media" coccoon and weave their networking strength to encompass "word of mouth" and new technology application. Consider the mobile phone, blogs, movies, matches,competitions etc. Can't PR play a role in reaching directly to the TA? As long as the practitioners depend solely on journalists, they'll continue to receive brickbats.

Quite intriguing! can money entice journalists to pen down reports that will transform their own nation into pits? Well, it certainly seems so going by the recent events that shook America. One of the prominent newspapers there has reported US govt funding a PR agency to plant favourtable reports in Iraqi newspapers. The PR agency reportedly paid journalists to write about US funding and rebuilding initiatives in the country. If money can buy anything,PR can create anything.

Picture this, how would Ford sell a million cars in India without planned promotion, i.e, sans ads, PR,DMs and other below the line marketing activities. How about Oracle and SAP? Well, the world would have been genuine. Technology will sell for what it is worth and not for its brand value. People will get hired for demonstrated success and not based on pfaff.
Well, am not crazy to come out with weird imaginations and then sending it out to even weird readers. The other day, while speaking to some Oracle professionals, I gathered that an Oracle Apps suite is available for 75 lakhs(it could also be in crores). However, another colleague brought me a letter where the same application was "hard-sold" for 20 lakhs. Well, if I delve further, am pretty confident of getting the same at rock-bottom prices. How is this possible? Well, it is how cleverly you package your product and present it to a particular target audience. In this case, a corporate was charged nearly 4 times more for the same "cd" than an SME. Delve a little further and you'll see how cleverly the communication professional enabled Oracle to package a "cd" and earn 4 times more.