My trip to the UK in September was important for many reasons. It was my first time out of Heathrow since 1998, my first time visiting the office of a client I have worked with for six years, and the first time I have traveled so far to attend an international  PR conference. So it was with great excitement that I packed my bags and headed over for the planned three days.

Day two was blocked out for the PR Week conference on Strong & Clear Global Communications. The speaker list looked promising and I was keen to see how we were doing in Asia compared to the big boys.

The turnout was reasonable; there were about 80 delegates in the room. I was delighted to meet Arun Sudhaman from Media Asia in Hong Kong who has moved to the UK to write for PR Week, especially since his was the only familiar face in the room. I was seated at the table with the friendly folk from PR Newswire, LG Electronics, Sulake, and the Royal Hospital for Neuro-disability.

There were some interesting case studies and numbers shared by some of the speakers, and I did enjoy Schultz’s references to Made to Stick. Not surprisingly, social media and its potential was a key topic for discussion.

Some highlights:

• In response to the question ‘How do you see 2010 panning out with regards to the recession’, 57% said ‘slight improvement’, 2% were more optimistic, while 19% predicted ‘no change’.
• There were divergent views on whether digital PR should fall under marketing or communications since marketing budgets were larger, or we might see ‘turf wars on the ground’. I personally feel marketing programmes online should be run via the marketing departments, customer engagement by the customer service management teams while corporate messaging or general awareness and brand building should come under the PR umbrella.
• As media channels go beyond borders and 3.5% of news is now breaking in the blogosphere, are communications professionals ready so evolve into international communicators? This opens up an entire Pandora’s Box of cultural nuances, local preferences and effectiveness of these international channels to address a targeted audience. This, again, leads us to the question of what can we track and respond to and what has to be treated as water under the bridge.
• Video is still more prevalent in the US (11.2 billion streams in July 2009) as compared to the UK (29.6 million). However, there is no getting away from the visual impact of video as an engagement tool. The T-Mobile Dance on YouTube, as shared by Robin O’Kelly as had over 14 million views.
• Stephanie Forrest, Senior Director, Global Business-to-Business Communications at Motorola Inc. identified changing skill sets as a challenge for communications teams integrating social media campaigns, advising us to (1) find people with a passion, (2) recognize their efforts, (3) get a dedicated team in place, (4) experiment to see what works.
• James Sorene, Head of News at the Department of Health used the international Swine Flu pandemic to explain how to effectively manage a crisis shared his motto: tell it all, tell it fast, and tell the truth.
• Mark Stouse, Global Communications leader at BMC Software shared his experience of assigning quotas or points to the communications teams linked to sales growth so their deliverables were more in-line with the company’s business objectives. LG Electronics’ European marketing Director Dominic Chambers suggested marketing and communications departments report into a single Chief Marketing Officer title instead of the traditional approach where the Director of Communications is a separate silo. (Interestingly this reflects a previous post on Neil Rackham’s view on the need for a Chief Revenue Officer to align the business better.)
• Coming out of the fuss (read about it here) in the United States on Walt Disney’s upcoming release The Princess and the Frog, Matthew Grossman, Vice President for EMEA Corporate Communications highlighted there were increasing instances of journalists looking online for story ideas, and stressed the need for fairness of reporting, fact checks and representing various facets of the story.

Overall, it didn’t seem as though the Asian communications industry is lagging its Western counterparts in any way. In fact some of the campaigns being driven in this region are more innovative and effective despite the fragmented demographics.

London is still the amazing juxtaposition of a multitude of people of different colors in grey business suits hurrying past landmarks steeped in history. The sun was out on all three days, and it was great to meet with old friends, clients and business partners. I look forward to heading back in the near future, perhaps with some time to spare.