DARK P R or NEGATIVE P R or BLACK P R

Friends, Thank you for reading my earlier blogs and sharing your views. I really feel encouraged after reading your feedback in the comments column. Friends, today presenting my 43rd blog titled “DARK P R or NEGATIVE P R or BLACK P R” to you.

DARK P R or NEGATIVE P R or BLACK P R

Since many years we are told by experts that public relation is always positive and can’t be negative, and “PUBLICITY”, which is an extension of P R, can be positive and negative both. When publicity is positive we can use it in our public relations communication to further enhance the image of our client (s) and if the publicity is in negative then we will use public relations tactics to turn the negative publicity into positive. 

Thanks to my habit of reading…… I spend a good few hours daily in reading on the net. Recently, while searching something related to public relations on Google I came across the term “DARK P R” and that was sufficient to stimulate my interest in the topic and to further dig deeper. In next few minutes the World Wide Web introduced new terms like Negative P R, Black P R to me….and gave birth to this blog.   

Friends, have you ever come across the term “TROLLING” or have noticed trolling on twitter or have you ever been the target of criticism or trolling or a victim of deliberately posting of inflammatory, irrelevant, or offensive comments or other disruptive contents about you or your organisation on any digital platform i.e. Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, LinkedIn or Whatsapp by a known person, a friend turned foe, a former student, employee or customer, or business associate?  If yes….. Then you very well know how and where it hurts and especially when it's totally baseless, biased, written with prejudice and with no or zero truth in it……a fine example of DARK P R or NEGATIVE P R or BLACK P R.

Public relations or P R has an evil twin: dark public relations, sometimes also referred to as negative PR or black PR. It involves the unethical damaging of a client’s reputation or corporate identity; that is, it’s about getting the bad word out - and creating that bad word out of lies and falsehoods if need be. It’s the complete opposite of what P R should be about: protecting and promoting the image of a person, firm or institution.

However, the fundamental difference between “Dark or Negative or Black PR” and P R as many of us practice it, is that little huge line called “Ethics”. This is a line which, regardless of how many Codes of Conduct we subscribe to, is directly attached to our fundamental values, beliefs and behaviors.

DARK P R or NEGATIVE P R or BLACK P R is a process of destroying the target's reputation and /or corporate identity. The objective in this kind of P R is to discredit someone else, who may pose a threat to the client's business or be a political rival. It is similar to “White & Black Hat Search Engine Optimization” practices where the “White Hat SEO” follows Google's guidelines and improves user experience, while “Black Hat SEO” violates those guidelines and is typically done with complete disregard for human users.

Public Relations also have its own version of negative campaigning and are pre-meditated attempts of destroying a competitor’s reputation / brand in its entirety. Such type of practice is most commonly used in Political Campaigns where the campaigners will purposely promote negative aspects of their opponent by producing misleading facts about the competitor, publically running negative ads that attack the competitor’s identity and leaking secret information to the public in an attempt to discredit the competitor.

In this era of modern public relations, many a public relations professionals, image & reputation management consultants also specialize in ruining or damaging rather than enhancing the image or reputation of a person or an organisation. Such people either work for the ruling political party or main opposition party and have a similar agenda i.e. generate fake news, lay false trails, and use social media to weaken or decimate rivals by manipulating public opinion for nefarious purpose.

Mostly the negative campaigns starts with a rumor told here, a half-truth there, followed by negative SEO tactics aimed at the competitor by using fake names, hidden IP addresses, planted news stories, and other smoke-and-mirrors tactics (i.e. any proposal when examined closely proves to be an illusion or to be more precise actions intended to make us believe that something is being done or is true, when it is not) in the media or to publish damning or unflattering content about the competitor.

Typical targets of Dark or Negative P R include those political leaders who have the capacity to make a big dent in the image of ruling party and its main leaders, CEOs of the corporate world, and popular activists and opinion leaders having national and international image.  But, as a matter of fact, almost everyone can become a target.  There is a multitude of Dark or Negative PR tactics and techniques and these run the gamut from so-called honey traps, false or fake content, email manipulation, negative reviews in the media, unauthorized leaks in a planned manner etc. etc. etc.   

The biggest problem with Dark Public Relations is that it can literally erupt out of nowhere. It’s like a bad online surprise party for your competitors. A traumatic event, they will never forget, never expect and never recover from it.   One of the main functions of a company’s communication or P R dept. is to closely watch and maintain its reputation among various stakeholders such as investors, customers, suppliers, distributors, employees, regulators, politicians, non-governmental organizations, the communities in which the company operates to protect company’s reputation in the eyes and minds of its target public from the attack of Dark Public Relations which can damage its reputation forever in one go.

Therefore, the organisations or the companies who are hit by Negative or Dark P R activities should take a two-pronged approach. Internally, they should look at the origins and evolution of the messages against them and try to establish the background and motivations of these messages. Using the analysis of usernames and commonalities in language, they may be able to trace the negative messages back to a single source. At this point in time, companies may enlist technology professionals to identify IP addresses, and in doing so, review who might be behind the attack. Outwardly, they should execute an effective communication plan against it so that they can shape and develop the story against these messages to defend image of the company.

And, if the company is at fault in any way, then best option for the company would be to apologies without any delay by admitting the fault and tell the affected or the target public what they’re doing to make things right instead of deflecting the blame. Having the right attitude helps to stay calm and avoid aggravating a challenging situation even further.

Conclusion

Negative P R, Dark P R or Black P R is a controversial business phenomenon that can ruin years of hard work and reputation of any organisation. This kind of bad P R has become even more crucial in the Internet era because anyone can create content, write reviews, or leave negative comments about you or your business online.  For this reason, it is now essential for public relations professional to learn the basics of Negative P R, Dark P R or say Black P R, know what to expect from it, and figure out how to deal with it proactively. My suggestion to public relations professionals would be to strictly follow the P R ethics and not to engage in Negative P R, regardless of how tempting it is.

Friends, please do share your comments.

Thank you for reading the blog.