Edelman helps its clients achieve their business objectives by building relevant and compelling relationships with an array of stakeholders that have the ability to affect their business.
We recognise the changes in the communications environment, facilitated by rapidly emerging technology and the ability of people to use it effectively, is changing the way people receive, create, filter, absorb and share information.
Today, people want to engage in two-way communication. They want to discuss, not just be talked at; they want to pass on and create information, not just passively receive it. This changes the dynamics between an organisation and its stakeholders and is having ramifications for all areas of business.
Mass media and traditional one-way PR techniques no longer speak to today’s consumer with same impact they used to. The steady drop in newspaper readership and those watching broadcast media news is balanced by the worldwide explosion of personal, instant and very direct channels of information gathering and distribution in the interactive online environment all its digital forms - including personal and networked computing, and its continual morphing with mobile technology and other digital appliances.
In a very short time, online and social media has drastically altered the communications landscape and has forced organisations, the media, governments, marketers and company stakeholders to completely review traditional ‘message control’ style communications.
The concept of a “top-down”, one-way flow of information doesn’t register anymore – today, information flows from person to person to person. Conversation is started, enriched and made memorable by individuals talking to their peers without interference or influence from traditional sources of power and information.
Edelman has developed a range of tools to help its clients adapt to communications in the digital age. These include the Pioneer Thinking Roadmap, 360 degree consumer model, Influencer and Issues Mapping, The Master Narrative, The Edelman Connector and The Relationship Index.
Edelman’s research clearly highlights that trust in peers (friends, family and colleagues) and the development of “word of mouth” continues to grow and deepen at the expense of traditional media and sources of authority. “A person like you” is clearly now the most trusted source of information for most people. Increasingly people are turning to the internet to find and compare information from several sources and talk with others about subjects and issues of interest.
This revolution in influence, the rise of two-way communication and the interactive online environment provide considerable opportunities for companies to change the way they involve stakeholders – employee, consumer, media, NGOs, government – in their brands and corporate initiatives.
Edelman has committed to understanding and being the industry leaders in this digital era and helping our clients interact with stakeholders in new ways, whether it’s through social networks, across mobile devices, virally, or through blogging, podcasting or online forum participation.
We are also committed to the creation of intellectual capital that provides predictability of outcome for our business, from our Edelman Trust Barometer, and our Asia Pacific and Australian Stakeholder Studies to our studies on employee engagement trends, the blogosphere, online “Word on …” reports and its impact on business.