Josh Bernoff Loves PR People

This was his opening line at this keynote this morning, because we help him get in touch with the people he needs to talk to to get hsi research done.

I invited “Groundswell” co-author Josh Bernoff to deliver the opening keynote at the PRSA Digital Impact conference which I am chairing this year and I’m really glad he accepted.

Josh had some very intersting things to say about how new media is changing the businesses of media and public relations.

He started with a recap of the Digg/DVD copyright issue that led to the initial Streisand Effect.

Then he used the example of the Comcast technician who fell asleep on a guy’s couch.

The theme of his talk is…

“Concentrate on people and relationships, not technology.”

Josh says its the social trend that matters, not the technology. People communicate among themselves, and that’s something we don’t control. But we can participate and create value by redirecting the power of the individual,and turning the inertia to your advantage.

He then took us through the People, Objectives, Strategy, Technology methodology, which Shel doesn’t like because he thinks Objectives should go first, which I think is a valid point.

But in the end, his argument is that PR and online communications is about participating in online communities, and that media relations is transforming into online community relations, with that, I couldn’t agree more.