In the world of Public Relations, getting to know the public is the main job. With helping journalist, they can help journalist make stories that are relevant to the majority demographic. For example, if the news station broadcasts over an area that has mostly farmers in the region, then the news report will most likely involve information that speaks on weather habits that may affect the crop this year or a story that mentions some updates that are happening in the farmers’ world.
As a public relations practitioner, the relationship between a PR practitioner and a reporter be very important.
At sometimes there can be rough patches where the two people do not get along but working together is very important to help get relevant news out to the public. Reporter C. Emmanuel says “As a reporter, it is always important to recognize that your relationship with all public relation practitioners is not the same at all times. In some cases, a reporter reaction to a practitioner is based on the way the practitioner approaches the reporter.
Sometimes a PR personnel can present themselves as being a forceful person when pitching a story. But for the most part, the relationship a reporter has with a PR practitioner has to be understood by both parties.”. By saying this she explains and confirms that overall the relationship between the reporter and the PR Practitioner. Although there can be hard times and the relationship can go downhill.
The negatives of the relationship between can be the risk of the PR Practitioner taking the job away from the reporter.
Meaning since part of the job for most practitioners who work in news media is to help find stories for the reporter to put on their daily news station or newspaper. The stories that the PR Practitioners submit to the are stories that they the practitioner think are current or relevant to the broadcast area or who they know who would report that. The only risk is that if the practitioners do most of the work and the reporting then the reporter won’t have much work to do and their job will not be needed. “A significant amount of time a reporter has is spent on coming up with information to write different stories. When working with PR professionals, that time that reporters spend on accumulating stories is decreased, which in many cases makes a reporter’s job less difficult.” said by C. Emmanuel when asked about the topic.
The positive side of PR practitioners and reporters working together is that while working together they can help get factual information for a story and use each other as a source to keep each other ethical. “In order for a reporter to successfully get their job done, PR people should make sure they provide all the factual information that is a part of the story they are pitching within their press release. This will help the reporter present the story in the correct way. PR practitioners should make sure pitches are sent to reporters in a timely matter so that the reporter has time to write their story.”, says C. Emmanuel The main communication style between Reporters and PR practitioners are mostly emails.
The PR Practitioner send the press release and with this technique, it helps the reporter get the press release in a timely matter. Usually, reporter has a deadline that they must meet. According to C. Emmanuel, her deadline is usually around 4:45 pm. “My deadline for everything I report on has to be in at least about an hour, or half an hour before we start practicing for the news broadcast that night. Usually, we start practicing exactly at 5 P.M., so I have to make sure everything is done by 4:30 P.M., no later than 4:45 P.M.” Overall the relationship with PR Practitioners and reporters, though can go through rough roads, are very impotent in many ways. With involving credibility, trusting or communicating with each other, or plain working together to get information out, benefits many people.