PUBLIC RELATIONS — THE TOOLS FOR UNILATERAL COMMUNICATION AND DIALOGUE ON THE INTERNET

PUBLIC RELATIONS — THE TOOLS
FOR UNILATERAL COMMUNICATION
AND DIALOGUE ON THE INTERNET
Open Access

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MINIB, 2016, Vol. 20, Issue 2, p. 79–90
PUBLIC RELATIONS — THE TOOLS FOR UNILATERAL
COMMUNICATION AND DIALOGUE ON THE INTERNET
Dariusz Tworzydło, Ph.D.
State School of Higher Education in Oświęcim, Poland
dariusz@tworzydlo.pl
DOI: 10.14611/minib.20.03.2016.11
The development of technology and IT tools have brought about an extraordinary acceleration of the public
relations branch around the whole world. We live in the times of revolution in communication, in which one
year is whole eternity. Messages, the speed of their publication, the tools are changing. The sender and the
recipient, who have become used to the dynamics of the message and the fact that it is and will be distributed
without spatial and temporal limitations, are changing too. Netscape browser, wp.pl, the era of Wikipedia,
Facebook, dynamically developing YouTube, or Nasza Klasa, Twitter and a whole range of other tools from
the scope of social media, as well as monitoring systems1 — these are just chosen stages, or as others think,
milestones in the pursuit of novelty and new forms of distribution of information. It is in times like these that
public relations experts have to create, send and receive messages. Back at the end of 1990's hardly anyone
expected that such changes could take place. It is also hard to predict what we will see in a few, or a dozen
years. One thing is certain, namely, that changes will be taking place and will be even faster than now.
As the currently modern media already have a significant impact on voting decisions, or social
transformation, the process is analysed and studied in detail. Moreover, what is subject to research is the
question whether communication on the Internet should be based on mass communication, or rather on
an individual approach. Private individuals make decisions based on their own needs, but companies have
to analyse many factors that influence final decisions concerning the choice of tools, or the very decision
concerning communication. Among these factors there are: scope, availability of tools, even the branch in
which a company is active.
This article includes a presentation of chosen tools used in the process of unilateral communication with
the environment, but also tools used for dialogue. Unilateral communication discussed in this article doesn't
assume a response from the recipient, apart from a possible decision to take action in form of purchase,
or clicking. At the same time dialogue gives the opportunity to interact, exchange thoughts and ideas, direct
assessment. Moreover, the benefits from the process of conducting dialogue online, as well as the barriers
hampering the dialogue will be presented. Also, the directions of changes taking place in association with
the dynamic development of online communication tools and processes will be presented.
Summary
Keywords: public relations, marketing, media, communication tools, communication, new technology,
online marketing, social media

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Public relations — the tools for unilateral communication and dialogue on the Internet
www.minib.pl
Internet — directions of development
and changes in distribution of information
Currently, business analyses the implementation of technologies and
methods of communication with the environment allowing to build
competitive advantage. However, it is worth pointing out that already now
there is a whole range of various tools for communication and building
relations by using the Internet, which attract more, or less attention. They
can be divided into the following way:
1. Tools used for unilateral communication, or a support for this
communication:
a. Internet websites
b. sponsored links
c. positioning
d. banners
e. mailing
2. tools used in dialogue
a. message boards
b. social media
c. viral videos
d. blogs
3. other tools influencing unilateral communication, conducting a
dialogue, engaging entities within the direct, or indirect circle of
companies' interest:
a. press offices for direct and indirect communication with the media
b. tools monitoring online activity
i. GOOGLE systems
ii. companies' systems and solutions developed by companies
themselves
iii. tools for monitoring Internet media
iv. tools for monitoring blogs, activity on message boards and others.
Despite dynamic development, the emergence and implementation of
new technological solutions, there is still a significant gap between the
expected condition and reality in terms of not just access, but above all the

will to use IT tools and Internet for handling social dialogue. This results
from, among others, the following premises:
a) lack of trust for this form of communication (using the Internet) and
building relations,
b) lack of ability to take advantage of modern technological solutions,
c) fears and other limitations associated with, for example, age or approach
of some people in the management who still regard IT tools and
something that doesn't directly bring benefits to their companies,
d) the specific character of branches and particular activities.
Other barriers have been presented in the further part of the article,
however, the most significant ones are the result of limitations of mainly
psychological character.
