Public Relations & Social Marketing Insight

It’s not a surprise Facebook and Google have stayed ahead of everyone else. The two platforms have focused on two key areas: personalizing advertising and those mobile trends we just examined.

Last month, Facebook announced that they have a billion mobile-only users -- not a billion users of the mobile app, but a billion people for whom the entire Facebook experience takes place on mobile. Google has invested its vast resources into mobile search, and in May 2015, more than 18 months ago, it said that “More Google searches take place on mobile devices than on computers in 10 countries including the US and Japan.”

The shift in focus to paid social media content is redefining, yet again, the role of the PR professional—a topic that Kellis will dive into in his opening Wake-Up Call session at PR News' Big 4 Social Media Summit, which will be held in San Francisco on Aug. 10. In a way, paid social is bringing public relations full circle.

"At least at Clorox, earned media now comes from creating social media ads that people will share," says Kellis, who leads the social media function for all of Clorox’s brands, including Hidden Valley, Clorox-branded products and Glad. "In the past, we’ve done PR around advertising in magazines and other media. That’s what we’ve come to with social. We’re doing PR to get earned media impressions from the sharing of social media ads. The earned part is critical, because we’re no longer measuring organic social campaigns—that’s completely out the window."