Overview of Corporate Communication

Function:
from PR to Corporate Communication
A growing number of companies recognize the value of corporate communication
and are adapting their budgets and internal structures accordingly. The fifth
Public Relations Generally Accepted Practices (GAP) Study, released by the
Strategic Public Relations Center at the University of Southern California on May
18, 2008, revealed that PR /communication budgets had increased by 10 percent
between 2002 and 2007 for all responding organizations.
After examining the roots of corporate communication, we discuss the most
appropriate structure for the function within an organization, including reporting
relationships. Public relations (PR), the predecessor to the corporate
communication (CorpComm) function, grew out of necessity. Although
corporations had no specific strategy for communications, they often had to
respond to external constituencies whether they wanted to or not. As new laws
forced companies to communicate in many situations they hadn't previously
confronted, the constant need for a response meant that dedicated resources
were required to manage the flow of communications.
This function, which was tactical in most companies, was almost always called
either "public relations" (PR) or "public affairs." Typically, the effort was focused
on preventing the press from getting too close to management. Like a patriot
missile, designed to stop incoming missiles during war, the first PR professionals
were asked to protect the company from bad publicity, often by "spinning"
damaging news in a positive light. Thus, the term "flak" came to be used to
describe what PR people were actually doing: shielding top managers from
"missiles" fired at them from the outside. The "flak" era of public relations lasted
for a number of decades, and when companies needed other communications
activities, public relations personnel were the obvious choice to take them on.
In the 1960s, for instance, it was not unusual to find public relations officials
handling speechwriting, annual reports, and the company newsletter. Given that
the majority of work in this area involved dealing with the print media (television
wasn't truly a factor until the 1 Fifth Annual Public Relations Generally Accepted
Practices Study," Strategic Public Relations Center, University of Southern
California, May 18, 2008. From "PR" to "CorpComm" early 1970s), many
companies hired former journalists to handle this job. The former-journalist
turned-flak brought the organization the first dedicated expert in the area of
communication. Until recently, the top managers in large companies came from
backgrounds such as engineering, accounting, finance, production, or, at best (in
terms of understanding the company's communication needs), sales or
marketing. Their understanding of how to communicate depended on abilities
they might have gained by chance or through undergraduate or secondary
school training rather than years of experience.
Given their more quantitative rather than verbal orientation, these old-style
managers were delighted to have an expert communicator on board who could
take the heat for them and offer guidance in times of trouble. PR professionals
often were seen as capable of turning bad situations into good ones, creating
excellent relations with their former colleagues in journalism, and helping the
chief executive officer become a superb communicator. In some cases, this
reputation was true, but for the most part, the journalists were not the answer to
all of the company's communications problems.

Spin Doctors
The power of public relations is the word. Word has served as means of reaction,
awareness and conviction to change either deep beliefs, traditional habits, the
reform of the social structure and even the history. The word 'spin-doctor' seems
to have originated in the United States and probably comes from baseball.
However, the first definition of 'spin-doctor' as how we know it currently dates
back to 1977 and appeared in the Oxford English Dictionary as "a person who
provides a favourable slant to an item of news, potentially unpopular policy
etcetera, especially on behalf of a political personality or party".

The term 'spin-doctor' started to be used in Britain in the 90s and was associated
with the rise of public appearance of Peter Mandelson and other New Labour
media experts, with Alastair Campbell as its main figure.  Alastair Campbell was
the Director of Communications and Strategy for Tony Blair between 1997 and
2003 and was considered to be one of the greatest 'spin-doctors' in British
politics. 

Spin is the most praised and reprehended tool in terms of government-media

relations. Every government uses it, including the opposition. Political will over
media can be manifested through media regulations, state control over media,
information secrecy, pressuring the media, etc.

Political parties and governments are visible sources of pressures on journalists.

There are many reports on how governments and ministries affect media content
in their reports. They influence the media through media experts and spin
doctors (Street, 2003, pp. 125–128). Spin doctors are people responsible for
shaping positive public perception about politicians or political parties by
skillfully manipulating the mass media.

Those people can be personal advisors of politicians, and often a confidential

friend. Spin doctors know how the media operates, the specific characteristics of
media, and they also frequently come from the media realm into politics. They
have excellent connections with editors, particularly the most influential ones.
Spin doctors depend on the media, and the media depend on spin doctors.
They have the goods, the information that is the life of the media (Tomić, 2010,
p. 147). One of the roles of spin doctors is to give anonymous guidelines about
the actual meaning of certain events, actions or statements, as well as to
influence interpretations.