Benefits and barriers associated
with communication and dialogue online
Among significant benefits we need to pay attention to during the
analysis of the process of dialogue conducted online is the opportunity to
reach precisely defined target groups. Internet very accurately segments
and allows finding users characterized by particular features and profile
associated with, for example, interests, or expectations. With such a defined
and clearly selected group, it is possible to design a message, content aimed
at this group, which will be later placed in the most suitable location. This
way we can achieve concentration of spending and thus, we can save not
just funds, but also time. Another benefit brought by the Internet is speed.
The only blockade in this area is the time we need to prepare and accept
contents on the level of company management, as its distribution can be
immediate. Another benefit is certainly the low cost of online activity.
Reaching the people interested in a particular message is obviously many
times less expensive than in case of actions in traditional media. However,
both the Internet and traditional media can efficiently complement each
other. Both individuals and companies, which under normal circumstances
would be unable to attract attention, often gain recognition and acceptance
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by means of the Internet. Internet is also a huge database of knowledge,
which it would be hard to obtain outside the Internet.
However, it is necessary to point out that apart from benefits, there are
also barriers associated with online communication. The first problem is
very high speed of change, which requires continuous monitoring of the
environment and fast adaptation of a company's actions to changes in the
instruments. Another barriers is much greater susceptibility to crises,
compared to traditional media. Such crises can spread and grow much
faster online, than in the world outside the Internet. It is also a fact that
the Internet gives the possibility of being anonymous, which contributes to
the escalation of crisis-inducing factors, as many entities, or persons with a
competing goal may take up negative actions thanks to the feeling of
impunity. Here it is necessary to add that a crisis started outside the
Internet can quickly make its way to the Internet and there get stronger
and more serious. Another important barrier, which is visible not only in
the context of societies, but also companies is the weakening of direct
relations in favour of relations established online. This leads to problems of
personal nature and thus, internal in companies, as this way problems
associated with personality and social psychology can pile up.
Tools supporting the process
of information transfer and dialogue on the Internet
There is a whole range of tools which support dialogue on the Internet.
However, in this section also tools of a unilateral character, which have
little to do with dialogue, will be presented. It is these tools that often lead
to dialogue, constitute its basis and a starting point. They are also an
element of the whole process of reaching the recipients.
One of such tools of unilateral communication is Internet website,
which constitutes a basic element in the process of delivering often very
broad contents to groups of recipients. What's important is that this
content fully depends on the sender. Together with Internet websites,
banners play a significant role in unilateral communication, despite their
weakening role, they are still used in the process of promotion. Thus, mini-
games encouraging to make decisions concerning the choice between
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options appearing in association with a user's activity, are still being
developed. Banners include a message, which we display and which we
want to deliver to the final recipient. Their form and what they
communicate have the biggest influence on reception in times of very big
amount of advertising materials, which reach us as consumers of messages
and informative contents.
One of the tools used this time mainly for strictly promotional purposes,
in the context of the Internet website of a company/institution, are
sponsored links. They are used mainly to promote an Internet service, but
they are based on contents created around them. The effects is the
establishment of direct links from particular locations on the Internet
to the promoted service. It is possible to keep the costs of such activities in
check, as links are often purchased based on the PPC system — pay per
click.
An important and very often used form of promotion on the Internet is
positioning. The main purpose of positioning in Internet search engines is
achieving a situation in which the link to the desired website is positioned
as high up in the list of the results of search by particular key words as
possible. Currently, position in search engines means not only success in
terms of image, but also success in sales. Research has shown that Internet
users tend to reach for information and data contained in the upper half of
the first page of search results. That's why Internet websites fight for the
highest position. Positioning consists of two main stages. The first one is
the analysis of the current position of the service in search engines, the
second one is preparation of a list of key words, which typed in a search
engine make it possible to find the Internet service. On their basis the
proper stage of the positioning process is carried out.
What is becoming more and more invasive and thus less and less
efficient is another of the presented tools, namely, mailing. This is an
online equivalent of direct mail, which is supposed to build relations,
encourage a purchase, attract new clients, or convince potential clients of
the value of a company's product.2 Regardless of the fact, whether the
dispatch is carried out by means of own mailing system, on the basis of
own e-mail database, or based on purchased solutions, or databases from
companies offering for sale databases compiled based on own research,
more and more often mail boxes are arranged in such a way that what
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looks like spam is filtered out and eliminated. For this reason the
efficiency of such form of contact is dropping.
