Tagged / public relations

Fusion supports Euro PR History Network advance

Delegates to the EPRHN Planning Meeting

With financial support from the Fusion Investment Fund, the European Public Relations History Network (EPRHN) held its first planning meeting at BU on Wednesday June 26.

The network was founded virtually in 2012 by Prof Tom Watson of the Media School and drew interest from 33 academics and practitioners in 11 European countries. It was approved.as a project by EUPRERA (Europe’s PR education and research association) in autumn last year.

Its aims are to develop and produce information about the history and historiography of public relations in Europe through the identification and formation of archives, transnational research, joint research bids and the production of publications in print and online formats.

The meeting of EPRHN’s core group brought seven historical researchers from Germany, Romania, Spain, Scotland, Turkey and Bournemouth. Fusion assisted their attendance through travel bursaries.

Among the actions to be progressed are a bid to the EU’s COST (Cooperation in Science and Technology) scheme, which was facilitated on Wednesday by Paul Lynch of RKE; a second edition of its Archives Record publication; and a panel session on ‘developing the history of European public relations’ at EUPRERA’s annual conference in October.

Prof Watson, who was supported by Dr Tasos Theofilou in the organisation of the meeting, said it had been highly productive. “There’s a limit to what we can achieve by email and Skype. The EPRHN made a big forward step because FIF helped bring key members together”. It will also assist Prof Watson and Dr Theofilou to fully launch the group at the October conference.

“At present, 13 countries are represented in the network. We hope to widen that base and engage many more historical researchers in its activities”, said Prof Watson.

For more information about EPRHN and BU’s contribution to the burgeoning field of PR history, go to: http://historyofpr.com.

Squeezing the pips from a conference with social media

Please forgive the self-publicity, but I would like to share my recent use of social media to promote BU, research, a conference and papers.

Last week, I attended the annual International Public Relations Research Conference (IPRRC) in the US, where I presented three papers, one with a US co-author. It’s the largest conference in the field, drawing 101 papers over three days and attendance in the order of 150-175 academics, graduates and some practitioners.

To broadcast involvement in the conference, I used my personal blog to present a daily summary of interesting papers:  http://fiftyonezeroone.blogspot.co.uk/. The blog posts have had over 210 visits so far and were also circulated on LinkedIn, Twitter and Google+. There have been many re-tweets (RTs), plus appreciative emails and direct messages via Twitter.

A short summary of “top 10 research tips” was written for the prmoment.com website which has around 30,000 users, worldwide. It was posted on the site’s blog and is included in this week’s publication: http://blog.prmoment.com/ten-pr-research-tips-from-bournemouth-universitys-professor-tom-watson/

The outcomes of this type of activity will be long-term and hard to measure, but as I was the only UK delegate at IPRRC this year, it has given BU, our research and industry knowledge an international platform of expertise and insight to present ourselves. The capital cost was almost nil, as I used my own netbook, Wi-Fi was free and the time component was less than an hour a day. Try this approach at your next conference or internal event.

Tom Watson presenting at IPRRC 2013

Fusion supports new PR research collaboration in Asia

Awarded & submitted bids, Fusion, REF Subjects, Research themes

Prof Tom Watson teaching at Chulalongkorn University

For several years, the Media School (TMS) has been developing a relationship with Chulalongkorn University in Bangkok, Thailand. Chula, as it is known, is rated as the No.1 university in the kingdom.

The SMN award allows the development of a collaborative project between TMS and the Faculty of Communication Arts at Chula to organise an academic conference on public relations in Asia in Bangkok on November 18-19.
The conference will provide a platform for academic research on public relations history, current theory and practice, and future trends. In particular, it will investigate Asian (i.e. non Anglo-American) perspectives of public relations and will be the first dedicated conference to do so.

Prof Tom Watson, who is a co-chair of the conference, says the SMN funding “will lead to the development of a sustainable academic and research partnership between the two universities. It will enable BU staff participation in cross-cultural research with Thai colleagues. The conference will also place BU in a leadership role on research into cross-cultural communications and international public relations.”

Dr Ana Adi is working with Prof Watson on the project. She taught at Chula in mid-2012 on a staff exchange. She and at least one other TMS academic will be attending the conference and presenting papers.

