Advertising vs Public Relations

Media Relations, Healthcare Public Relations, Entertainment PR firms, Healthcare Public Relations, Communication Agency are all necessary for the survival of a business. 

• Public Relations vs and Advertising

Of the four Ps of marketing - Product, price, promotion and place - several activities make up the promotion P of the marketing mix: advertising, sales promotion, personal selling and public relations. Of these activities, advertising and public relations make up a significant part of the promotional marketing efforts. 

Advertising is an impersonal mass communication about a product or service paid for by the marketer. Public relations is the element in the promotional mix that evaluates public attitudes, identifies issues that may elicit public concern and executes programs and acceptance. While advertising is a one-way, impersonal message paid for by a marketer, public relations focuses more on feedback and the public response. 

Here's an example to understand the difference between advertising and public relations. Advertising is a lot like taking a huge , 600-student intro to Economics course your freshman year of college. You sit and listen to the professor, take notes and try to absorb the information, but the chances of him or her noticing when you don't understand something or stopping to answer a question from the back row are pretty slim.

So, if advertising is the primary message sent to potential consumers to persuade them, public relations is the response to customer feedback and is an attempt to build a more personal relationship with consumers.

• Public Relations Goals and Functions

The main goal of public relations is to create a positive image of a company or product. There are several functions used in public relations to help create this positive image, including sponsorship, consumer education, new product publicity, product placement and the internet and social media. Be sure to check out the next lesson on reasons companies use public relations to see these functions in action. 

All of these functions have the goal of getting the company's name out to the public while generating as much goodwill, or positive feelings about the public while generating as much goodwill, or positive feelings about the company or product, as possible.