How PR firms are ensuring resilience during hard times
By Tanya ShanThe prevailing economic crisis has severely impacted all businesses across the country, and those engaged in the field of public relations are no exceptions. Public Relations (PR) refers to managing how others see and feel about a person, a company, or a brand and plays a significant role in building confidence amongst the general public. This week, The Sunday Morning Business spoke to several PR firms/agencies in Sri Lanka to determine the scale of impact on their businesses due to the unprecedented economic crisis the country is enduring at present. Commu1 Director Nishan Magodaratna shared that the current economic downturn was affecting the PR industry in a multitude of ways. “Primarily, it has thrown the print medium – our lead PR media – in at the very deep end. Corporates have drastically reduced their A&P budgets during the last four years and print has undeniably taken the biggest jab, and these corporates have yet to see the effectiveness of print media in their communication strategy, be it advertising or PR,” Magodaratna revealed. Secondly, PR is a reflection of the marketing or business activities of a brand or corporate, and no proper or effective PR could emerge from nothing, unless it is sheer rhetoric, Magodaratna noted. The economic downturn forces companies and brands to lie low and opt for the bare minimum, but lesser marketing activities mean lesser PR activities. Clients are now shelving almost all their new activities and projects until the next improved cycle of events, which causes PR agencies to shoulder the damage.“We have certainly experienced a slowdown of client activity, which is understandable. But what is more earth-shattering is the sheer ignorance of some who go all out and do sponsorships or associations in unrelated territories that make no business or communication sense at all. In most cases, it’s an ego thing, but most are sensible enough to have a dialogue with us so we can help them conduct themselves sensibly and carefully,” he stated. Magodaratna stated that as a responsible PR agency, they communicated the reality of the situation to their clients, which sometimes meant lesser options and measures. He added that his agency did not want to reinvent itself as anything other than what it really was, and while this might be a dying breed, it was far more gracious to withstand the blow instead of denying it through a multitude of other means.“Even in bleak times such as these, there might be good news to share amongst our audiences. Corporates and businesses can reinvent themselves to do good to the suffering communities. From banking and finance companies to confectionary companies, almost every sector and industry should find ways and means to help different communities and segments,” he stated. Meanwhile, Mercury Public Relations PR Consultant Sulochana Perera told The Sunday Morning Business that one of the biggest challenges at present was to secure space for news coverage on publications, because with newspapers scaling down the number of pages as a result of being unable to source paper, it frequently became difficult to deliver the promised scope.“This is especially the case when it comes to Sinhala and Tamil publications that have either entirely removed their business sections or reduced the space allocated for brands. Newspapers too are emphasising more PR relationships based on advertising support which is difficult for smaller clients to meet. Further, certain activities such as events have been postponed or cancelled due to logistical issues which in turn has affected our revenue. Unfortunately, there seems to be no viable solution in sight and with the fuel issue, we can only expect this problem to exacerbate. We are pushing forward with a heavier focus on digital PR,” she explained. According to Perera, while PR-related spending by companies was certainly more controlled at present, her company at least had not seen changes to the lineup of activities planned for the year by most clients. HighVoltagePR Managing Director Supun Dias sharedthat while advertising budgets had been scaled down in terms of print and electronic media buying, work was still coming in in terms of copywriting, content creation, and translation, since they had clients from the financial sector.“We have expanded our services to clients on digital marketing and digital buying along with social media management services. Also, in a personal capacity, I have diversified into exports. We have somehow balanced our revenue streams since we have employees whose jobs have to be secured and we have to assure them a future during these tough times,” Dias added. He noted that as many employees worked from home, this had reduced most of the additional costs.
