Glossary of Public relations terms, definitions and jargon
If you can think of anything useful that could be added to this list please email us info@joriwhitepr.co.uk.
Audit Bureau of Circulation - ABC
The Audit Bureau of Circulations independently checks the circulation of the national newspapers.
Account team
The team of agency staff assigned to a client programme. Generally consists of various members drawn from board director (overall strategy and top level advice); account director (team management and quality control); account manager (day-to-day programme management); senior account executive/account executive (execution of most day-to-day activities); and account assistant (research and admin support)
ACE - Advertising Cost Equivalent
A comparison between the cost of an advertising space and an equivalent editorial piece.
ACE PR Value
The PR industry considers ACE PR value to be approximately 2.5 times greater than that achieved by advertising.
Advertising
Paying to have your company’s marketing message in various media such as magazines, newspapers, radio and TV is known as advertising.
Advertorial
A a newspaper or magazine advertisement giving information about a product in the style of an editorial or objective journalistic article..
Agency
A business or organization established to provide a particular service, typically one that involves organizing transactions between two other parties.
BARB - Broadcasters Audience Research Board
BARB (Broadcasters’ Audience Research Board) is the organisation responsible for providing the official measurement of UK television audiences.
Brief
This is the set of instructions from the client to the consultancy, or can be created by the agency for use by a team.
Broadcast
The dissemination of programmes or messages through the media of radio, internet or television.
Brainstorming
This is a group creativity technique designed to generate a large number of ideas for the solution of a problem.
Byline
This is a line at the beginning of a news story, magazine article, or book giving the writer's name.
Circulation
The number of copies distributed by a publication. Circulation figures are available for all major publications.
Client
Simply the organisation or person who employs a public relations agency.
Collateral PR
Materials that support media or packs and obtains links with the primary source. These materials can include brochures or printed informations about the company.
Column Inches
A form of measuring PR success multiplying the length of a piece of editorial by the number of columns.
Communication
A two-way flow of information fostering a common understanding and trust.
Competition
All other organisations that represent a threat to a particular business.
Competitor Analysis
Getting to know your competitors better and using the information to inform your business decisions. Can be applied to PR.
Composition
The different components, in terms of the audience, that makes up a media's universe.
Contract
an agreement made between the PR consultancy and the client covering areas of agreed objectives, timing, service levels and price. The PRCA has an approved client/consultancy agreement for its members.
Copy
the text produced by a consultancy for a press release or article. Journalists also refer to their news stories or features as copy.
Core Message
The angle taken in order to target the correct publications. Press releases contain the core message.
Corporate Communications
This can be defined as the communication issued by a corporate organization, body, or institute both internally and externally.
Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR)
This refers to operating a business in a manner that accounts for the social and environmental impact created by the business.
Coverage
The amount of exposure given to a company in the media.
CPT - Cost Per Thousand
The cost efficiency of publications. Calculated by dividing the rate or specific advertisement cost by the circulation or number of readers.
Credentials
Either the published information consultancies provide doe prospective clients or an initial no-cost presentation of the consultancy?s capabilities.
Crisis Management
Having a communications plan in place that can be effectively put into action when something goes wrong for a company or organisation. For instance, how a product recall will be handled. A crisis can be described as a period of potential or actual damage to the perception and/ or reputation of an organisation, individual or concept caused or started by an unexpected event. Forward planning can prevent if not minimise a crisis from happening.
Cutting
the piece of written material containing messages about the client or its products or an extract from a paper or magazine regarding a particular account. Also commonly referred to as ?clipping?.
Cue sheet
briefing notes to help a spokesman prepare for an interview with a journalist. The cues should cover the issues that are likely to arise in the interview and approach that should be taken on these issues.
Demographics
Information about the target audience. Such as age, gender, race etc.
DPS - Double Page Spread
Two pages of the same article covering both pages of an open publication. Becomes more eye-catching to the reader.
Duplication
Where a person consumes more than one media. I.e. they may read ‘The Guardian’ and ‘The Telegraph’.
e-PR
Also known as online PR, this involves communications using the internet, using new technology to communicate with stakeholders. This could include tactics from using the company website effectively, to a ?word-of-mouth? campaign using email (known as viral marketing).
Editorial
Written materials composed to communicate a brand to the various audiences identified by the client and consultancy. Section of a publication written by a journalist such as an article or feature.
Embargo
A warning to the media not to publish a news item until the date specified on the release.
Evaluation
The continuous process of measuring the impact of a PR campaign from start to finish.
Executive Summary
Listing of key research findings.
Expenses
The charges consultancies make for expenditure incurred on client programmes, such as print, travel, telephones, mailing costs etc. Usually charged monthly in arrears against agreed budgets and often with some items subject to standard consultancy mark-ups.
Exclusive
A news story offered by a PR practitioner to a single newspaper title, radio, website, or TV station.
Exposure
The extent to which the target audience becomes aware of a person, message, activity, theme or organisation through the efforts of PR.
Feature article
A broad or in-depth newspaper, magaszine, internet, radio or TV article that discusses, analyses or interprets an issue, subject or trend. A feature generally takes longer to research and produce than a news story. An article of a detailed nature.
Fees
The charge consultancies make for the time of the executive staff working on client programmes, usually invoiced in regular instalments monthly or quarterly in advance and monitored through daily time sheets.
