Posted on by Barbara Nixon

Five Ways to Keep Current in Public Relations News & Trends

JKL 5 by mag3737

Let’s face it . . .  whether you’re a PR student, practitioner or faculty member, we’re all busy. So how can you get (and stay) up to speed with the ever-changing world of public relations? Here’s a quick guide to how I stay current in public relations.

One: Listen to PR podcasts.

Some of my favorite podcasts are: For Immediate Release, Inside PR, The Creative Career, Trafcom News, Marketing Over Coffee and Coming Up PR. My favorite time to listen to podcasts is during my daily two-mile walks in this sweltering Florida heat. I also listen to them when I drive, work out and clean the house. Some people prefer to listen to podcasts on their computers; my preference is listening to them on my Palm Pre or iPod.

Here’s a short video on how to subscribe to and download podcasts using iTunes. If you’re not an iTunes person, you may want to visit Podcast Alley, where you can find thousands more podcasts. You can listen to the podcasts directly from the website.

Two: Subscribe to daily or weekly PR e-mailed newsletters.

My favorite PR newsletter is one that comes into my inbox daily from Ragan Communications: the PR Daily newsfeed. When I want to read the latest on PR, this is the newsletter I turn to first. Another helpful newsletter comes from Chris Brogan; Chris provides different content in the newsletter than he does on his blog, so it’s definitely worth subscribing.

Three: Follow PR practitioners on Twitter.

Are you a public relations student (or recent grad) just getting started using Twitter? Try following some (or all) of these people or organizations in my Twitter Starter Pack for PR Students. They all have something in common: they tweet useful or interesting information for people involved in public relations.

Four: Read PR blogs.

There are hundreds of blogs about public relations. I’ve bookmarked many of them in Delicious for you. You can subscribe to them using your favorite RSS reader (such as Google Reader), or just read them on the web. Some of the most helpful blogs I’ve discovered recently include The Comms Corner and Karen Russell’s Week’s Best (which I just learned is on hiatus for the summer), as they aggregate current posts of interest to PR practitioners.

Five: Watch the news on TV.

Yes, I said “watch the news on TV.” I mean on a real TV, with a complete newscast, not just bits and bobs that you catch online. I start off every day a steaming mug or three of chicory coffee and at least an hour of broadcast news, usually with 15 or so minutes of local news followed by the Today Show. By knowing what’s going on in the world, it helps frame the snippets of stories I read or hear online throughout the day. To be sure that I’m keeping up on the news, I also listen to the podcast version of  NPR’s Wait Wait Don’t Tell Me weekly news quiz. (I sometimes even play the Lightning Round of Wait Wait in class on Mondays to see how much my students know about what’s going on in the world.)

Your suggestions?

What additional resources would you recommend?

(NOTE: This post is an updated version of one I wrote in early January 2010.)


102 Replies to “Five Ways to Keep Current in Public Relations News & Trends”

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  8. Just finished a tweet chat about all the books and blogs we wish we’d have time to read, so I’ll add YES to reading and following other PR practitioners. As a solo PR, I follow or lurk the Wednesday tweet chat for #solopr, which offers great resources on PR trends. And of course, need to MAKE time to read and comment on PR blogs and posts.

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  12. Barbata, Good post and thanks for the PR podcast list. I have always used podcasts in the same way you describe.

    Not to be too self serving but i also do a podcast called Marketing Voices http://www.marketingvoices.com that i have done since May 2006. It has around 15,000 downloads a podcast and you might enjoy it too. ww

    I interview people like Charlene Li (just posted a three part series of her and her new book) plus Guy Kawasaki, and Jeremiah Owyang.

    Nice to connect

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  19. Fantastic resource, Barbara!

    This also explains a couple of things:

    1) Why I had a sudden burst of new followers, and
    2) Why several of them seemed to be following the same 60 people!

    Well done, and I am flattered to be on your recommended list.

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  48. Great suggestions. I really need to get back into the habit of listening to podcasts as much as I can. Another good resource for PR blogs is Alltop – http://pr.alltop.com/

    I’d also encourage not just following PR people on Twitter, but actively engaging in conversations, questions and especially relevant chats when you can. It really is like having a professional development conference going on at (almost) all times.

    – @vedo

    1. Great point, Richie. I’ve noticed that when PR students are just starting out in Twitter, they are in broadcast-mode only . . . even when PR pros write back to them!

      What are some of your favorite Twitter chats? I was thinking of writing a blog post next week about participating in a Twitter chat — either that or linking to posts that others have written.

      Barbara

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