What helps in online discussion, taking into consideration the
accompanying goal of supporting communicational and promotional
activities, is activity on message boards. In this case achieving the desired
effect is possible only when discussion is planned and takes place on the
most popular message boards in a particular area of interest. Posting
comments on message boards makes it possible to not just conduct a non-
invasive3 dialogue, but above all, reaching groups of people directly
interested in problems that we want to and plant to inform about.
Apart from message boards, what plays a major role in dialogue ae
social media, in which contents are created by users themselves. Thanks
to this they have now become very popular channels of communication.
Micro-blogs, social games, fora for posting and distribution of videos,
chats, all of this constitutes not just a challenge but also a response to the
needs associated with the development of the market. The current stage of
development of the Internet is called by some the era of Facebook, which
is the biggest social media portal in the world.4 Apart from Facebook, other
services such as YouTube, Nasza-klasa.pl, Golden Line, Flickr,
Crowdstorm, Slideshare, Skype, PHORUM, meebo, Myspace.com,
LinkedIn, Twitter, Tweetpeek, Instagram and hundreds of others around
the whole world lead to a situation in which direct relations are pushed
aside and more and more, not just young people, get to know each other,
exchange information, maintains contact by means of the social media.
They are created taking into consideration such parameters as age, sex, or
interests. In social media also companies have many new, exciting
possibilities of communicating with current and potential clients, partners
and employees, which were not available before the arrival of social media
Internet.5 Running a Facebook fanpage a company can not only promote
its services and products, announce special offers, launch new products on
the market, but can also efficiently communicate and that includes also
recruitment.6
Younger and younger generations are entering the world of Internet
and due to the intuitive nature of applications, kids don't start with playing
on a playground, but with searching for data on the Internet, or
independent communication with relatives. What is the reason for such a
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dynamic growth of interest in social media? Certainly, the fact that in this
case we are really dealing with dialogue, conversation, which is not
controlled by anyone, but at the same time can be held in any location and
time (it is enough to have access to the Internet). Another factor, which
suggests that social media are starting to play an ever more significant role
in social, but also economic life is that the dialogue in social media is open
to argumentation, unrestricted and often exhaustive, further, it allows
acquiring full information. What is becoming a norm in the process of social
communication is spreading to the economy and its elements such as
companies. Thus, not only young people, but also commercial entities take
advantage of the tools enabling dialogue.
Another interesting communication tool using the Internet are viral
videos. Adapting a video to the purposes of a campaign together with the
target group, in combination with the script and form in which the video is
prepared, gives the effect in form of an interesting, inspiring form of
contact and promotion. Nowadays, the combination of short video forms
and promotion, especially on a YouTube channel brings measurable
promotional effects.
The last tool that will be presented in this article is blog. As opposed to
an Internet website of a company, blog gives the possibility of interaction,
which is not available on an Internet website. Blog enables discussion,
answering questions, lively reactions, convincing people of a company's
arguments. This is certainly not what an Internet website can provide.
However, in order to be efficient a blog has to contain not just the above-
mentioned element of interaction, but has to be run continuously. Posting
new information once in six months is far from enough and may cause
frustration among the recipients, leading even to the emergence and
deepening of crisis situation.
The mentioned tools constitute a kind of a list of chosen forms of
unilateral contact, or dialogue between a company/organization and the
social environment, which are now created not only by clients, or potential
clients, but also a series of other entities exerting a smaller, or greater
influence on the functioning of a company. Both the first group of tools,
that is, those used for unilateral communication and the second group of
tools, that is, the tools supporting its functioning, but on the basis of rules
of dialogue, currently play a very important role, not only in sales, but also
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in the area of building and maintaining image. Aware companies pay
attention to this.