Many spin doctors used to be journalists and therefore they know how the media
functions. They are aware of journalists’ dependence on deadlines and they are
always ready to provide information. Of course, they are seeking to get positive
texts for their superiors, and minimize the negative ones

Functions of Public Relations

Public Relations Department supervises and assesses public attitudes, and
maintaining mutual relations and understanding between an organization and its
public. It improves channels of communication and to institute new ways of
setting up a two-way flow of information and understanding.
1. Media Relations
 Preparing position papers on issues of importance to the organization
 Handling publicity
 Issuing news of activities to external audiences
 Establishing and maintaining contacts with the mass media
 Handling responses to inquiries from the mass media
 Coordinating media conferences and tours 
 Tracking and evaluating media coverage

2. Guest Relations
 Guest reception activities
 Preparing visit agenda and other visit related matters
 Conducting university tours
 Preparing brochures, tour guides, tapes, videos, maps and other guest-
related communications materials
 Preparing gift items for the visitors

3. Publications
 Preparing and publishing materials for public including dealers, agents,
advisory bodies and employees
 Helping out other departments to promote and publish event
announcements and other event related advertisement materials
 4. Marketing Publicity
 Announcing new products or services and enhancements in products and
services, though editorial channels of mass media
 Developing and executing promotional materials
 Participating in exhibits and marketing events

5. Others
 Developing a good working climate for university
 Providing PR Services to other departments (photographic services,
providing gift items, and etc.)
 Organizing PMU events
 Providing public information
 Managing sponsorship
 Building and managing relationships with other companies

Differentiating Organizations through Identity and

Image – Shape Identity – Building Image – Building
Reputation – Corporate Advertising

The image of an organisation can be summarised under many categories ranging

from young, friendly, speedy, honest to corruptive, in-efficient, suspicious and
anti-social.

Image building exercise

The exercise of image building starts with evaluating the status, understanding
the current perception for the brand in general and publics specific. It’s followed
by deciding the image to be build or need of alteration and activities involved to
do so.

The data collection to gauge the present image can be done by:

 Interviews and interactions with the target group. Various structured

survey tools or talks and interactive communication can be employed for
this data collection.
 Secondary sources like articles published media coverage and mentions
about the brand are analysed to check the perception.

The data collected forms to be the basis of the analysis of the image. Breaking
down the data gets you the image at the time of data collection and should be
read with reference to the source of data. It may vary from time to time and from
publics to publics.

Aspects of analysis

Public Opinion Research: It is to ascertain what people think about the brand, its
management, services, etc. Essentially, understand the attitude of publics
towards the organisation.
Image Study: Understand how and what is the organisation known for; analysing
brand’s reputation.

Motivation Research: It is to ascertain why the public carries a positive or

negative attitude towards the organisation – the root cause(s) – and also the
underlying emotional factor.

On the outset the image could be favourable, neutral or unfavourable &

undesirable. And that’s to be gauged.

Desired image

Brand may like to project a certain preferred image while the present image may
or may not fall in line with its expectations. The ‘Mission Statement’ of the brand
helps identify the image to be projected and the role of public relations is to
narrow it down and bring in sync with the desired positioning as well. For
instance a banking or financial institution may want to be known for its integrity,
honesty and efficiency in asset management but may like to project a ‘speedy’
or ‘friendly’ or ‘socially responsible’ image.

Based on the analysis of existing image and the desired image an action plan is
to be drawn and suggested by the PR. In case the image is way deviated and
degenerated as compared to the expectations a neutralisation activity or crisis
management exercise is to be undertaken.

Steps to Image building

 Adopt appropriate strategy

 Choose appropriate message
 Select appropriate media
 Disseminate information actively
 Keep analysing the response

Effectiveness survey

Post all public relations’ image building exercise an effectiveness survey must be
conducted so as to measure the impact. Sole purpose of the survey is to
ascertain the change in attitude of the people after campaign. The survey also
gives data points to help sketch better campaigns in future. It’s a continuous
process that leads to better image building and maintaining.

Public relations’ role is not to project the negative with a positive image but to
open the communication channels, remove the myths, doubts and suspicions.
Thus changing the shade of light that’s to be shed and bringing the best face of
the organisation forward.

