Will blogs kill PR?

Roland Tanglao has an interesting point in his PR is dead rant on globalprblogweek.com. He espouses the belief that once blogging gains popularity as a mode of communication, public relations will slowly become irrelevant to corporations.

This is akin to the belief that television would sound the death knell of newspapers. On the contrary, we have seen that not only have newspapers flourished after the advent of television, but they also formed a mutually beneficial relationship. How many times have we seen news channels cover a story broken by a newspaper, just as the number of times newspapers have analysed (the next day) stories broken by TV channels. Both the media have understood that they are, at the end of the day, infomediaries - the audience will choose the mode of communication.

Similarly, blogging will be the new form of communication, but by no means, will it be the cause of extinction of PR. A true PR professional will look to promote the message in all forms possible. This will not only include traditional media like print (and now TV), but also new media (Internet, blogs, mobile news etc). Rather than dying, PR is likely to use blogging as another tool.

However, the danger lies in the fact that many PR professionals tend to act as courier boys - sending press releases to all media and then following up for coverage. We should understand that PR should strategise, conceptualize, implement, improve and consolidate a communication exercise.

The message should hit the right audience, at the right time, in the right manner - all the time. Isn't that what communication is all about?