Advertising and public relations

The distinction between advertising and PR is more easily avert: advertising involves paying a medium (TV, radio, newspaper or magazine, for example) for airtime or column inches in which to put across a promotional message. The content of an ad is always controlled by the advertiser, unlike the content of editorial pages or programs, which are controlled by journalists. Public relations practitioners try to persuade journalists to cover their products and services on the grounds of newsworthiness. An ad doesn't have to satisfy any news value – it just has to be legal and paid for.

The Institute of Practitioners in Advertising defines advertising as follows:

Advertising presents the most persuasive possible selling message to the right prospects for the product or service at the lowest possible cost.

Here, the phrase “selling message” distinguishes the two disciplines – PR aims not to increase sales, but to increase understanding. Sometimes, of course, understanding a product or service improves sales, but PR does not claim a direct causal link. The content of the message is likely to be PR-driven, related to the corporate strategic aims of the organization rather than product support. (Theaker 2001:6)

To conclude, when advertising is used by public relations, we shall understand that PR practitioners are not selling a product or a service (commercial advertising), their target is to obtain the recognition of the organization.

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