营销博客圈再次受到重点关注，这次是源于一场关于公关现状问题的讨论。（译者注：blogosphere，博客圈，也称博客空间或网志空间，是博客、博客作者以及社群的统称。）
这也没什么好奇怪的。每隔几个月就有人宣布公关失败，然后一帮子公关人士写文章，大谈要是没了他们，这个世界将如何坐着吊篮去地狱，一坏而不可收拾。
最后一定要等到这些博客中比较火的几个被一些不相干的人攻击了不下百次之后，整个事情才会慢慢平息下来。
这让我对旅游公关业务的状态产生了质疑，尤其是在英国。我本人在英国的这二十年，多数时候都是把新闻发布直接抛到垃圾箱里。
英国的旅游公关无可救药了吗？
还没。但是能隐约嗅到这样的意味。
问题在于英国旅游公关业务始终是在传统媒体上兜圈子。
扫视一下公关们的圈子，你就会发现所有人都把侧重点都放在了跟记者保持良好的关系上，并且强调所谓的“代表客户控制新闻报道的能力”。
要通过支离破碎的媒体了解到一些时髦的东西是很容易的事，并不需要什么高深的学问。
固然有一些旅游公关们对新媒体以及Facebook的风靡报以嘘声，但是他们中仍有很多人抓着电子邮件不舍得放手，就像难民营的小孩看到了香蕉就死盯着不放一样。
我这么说他们肯定不服气——OK，换我我也替他们不服气呀——他们已经成功地让三家地方小报派人奔赴巴巴多斯去报道那里的躺椅节了呀。
可旅游公司却逐渐发现这些钱打了水漂。压根不值！
就拿我认识的一家旅游公司来说吧，他们在星期日报上买了四版的宽幅广告，结果只收到一个咨询电话，打听第二天的行程。
此外，传统的新闻报道就像是兴奋剂，见效快，但回报短，想要出成绩，你不得不吃了一次又一次。
我们要把公关更紧密地和结果结合起来，要把它看成一种能为客户产生可衡量的收入的东西。公关需要精心策划以产生长期的利益。
正是出于这样的原因，公关不能只接触报纸记者，还要直接面向大众，要与客户建立关系，要把Google作为重要的媒体来对待，要努力提升被搜索量，要与任何有着传播能力的人进行沟通，让他们知道产品的优势，无论这个人是否官方的。简而言之，哪里有市场哪里就需要公关，网上也同样需要公关。
现代的公关公司必备的一些技能有——网络文本写作（copywriting），网络检测(译者注：能随时了解自己公司的相关新闻和信息在网络出现的情况），搜索引擎优化，搜索营销，基本的Web开发，多媒体内容创作，以及网络分析等等。
什么？除此之外还有没有其他的路子？市场上的钱必将不断流向那些在网络营销方面有所作为的人——搜索营销公司和数字代理，因为他们能提供真正可以衡量的结果。
那么接下来那些可怜的旅游公关们又会怎么样呢？兴许运气好的也只能是在组织WTM的鸡尾酒会吧。（译者注：WTM全称Workshop Together Meeting, 是一种行业成员聚会，目的在于联络感情、分享工作经验等）。
英国的旅游公关急需一场革命！
原文：
The problem at the heart of travel PR
The marketing blogosphere is navel-gazing again, this time about the current state of PR.
No surprise there then. Every few months somebody declares PR dead and a bevy of PR’s write about how the world would go to hell in a hand basket without them.
Eventually the whole thing settles down until yet another A list blogger gets hit by a hundred irrelevant pitches.
It makes me wonder though about the state of the travel PR business, particularly in the UK where I personally lobbed press releases into waste bins for the best part of 20 years.
Is the UK travel PR business dead?
Not totally. It just smells like it.
The problem is the business still swivels on traditional media relations.
Scan the PR’s own pitches and you’ll find all the emphasis on cosy relations with journalists and the "ability to control press coverage on our clients' behalf".
It doesn’t take a PhD in fragmented media to know that model is about as up to the minute as Mr D’Arcy’s breeches.
Sure, some travel PR’s make noises about new media and getting down with Facebook, but many still gaze at email with the wonder of war-time kids setting sight on a banana.
They’ll protest - ok, I’ll protest for them - that they have had great success getting, I don’t know, three regional hacks out to Barbados to cover the Deck Chair festival.
But travel companies increasingly find those sums don’t add up anymore. It’s just not worth it.
I know a travel company which scored a four page spread in a Sunday broadsheet and only received one call about the trip next day.
Besides, traditional press coverage is like a sugar rush. The returns are short-lived and you have to keep on doing it over again.
PR needs to be more closely tied with results. It must be seen to generate measurable revenue for the client. It needs better strategies to generate long-term benefit.
For that it needs to speak directly to the public as well as hacks, build relationships with customers, treat Google as vital media, drive search traffic, communicate the benefits of the product to anyone with a broadcast voice, official or not. In short it needs to go where the market is and go online.
Here are some of the skills a modern PR agency needs - online copywriting, web monitoring, SEO, search marketing, basic web dev, multimedia content creation, web analytics.
The alternative? Marketing money will continue to shift to the people who already pitch this stuff and therefore can provide truly measurable results: the search marketing companies and digital agencies.
And then what will be left for the poor travel PR’s? A few quid for organising cocktail parties at WTM.
PR in this country needs a travolution (that’s not trademarked or anything is it?). [That's enough "'lutions" - Ed]
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