The conference collaboration started with attendance by Chula’s Dr Napawan Tantivejakul at the International History of Public Relations Conference 2011 at BU, which began a dialogue about a joint conference with an Asian focus. This was cemented when Prof Watson visited Chula in November last year as a visiting professor and negotiated the arrangements. It is hoped that there will be 16 speakers, plus two keynotes, and 50 delegates at the November event.

Presenting student research internationally

It’s a long way in place and time from October 2010 in the Media School to March 2012 at the International Public Relations Research Conference at the University of Miami in sunny Florida. That’s the journey that BAPR graduate Lauren Willmott has taken from first thoughts on her dissertation to presenting the results at the conference, along with academics and practitioners from 24 countries and over 100 other papers.

Lauren Willmott and Prof Tom Watson at IPRRC Miami

Lauren’s research on the use of Twitter as a crisis communication tactic was supervised by Prof Tom Watson.  It reviewed two transport crises in 2009 and 2010 and investigated the role and usage of the 140-character medium in keeping passengers, their families and the media abreast of the news.

The investigation won her the Wessex CIPR award for the best public relations dissertation and also helped Lauren gain a position at the leading international PR consultancy A&REdelman in London where she works on Olympics-linked accounts. The firm also sponsored her attendance at the conference.

With Prof Watson’s assistance, an abstract from the dissertation was submitted to the prestigious Miami conference, and chosen for presentation. “This is a highly competitive review process with an acceptance rate of less than 50 per cent. Lauren’s research was pitted against some of PR’s best known academic researchers and so it was a real success that the jointly-authored paper was accepted,” said Prof Watson. “It was also the only paper accepted from a first author/early researcher who was not on a postgraduate or doctoral programme.”

So on Saturday March 10, Lauren presented her paper and got feedback (and applause) on the paper and for next stages of research. Amongst the responses to Lauren and Tom was that the paper’s standard was much higher than expected from US bachelor-level graduates: “Are all your students producing work as good as this?”

“Lauren’s achievement in presenting her paper at this high international level shows that BU students, with supportive supervision, can share the stage with the best researchers. It’s been a rewarding experience for everyone involved,” said Prof Watson.

Lauren’s verdict was, “It was amazing to be given the opportunity to present my dissertation in front of professionals who had inspired my research topic. The conference enabled me to network with a diverse range of PR professionals and as a result I have been presented with several opportunities such as Skyping into a lecture of students at the University of South Florida to talk about working in a London agency.”

Towards ‘Impact’ – promoting research online

Guidance

As the spectre of “Impact” looms before us in REF 2014, I’d like to share a case study on developing interest in research in academic and practitioner communities. I don’t claim that it’s best practice but there may be some ideas for others to consider.

Two of my related areas of research in the public relations field are measurement and evaluation of campaign effectiveness and the history of public relations. Over the past two years I have brought them together in historical research into the evolution of public relations measurement and evaluation. This has already resulted in conference papers and a publication in the leading impact factored journal, Public Relations Review.

 My most recent research has been into a controversial measure called Advertising Value Equivalence (AVE). It is widely used but has been effectively banned by leading public relations professional bodies. Next month, I will be presenting a paper on the history of AVE at the International Public Relations Research Conference in theUS. That paper will later be revised and submitted for a leading journal.

 Knowing there is a world-wide interest the debate over AVE, I prepared a short “popular” version of the paper and targeted it at the Research Conversations blog of the US-based Institute for Public Relations, which is well-regarded and widely read.

It appeared on February 15 as ‘So, Where Did AVEs Come From, Anyway?‘ and immediately started an online discussion.

Taking the article’s URL, I then placed it with introductory text on three relevant LinkedIn groups for PR history, media measurement and theUK’s lead professional body. Online discussions have taken place on two of these groups. The URL was also sent out via my two Twitter accounts (@historyofpr and twatson1709). Each has resulted in retweets of the URL, including some by leading social media commentators. There have also been positive comments.

Within just two days, the use of social media has enabled the summarised research to reach potentially interested, relevant audiences around the world. And I have still to present the paper next month. Only time will tell whether “Impact” has been created but social media has help pave the way for knowledge transfer and industry engagement.

 Any feedback on how I could have organised the social media dissemination more efficiently would be welcomed.

Prof Tom Watson, The Media School