CMNS2290 week 4 readings

I believe they key messages from this week’s readings were about:

How important media relations are within public relations - the media are said to make up a large portion of stakeholders within the PR sphere. The online readings highlighted framing and interpretation as well as the relationship between the media, PR and the public sphere. It looked at how the media shapes public opinion and the benefits which a PR practitioner may gain through developing a strategic media campaign. The textbook reading focused on how to build a relationship with the media – the different media styles and how to use PR tools to target these styles.

The key readings could be applied to my groups work:

I think it would be important to identify the types of media which my group need to/intend to work with. The readings could further be applied to my group work by way of which tools could be used to target different media types and how to appropriately use them.

The readings made me think more about public relations theory/practice in that they:

Helped me to get a better knowledge of how to effectively get a message across to the media, stakeholders and the general public. It demonstrated how important it is to recognise who the targeted audience is and furthermore, what tools are most successful at reaching this audience e.g. media conferences allow a larger number of people (perhaps stakeholders and journalists) to deal with a story. The readings further made me realise the importance of a good relationship between a PR person and the media.

The readings related to the other readings I’ve done in previous weeks:

In previous readings the need for strategic planning and research has been highlighted. This weeks readings further looks at the need to do this – the need to research what media to use to reach key publics and the necessity of planning how to do this (media releases, press kits, feature articles etc).