Unfortunately, not everyone is aware of the fact that once published,
information and data remain online, whether you like it, or not. By means
of an Internet search engine, or special programmes it is possible to collect
in one place all data concerning a particular user, his address, financial
condition, etc. The same concerns commercial entities, that's why it is
advisable to be aware of these risks in order to take advantage of
opportunities provided by the Internet without harming yourself and the
company.7
Prospects for the development
of tools supporting communication
At the beginning of the 21st century the economy is undergoing
a transformation from the production-service model to production-service-
creative model, which means that at the expense of work in the industry
(where more and more tasks are subject to the process of automation), new
jobs appear in the area of communication.8 In the coming months and
years we will still be experiencing the process of changes that affect and
will affect dialogue and communication on the Internet. The era of
information is a fact and for this reason there will be further tools and new
devices, which will be more and more visual and based on graphic and
video content.9 Business analysts predict that more and more
organizations and companies will be adding social media to the range of
their communication tools.10 Not just social media portals, but also many
other tools used for communication on the Internet will undergo
a revolution, which involves continuous adaptation to the recipients'
expectations. We may try to guess what the future will bring, but certainly
over the next dozen years we will make a similar progress as the Internet
has made since the 1990's.11
The changes discussed here are the result of not just the needs
exposed by the participants of the process, but also the monitoring of
these groups conducted continuously. One of the monitoring methods is
eyetracking, which makes it possible to identify the elements attracting
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attention of users viewing particular messages on the Internet. These
surveys also make it possible to identify the elements which attract the
attention of the surveyed to the greatest degree and the longest, they
also make it possible to determine the model and the direction of space
scanning by the recipient's sight. This is just one of surveying tools,
which gives us the possibility of monitoring not just the current state,
but also changes in the area of perception of what we receive as content
and target image by means of the Internet. Certainly, not only
eyetracking, but also a series of other projects will lead to a situation in
which on the basis of continuously acquired information, more and more
tools for unilateral communication, as well as online dialogue will be
created. Here it is necessary to point out that both are necessary in
current social reality.
To sum it up, it is worth adding that efficient online dialogue is
possible, but only when certain conditions are satisfied. First of all,
companies have to listen to and answer to changes in the environment,
as only this way observation can lead to creative ideas. Moving
further, from the point of view of companies and organizations, it is
necessary to monitor the activities of the competition and taking
reactive actions. Actually, it would be best to move faster than the
rivals and be Ahead of them, but this will be possible when e.g. the
company takes up the challenge in form of experimenting and
implements solutions broadly used in social communication for its
business needs. Going further, to hold efficient dialogue and not just
communicate based on tools making it possible to push contents in
just one direction, it is necessary to skilfully use the tools discussed in
this article. It is worth engaging those who build efficient relations in
modern media and communication channels based on the social
environment. Finally, it is necessary to be prepared for crisis
situations, which unfortunately in association with the lack of
temporal and spatial limitations, which are often the advantage of
modern communication and dialogue tools, are becoming an element
of daily life which causes the frustration and fears of the managers.
Crisis can lead to serious image problems. This is what you have to pay
attention to most of all, as the consequences of a crisis may be very
serious, including company bankruptcy.
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References
1 Sikorski, S. (2016). Nowe technologie w PR. In: A. Łaszyn, D. Tworzydło, Pierwsze ćwierćwiecze. 25 lat public re-
lations w Polsce. Wydawnictwo Message House oraz Newsline, Warszawa–Rzeszów, p. 213–214.
2 Reed, J. (2011). Szybkie łącze z klientami. Marketing internetowy. Wydawnictwo Helion, Gliwice, p. 77–78.
3 Takiego, który nie będzie odebrany przez społeczność uczestniczącą w dyskusji jako działanie stricte reklamowe,
prowadzone przez firmę w celu nakłonienia do zakupu określonego towaru lub usługi.
4 Shih, C. (2012). Era Facebooka. Wydawnictwo Helion, Gliwice, p. 31.
5 Tamże, p. 52.
6 Kolbus, B., Dudek, D. ( 2013). Lojalność wobec marki budowana za pomocą social media. In: D. Tworzydło,
K. Stasiuk-Krajewska, Z. Chmielewski, Public relations — nie tylko Facebook. Wydawnictwo Newsline, Rzeszów, p. 73
7 Bezpieczne korzystanie z internetu. Wydawnictwo Wiedza i Praktyka, p. 19.
8 Sikorski, S. Nowe technologie w PR. op.cit., p. 220.
9 Ibidem, s. 220.
10 Miotk, A. (2013). Skuteczne social media. Wydawnictwo Helion, Gliwice, p. 228.
11 Shih, C. (2012). Era Facebooka. Wydawnictwo Helion, Gliwice, p. 381.
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Gliwice.
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— Chairman of the
Institute for Information Society Development, Poland, and Chief Executive Officer of EXACTO sp.
z o.o. He specializes in public relations and marketing research. He was a member of the Public
Relations Council for two tenures and the President of the Board of the Polish Public Relations Society.
His bibliography includes more than 200 scientific publications, research reports, analyses and expert
opinions. He has been a co-author of many strategic documents and operating plans in the area of
public relations. He is a consultant to boards of companies and organizations.
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