One of the toughest things to do in the public relations world is to honestly discuss the concept of expectations. While reasons vary, it's likely to have something to do with our society's increasing reliance on things that deliver some form of instant gratification. Want a movie now? Tune to your cable provider's video-on-demand service. Want to avoid holiday crowds and complete all your shopping? Go online and you can be done in a few clicks.
The increasingly fast-changing world has also influenced the PR world in terms of how the services practitioners offer are sold. Clients are more than ever before expecting immediate results, in part because agencies pitching new business are quick to promise them thanks to the fact that many have developed a sort of of "let's win the account and worry about results later" philosophy.
I personally think that approach couldn't be more wrong, and I think it's up to PR practitioners themselves to change it. You wouldn't see a top 100 law firm go in and guarantee any particular result to a major corporation, so why would any reasonable PR pro do it either? The answer to this question eludes me, but I think it may have something to do with an inferiority complex that the industry has, which has stuck partially because people think there's nothing difficult about PR or that it's just a matter of "the right spin." Success in PR is achieved through a medium to long-term approach that involves a combination of the right messages sent to the right people at the right time.
If PR pros truly want opinions about the industry to change, then they have to lead the charge. As sales training materials often say, confidence breeds confidence. In other words, if you can successfully communicate to a current or prospective client that you know your business, everything else will take care of itself.
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