Blog

Impact of the 2013 elections.

A huge portion of the broad social media community is involved in advocacy and sharing of politically-related news and views. In the same manner, government starting with President Noynoy Aquino and a growing number of political personalities are also actively engaging social media.

PRworks, for instance, has decided to join the political conversations last October 2011 in anticipation of the increase in traffic for politically-relevant blogs. The agency has encouraged and supported our networks of writers and bloggers to join politika2013.wordpress.com which is designed broadcast views from the Philippine south.

Consider also the impact on Philippine politics of extensive use and success of engaging social media in political mobilizations abroad like the 2011 Arab Spring  and Occupy movement. Then there is the 2012  presidential elections in the United States. Facebook and Twitter users would more likely participate in offline political meetings. Online sharing is leading to offline engagement.

Social Media

Politicians interested in running for national and local public offices during the 2013 midterm elections would be stupid to ignore the importance and power of engaging social media communities. Already, several Facebook accounts and pages of known politicians. Some have also gone into putting up blogs and even Twitter accounts.

This means spreading political campaign budgets to include publicity through social media. Those who refuse to do so for various reasons would find their campaigns overtaken by social media-savvy politicians. Because the central offices of national candidates are based in Metro Manila, politicians would need public relations assistance to engage traditional and social media in southern Philippines.

Understanding and insights into how social media can help a particular political campaign vary however. Professional public relations practitioners could help in crafting an integrated political marketing campaign.

While the corporate world needs to deal with the faster spread of bad news – a situation that bred more crisis communicators, politicians running for elective positions face active competition that (it is safe to assume) engages in demolition tactics. Politicians need to learn fast in controlling social media conversations.

Role of PR will grow

As the corporate world, the political community and stakeholders, and traditional media organizations in the Philippines engage social media to reach the public, the value of proactive and reactive public relations grows with it. Our experience as PR partners in the Visayas and Mindanao for Globe Telecom and Nokia Philippines has made us realize and take advantage of new ways to communicate using emerging technologies.

Public relations agencies like PRworks will have to compete with advertising and SEO companies that pay for placement however. PR primarily focuses on building earned hits and communities of followers.

We, in PRworks, are doing this by engaging traditional and social media in online and offline activities and networks. Aside from helping Cebu and Visayas bloggers organize their events, for instance, the agency initiated the formation of the Media Information Network for Nutrition and Development (MIND) 7 with the National Nutrition Council (NNC) in Central Visayas. We also moved to form the Tourism and Heritage Information Network (THINK) 7 together with the Department of Tourism (DOT) also in Central Visayas.

Still, the pace at which information moves in all directions is a continuing challenge. We are dealing with an ever changing traditional and social media world. This means the continuing challenge for building brands and reputations, helping clients face crisis situations proactively, and engaging communities in southern Philippines online and offline. Back

————————

Related articles

• Public Relations in southern Philippines this 2012 (a) (prworks.wordpress.com)
• Public Relations in southern Philippines this 2012 (c) (prworks.wordpress.com)
• Public Relations in southern Philippines this 2012 (d) (prworks.wordpress.com)
• Looking past 2011 and forward to 2012 (cebubloggers.com)
• 12 social media trends to watch for in 2012 (commpro.biz)
• Where is PR going in 2012 (commpro.biz)