What's hot, what's not, what have you?
You blink and it’s another year. Whether you like or loathe it, culture and cultural zeitgeist are moving at a dizzying speed. At the end of each year and the beginning of the next, everyone and their mothers throw their hat into the ring and put out a recap of what’s been happening and what’s going to happen.
In her recent article for The Washington Post, Taylor Lorenz explains how the end-of-year recap has created a sense of social pressure and expectation. But in this day and digital age when attention is one of the most valuable resources and everyone wants a piece of the attention economy pie, it’s prudent to pause and reflect on our experiences. Such introspection might just inform what lies on the horizon.
After all, culture, like a relentless pendulum as we know it, operates in a perpetual circle. Skinny jeans to baggy jeans to skinny jeans to baggy jeans.
The “Ins and Outs” recap has been taking TikTok by storm. Whether it’s fashion or beauty, media or technology, we’re chiming in to discern what’s hot and what’s not. The short-form content that dominated the Internet in 2023? That’s so last year. Literally. We’re witnessing the renaissance of long-form content in 2024 – think YouTube before TikTok – in front of our very eyes. In October last year, TikTok invited its biggest creators to its New York offices for an event designed around encouraging them to create more videos at a minute or more in length. By making longer videos, creators will earn more money — and creators who post videos longer than a minute have five times the growth rate in followers of those who post only short videos. The vibe is shifting.
And the PR industry is no stranger to keeping up with culture, so I’ve asked a group of industry experts to share their ins and outs list in 2024.
Ronke Lawal – PR and Communications Consultant at Ariatu PR
Ins:
- Using our imaginations beyond what’s trending to find new ways to engage with audience. This means looking at new types of content/content creators/platforms
- Being more disruptive – how are we using PR to disrupt leadership conversations?
- Being louder about what we do in PR
Outs:
- Boring debates about diversity and inclusion that lead to nowhere
- Sycophantic behaviour in the industry which stops change
Kev O’Sullivan – Senior Partner and SVP at FleishmanHillard
Ins:
- Ensured media – where earned meets paid
- Gossiping in person
- Coupons!
- Using the word “viral” unapologetically
Outs:
- Ideas about hangovers and binge drinking – stop celebrating the industrial alcohol complex
- TV portrayals of PR people (Fall of the House of Usher, I’m looking at you)
Julian Obubo – Director, LA & Head of Diversity & Inclusion at Manifest
Ins:
- Using bullet point press releases
- 15 minute meetings
- CEOs that actually enjoy speaking to media
- Serving warm sausage rolls in morning meetings
Outs:
- Ghosting agencies after pitching
- “No agenda” meetings
- Tote bags …we’ve reached peak tote bag
Sara-Anne Mills-Bricknell – Senior Account Director at See Media
Ins:
- Telling jargon to jog on. It’s 2024. If you want your content to resonate and be accessible you need to keep it clear and simple
- Embracing AI to streamline processes
- Establishing greater connections with your audience through nano influencers
Outs:
- Stating someone is ‘delighted’ in any quotes
- X and I’m ready for whichever platform is ready to replace it
- Branded graphics on social. Keep your imagery user-generated and authentic if you want engagement
Mercy Abel – Cultural Insights and Content Lead at John Doe
Ins:
- Impactful collaboration for campaigns
- Celebrating each other’s wins
- Using insights not assumptions
- True PR not ER mentality
- Fun work environments
Outs:
- “Could’ve been an email” meetings
- Mistaking culture for trends
- Using non-inclusive language
- Not crediting teams behind campaigns
- Chasing payments & follow-up emails (we can do better!)
Paul McEntee – Founder, Here Be Dragons
Ins:
- Value
- Projects
- Fractional CMO
- Influencer Social Shopping
- Talent Belonging
- Niche
Outs:
- Time
- Retainers
- Brand Director
- Influencer Social Ads
- Talent Retention
- Mainstream
Kim Allain – Creative Lead, MSL UK
Ins:
- Reactive social comms – Brands doing social stunts that take over the internet. Think brands sponsoring influencers to get a front row seat on the 9-month cruise. Being at the forefront of Girls maths and girls dinner. Being better than store bought pesto.
- Employees as the real influencers of brands. Just click on Dr Miami’s socials and you see his fanbase fangirling over Santini – his social media manager.
- Community Notes. WHEW what a way for the brands, celebrities and politicians to be held accountable on socials (X to be specific). No more opportunity to post fake campaigns or comms without community notes holding them to account! Perhaps an answer to our AI real vs fake campaign questions.
Outs:
- Pantone colours. This is the year it’ll grey out because Gen Z and Alpha have a full conspiracy about how Pantone colours are linked to brands hitting the stock market and funded by multi billion pound conglomerates – I hope in my PR lifetime to not see it again.
- Calendar days. Don’t get me wrong Dry January et al still works – AND the bigger ones like Valentine’s Day of course will always have their day but we can’t go on creating more random days. Literally life is already complicated without throwing in a sandwich day, fried chicken day and a Dry January for good measure.
Whitney Simon – Senior Account Director, Head of DE&I at Missive
Ins:
- Thinking from an intersectional perspective when it comes to DE&I in PR
- More support, resources and training for line managers. As a result of COVID, line managers have become so much more than just ‘line managers’ – they’ve become mentors, friends, advisors and even therapists at times. Given the importance of the manager role, it’s important that we put more thought into who we make line managers – and how we train and give them the resources to do their job well. Otherwise, we risk losing talented people as we know that people don’t tend to quit jobs, they tend to quit managers
Outs:
- Performative DE&I practices. Since the murder of George Floyd, and the global wake-up to the BLM movement, we’ve seen so many organisations make commitments to increasing DE&I – only to see none of those efforts actually come to fruition.
Diversity and inclusion, the implications of AI and technology, as well as innovation, are evidently at the forefront of many professionals’ minds. When specifically discussing DE&I in the industry, Simon urges the industry to stop hiding behind flowery comments and bold promises, and actually roll up their sleeves and do the actual work of making the industry more inclusive.
“I have seen countless agencies talk about their efforts to increase diversity and inclusion, only to post a black or rainbow square – and avoid doing the difficult work of taking a hard look at themselves and their culture. As a result, we are still seeing agencies posting all white team photos, PR events with all white, all male speakers, and most notably, a lack of diversity when it comes to senior leadership roles,” she says.
Allain agrees that performative acts simply shouldn’t have a place in the industry anymore, albeit still happening in 2024. If anything, we’re living in a society where it seems like brands – and the industry in general – are entrenched in “pinkwashing” to “greenwashing” acts. I don’t doubt for a second we’re running out of colours anytime soon. But for her conscience and sanity’s sake, Allain asks communicators to do campaigns with purpose because it’s the right thing to do and not so that it wins them an award. “There are added points for the purpose to be connected to the brand/campaign and not shovelled in as an after-thought,” she concludes.
We have been making efforts – on diversity and inclusion, on AI and technology, on measurement and innovation, but 2024 isn’t a time for some lukewarm effort. It’s a time to truly embrace and move at the same speed with cultures and subcultures. Otherwise, the industry risks playing catch-up for years to come.
