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I really think that PR and Marketing is becoming more intertwined these days. More and more I think companies are using social media to connect with their audiences – which include customers, prospects and the media. And more and more those audiences are blurring. I know for us at HubSpot the process of PR and Marketing are very mixed – and this is because of the emergence of social media where you can reach media and customers at the same time in similar ways – and sometimes they are even the same people.

I do think that social media has a really important role to play in PR. It is a great tool to more easily connect with a larger number of people. I can already tell you that I am interacting in a more productive way with more influential people in our industry during my job at HubSpot than I have in previous jobs. And HubSpot is only a small company without a long history. Social media has made this possible.

I also think social media has a really important role to play in marketing. We use all forms of social media to market HubSpot (Facebook, Reddit, LinkedIn, Blogging, Digg, Delicious, etc.) and they have been very effective.

But, as I mentioned earlier, it is hard to separate them. The people I interact with are often both potential customer and media member. After all, pretty much anyone with a blog or even a Facebook account is a member of the media today, since even with a tool like Facebook you are publishing content to your readers (friends).

Finally, I published an article yesterday about how to measure your marketing results in social media, perhaps some of the folks on this post will find it interesting:
http://blog.hubspot.com/blog/tabid/6307/bid/3561/Social-Media-How-to-Measure-Marketing-Effectiveness.aspx

If a “marketing” person declares they are a communicator, then great. If they are more interested in generating leads and doing all the other boring stuff that directly makes money, then– well, someone has to do it, and social media may be a great tool for part of that function.

I’m a PR guy, and I am completely comfortable thinking of social media communications as a communications function, completely integrated with all the “old” communications functions. After all, they’re just tools. They’re newer, they’re cooler, but they’re tools.

I just know that it’s not just us PR people out here.

That’s pretty cool too.

Social media is about finding the right tools to become a natural part of the conversation and not just shouting ad messages at people. The disintegrating lines between practice areas is why you see so many social media specialists who are just looking for a good way to talk to people.

So, at first glance, it’s easier to see the PR play which is generally more about branding or sharing information than about an offer with a call to action. But, as a customer myself, I think that a compelling marketing message would be welcome if it is right on the mark, meaning I and my friends will benefit from participating. The challenge is to come up with that compelling message or offer in a way that is entertaining, provokes conversation, and is not perceived as invasive or controversial.