Definitions: Corporate identity, corporate image and corporate

communications
When reading about corporate image, one can observe that image is closely
linked with the identity of a company. Moreover, identity has been a term that
has created confusion in the business world and in the media due to the fact that
has been used just as a graphic idea of creating logos during the 1960s.
Corporate identity and corporate image have to be strategically interpreted.
Therefore, in order to avoid misinterpretations we will use the following
definitions in our dissertation to characterize these three concepts.
Corporate identity is formed by a company’s history, its belief and philosophy,
the nature of its technology, its ownership, its people, ethical and cultural values.
It is the sum of the values and purposes of a company, its corporate strategy, its
organizational structure as well as its organizational culture. Each company has
its own corporate identity. Corporate identity is more than creation of logos
Corporate image is perception. It is the mental picture of an organization in the
mind of the audiences. Corporate image will be created by all the intentional or
unintentional actions of an organization.
Corporate communications is the process that translates an identity into an
image. It is a very important process because it conveys the identity to all the
audiences. Then, audiences perceive it and create an image of a company.
Differentiation
Generally, greatest value explains why consumers buy or not products and
services. The aim of marketing is to offer what consumers want: also, if you want
to catch and retain them, you will have “to understand these needs and the
buying processes better than competitors do, and deliver more value”.
Companies can create superior value for its markets (Kotler, 2005, p421):
• With lower prices than competitors
• Offer more advantages which explains higher prices
This superior value will be at the origin of a “competitive advantage” (Kotler,
2005, p421).
In this part, we will see the different ways where a company can differentiate its
offer. These points are:
a) Product differentiation: by offering features to standardized products or higher
performance
b) Service differentiation: it will be a differentiation of services “around”
products, which will create a higher value and also a competitive advantage
(notably speedy, reliable and careful delivery)
c) Personnel differentiation: hire and train better their employees than
competitors; choose carefully its “customer-contact people” in order that they
have good attitudes and knowledge
d) Image differentiation: if different companies offer the same products and
features, customers will perceive their images differently. It has to be unique and
distinctive.
The necessity of managing a corporate identity
Environment have caused the necessity of an effective management of
corporate identity and communications.
a) Acceleration of product life cycles. Mainly it is referred to consumer
electronics goods where companies need to reposition constantly in their
markets. Therefore the ones with high visibility and reputation have a differential
factor that reduce the uncertainty in the mind of the audiences
b) Competition increase and it is difficult for companies to differentiate
themselves from each other. By communicating a unique corporate identity,
companies reach a differential factor that adds value in the mind of the
organization’s publics.
c) Integrations of companies like mergers, acquisitions, divestments,
privatizations, deregulations and recessions cause that a company has to
redefine its identity.
d) Globalization. As markets become globalized, companies have had to create
good images that can be a competitive factor to expand internationally and
differentiate from competitors.
e) The cost of communication. As the cost of communication has been increased
steadily, it is very difficult to support a large number of brands. Therefore, a
corporate communication campaign seems to be an economic way to embrace
all the products.
f) Shortage of high-qualified personnel. In order to be competitive, firms need to
attract and retain the best employees. Thus, by being well perceived it is easy to
retain and attract the best skilled employees.
g) Public expectations for corporate social responsiveness. Increasingly, society
is more aware of the environmental problems and is demanding high levels of
corporate social responsiveness to companies. Companies should try to
communicate and carry out social actions to create a good image.
To sum up, due to the factors exposed above, companies need to review their
identities and how they communicate them in order to create an image that is
relevant to the corporate strategy.
Corporate reputation is a perceptual representation which is different in every
company, and which adds value to such company. It is the perceptions of all
stakeholders and social partners regarding reliability, respectability, financial
power, quality, social responsibility and corporate recognition.
So, it is the sum of the positive-negative feelings, impressions and ideas of the
people toward the company. Social stakeholders now demand the company not
only to express but also to reflect itself. That's why they care about the social
responsibility activities, social media reflections and service quality of the
company. People can develop their reputation in time. Similarly, companies have
started to manage their reputation and to shape it in parallel with the
innovations. It is possible to divide corporate reputation into three. These are
namely; Existing Identity, Desired Identity and Corporate Identity (Melewar and
Karaosmanoglu, 2006). 
1. Existing Identity: The identity a company has at the time being. 
 2. Desired Identity: The company's reaching its desired identity through several
symbols such as logo, slogans, advertising etc.
3. Corporate Identity/Image: Addresses the company's internal stakeholders
and is based on their perception of the company. Corporate image is related
with the external stakeholders. It is about how the customers perceive the
company.
Corporate advertising is the advertising done for an entire institution/
company/ organization and not for individual brands or products. This kind of
activity is an extension of the Public Relations (PR) activity done by the company
to improve its image in the minds of the general public and increase its goodwill
which is an extremely important intangible asset.
Instead of advertising for its individual brands and products, the corporate
advertises to build its own image.

These companies invest in improving the overall perception of the company

itself. They want to prove that the company is ethical and all its brands and
products are secondary. The primary focus for these companies are their
customers, which is what they try to prove through corporate advertising.

Corporate advertising is also effective for companies that are involved in

businesses that have a lot of negative potential. Negative potential means
possible distress to human life. These companies are extremely susceptible to
controversies and hence need to regularly invest in corporate advertising to keep
their image stable in the market. Cigarette companies, oil drilling and exploration
companies, pharmaceutical companies and mining companies are examples of
organizations that have a need for corporate marketing.

Corporate advertising also help in increasing sales and easier recruiting and
retaining employees.

To crisply summarise it, given below are the objectives of corporate marketing:

1. Creating a positive brand image of the firm

2. Explain a view point to the public and to take a stand during controversial
times
3. Engage and enhance employee morale
4. Maintain good relations with labour unions
5. Establish company identity and macro level positioning of the brand