Financial PR
The efforts of a publicly-held company, or one that is on the way to a public flotation, to communicate with shareholders, security analysts, institutional investors and stock exchanges.
Frequency
Since people are exposed to more that one type of media, frequency is the average number of times that your audience could be exposed to your message.
Full Service
A one-stop PR shop which incorporates clients from many different industry sectors and which offers a range of PR disciplines, and sometimes in-house design and other services.
IPR - Institute of Public Relations
The leading public relations industry professional body for the UK and Europe.
IPRA - International Public Relations Association
An organisation based on membership for professionals in up to 95 countries. Members gain valuable networking and professional advice.
Keywords
Specific words or phrases often within a press release. Many professionals use keywords in order to search for specific publications or features.
Logo
A graphic or symbol representing a company or brand.
Mechanical Data
The layout details of a publication including page size, width of the columns and number of columns.
Media relations
Dealing with journalists and building good working relationships with the broadcast, print and online media.
Media Type
Such as broadcast, national papers, consumer magazines and local or regional newsletters.
Messages
Agreed words or statements that a client wants to convey to third parties, like the media or shareholders for example.
Media
Channel for the communication of information including newspapers, magazines, radio, TV, mobile phones and the internet.
News release
A written communication sent to all news media. Also known as a press release.
News conference
The live dissemination of news information by an organisation to invited media. The format is usually a presentation of information by the organisation followed by a question and answer session.
NLA - Newspaper Licensing Agency
The Newspaper Licensing Agency provides organisations with permission and access to newspaper content when and how they need it.
That's permission to copy and access over 1,500 titles either direct, using Clipsearch or via your media monitoring agency.
OTS - Opportunity To See (OTH - Opportunity To Hear)
The number of times the target audience is likely to see a marketing message.
Overlap
Houses that are able to obtain more than one ITV station due to living on the boundaries of regions.
Pitch
A full presentation of a recommended public relations programme, generally carefully researched and costed, which usually takes at least four weeks to prepare.
PR - Public Relations – noun
1. the actions of a corporation, store, government, individual, etc., in promoting goodwill between itself and the public, the community, employees, customers, etc.
2. the art, technique, or profession of promoting such goodwill.
Press pack/kit
A branded pack handed out to the media by an organisation. It normally contains background material, photographs, illustrations and news releases.
Press office
A press office handles all media enquiries and puts out all company messages ? or press releases - to the media on behalf of the organisation. This may be an in-house function or outsourced to a PR consultancy.
Press Release
A written announcement issued to the news media and other publications that seeks to draw the public attention of a company’s developments. (also see News Release)
Pro-Active PR / Re-Active PR
Editorials that appear as a direct result of the PR. Re-active PR is where the editorial has been placed as a result of the publication's input.
Proposal
Document outlining a proposed PR campaign to an existing or potential client.
Publics
These are audiences that are important to the organisation. They include customers - existing and potential; employees and management; investors; media; government; suppliers; opinion-formers.
Public Affairs
The process of communicating an organisation?s point of view on issues or causes to political audiences like MP?s and lobbying groups.
RAJAR - Radio Joint Audience Research
An independent research body who monitor the performance of all radio stations in the UK, whether BBC or commercial.
Rate Card
The cost published for advertising in any type of media.
Reach
The reach of a PR campaign is the total number of people within your target audience that may see your message. Often referred to as coverage.
Readership
A general term that refers to the number of people reading a particular publication. Includes both the individual that purchased the publication and the other persons who have read the publication.
ROI - Return On Investment
A measure of budget spent to a campaign, versus the income generated through the activity.
ROP - Run of Paper
It is an instruction to a publisher indicating that no special position is sought for an advertisement, i.e. it can be placed in any convenient part of the advertising space of the publication and is therefore charged at a lower rate.
SCC RATE / Single Column Centimetre Advertising Rate
How advertising rates are calculated. It is generally the width multiplied by the height of the publication column.
Sector Analysis
The measure of an industry sector's media coverage.
Sector/trade press
The media relevant to specific audiences. This includes special interest magazines such as hi-fi enthusiasts. Trade journals are read for business and professional reasons, for example Electronics Week is read by electronics engineers.
Series - Regional Newspapers
A number of publications covering a geographical area represented by the same publisher.
Syndicated Articles
The same article published across a series. The copy and layout can sometimes vary within the series.
Target Audience
This is the group of people you are trying to reach with your message.
Target Publications
Newspapers and magazines whose readership profile best matches a company's target market.
Tonal Bias
Whether an article takes a positive, neutral or negative angle.
Tone Of The Media
An analysis tool that accurately reflects the mood of the press. Takes into account the amount of editorial bias.
TV Regions
The transmission areas of each of the ITV companies cover specific UK
TVR - Television Rating
Percentage of specific demographic viewing a channel or programme, one TVR represents 1% of target audience.
Universe
The total number of people that read, listen to and watch a type of media.
Vertical Media: media relating to different market sectors for a product or service. For example, you can promote a barcode printer in the printing media, packaging media and food retailing media.
Viral Campaign: a communications campaign which is designed to exploit the potential of the internet to spread messages rapidly. The audience is encouraged to pass a message on to all their email contacts
Wikipedia have some excellent refence material HERE |
