Internal and External Communcation Trends

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Current trends of internal and external communications

External

In 2006 the New Media Summit conducted a survey on the top ten business communication trends (PR Newswire, 2006). A recent trend is that buyers have more information than the sellers in that a buyer may get several bids from organizations world-wide in a matter of minutes. Ten years ago, this task was met by driving all over town, making several phone calls, or having associates come to the home for appointments to discuss their products. This took days and in some cases weeks depending on the service or product you were trying to procure.

Another trend is that customers are now pulling what they want before purchasing the product. What this means is that the customer has the option of finding what they want and rejecting what they do not want with a simple search engine. Within the past ten years, customers were subjected to long, drawn-out presentations full of information they did not need nor wanted or they had to sift through pages of brochures and catalogs to get the information they desired.

The number three trend is the event of blogging. Blogs are important becuase buyers want instant feedback (discourse). Through blogs, customer and company may communicate instantly. Clients can give immediate feedback which can turn the perception of the organization on its ear or propel that organization to new heights. According to the survey in 2006, companies that communicate openly and honestly with the client create a customer loyalty and have an advantage against their competitors.

The fourth trend noted is that objective journalism is dying and the "citizen journalist" is born. No longer are people interested in the critic's view of a product or customer service; they are interested in hundreds of opinions and feedback. Ten years ago, businesses relied on what the media said the public said; however, they no longer trust this form of communication and are trending towards their actual audience...the client.

Electronic discussions are now becoming the new trend. It's the new public relations and customers are looking for discussions and turning away from the "gatekeepers" of reporting and going towards more of a "discussion facilitator". You see this mostly in blogs as this form of media is starting to replace some of the media such as Forbes Magazine, Fortune, etc.

Google News Alerts are starting to replace newspapers, trade magazines and could potentially replace medias such as radio and TV. The public (buyers) are no longer pigeon-holed into tangible written publications or channels on the TV (either local or cable); now people are looking and finding what they need, what they want, and how they want it. Organizations need to get on this bandwagon or they ...