Louis Capozzi, Chairman, Publicis PR & Corp Comm Group

I think that the most important trend that is emerging that will influence communications for the coming years is the empowerment of consumers, the democratisation of brands. The truth is that consumers are taking control of brands and the brand managers don’t own the brands anymore, the consumers own the brand and that democratisation is fundamentally changing the way companies think about communicating. I think now brand managers need to understand that they need to engage in a conversation with their consumers, that’s going to drive their behaviour in communications and create terrific opportunities for public relations.

Louis Capozzi, Chairman of Publicis Groupe’s Public Relations and Corporate Communications Group (PRCC), has a broad background in corporate and marketing communications and has held executive positions with major public relations firms and large corporations.

Capozzi is a board member of the Council of Public Relations Firms, The Lagrant Foundation, the International Communications Consultancy Organisation and the American Marketing Association Foundation as well as a member of the Public Relations Society of America.

In conversation with exchange4media’s Sumita Patra, Capozzi speaks in detail about the evolution of the PR industry, the challenges facing the industry, especially lack of talent and retaining skilled staff.

Q. What is the difference between public relations and corporate communications?

Communication and advertising are tactics, while public relations is an analytical process to better align the interests of the organisation with the interest of its public. Communication and advertising are ways to do that.

Q. Can you share with us your client portfolio?

Our biggest clients are pharmaceutical company Sanofi, General Motors, Proctor & Gamble, and consumer electronics company Philips, among others.

Q. What strategies do you adopt while deciding the communication strategy of a client? We use proprietary models for developing strategies. I have three different PR firms, each of them has their own model that they use for interacting with clients on strategy analysis and strategy development.

Q. Where do you see this industry headed?

Interesting question. I have to admit that I never would have imagined that there would be a half a billion dollar PR firm. When I joined Manning Selvage & Lee (MSL), it was $22 million, now I run PR businesses that are ten times that size. If you ask me what’s going to happen in the next 16 years, I have to admit that I have no idea. The industry is growing somewhere between 5 per cent and 10 per cent a year. So, if you look at their growth rate, you can expect that in 10 years the business would be double the size of what it is today.

Q. Is this problem of retaining talent a global phenomenon?

Absolutely. If you think about it, it’s a larger issue. In a very well developed market like America or London, for example, which are the biggest PR markets of the world, you get big PR firms that are growing the talent pool. It’s the same problem everywhere. No matter where you turn, you get problems of shortage of good people.

Q. How do summits like the ICCO Summit help the PR industry?

The number one value, I think, is we share a global perspective evaluation system, which is state-of-the-art and interesting. We all learnt from that and I think the number one contribution is to share best practices. The very important part of this is the congeniality and the cooperation that is within the industry. Public relations business is a small industry and we have a lot of challenges in common and it’s great to be able to share that with other people, the relationships with other people in the industry, because it gives you a larger context to understand the circumstances.

Q. How, according to you, has the PR industry evolved over the years?

In a very positive way, I think, the evolution of the PR industry has been very positive. The business has grown dramatically in terms of size of firms. When I started in the business, the largest firm in the world was $25 million, now the largest firm in the world is half a billion dollars. We have become truly global with big businesses and big global firms. We have a profound influence on our clients. We also we have to remember the days when PR people would sit around the table wrenching their hands saying how can we ever teach business executives the power of public relations – those days are gone now.

Q. How has the perception of the clients towards PR agencies changed?

I think there is much greater appreciation in business of the contribution that public relations and communications people make to the success of an organisation. One of the ways you see it manifest is the fact that most corporate communication directors of large companies now report directly to the CEO. I used to say, in old days public relations was like a can of pink spray paint in the CEO’s bottom drawer and after all the decisions were made it kicked the bottom drawer and say make this look good, but now we have the opportunity to affect not only what to say about the decisions but also what the decisions should be – that’s a profound change.

Q. What steps do we need to take in order to match up to our global counterparts?

India has an opportunity to jump over the old model and go directly to a model that’s much more contemporary and much more relevant today. In old days, we strived for recognition and public relations professionals suffered long periods to get acceptance and get to where they are today. I think there will be an opportunity to jump over the old advertising dominated model and jump straight into more consultative advice centric model with clients in India.

Q. Do you think PR plays a secondary role in the communication strategy of a client?

I think increasingly it is playing a central role and the reason for that is public relations people understand multiple constituencies and appreciate how to deal with the overlapping interests of those constituencies, whereas other communication like advertising, for example, are focused on the bull’s eye target of the consumer. We are in a profession where we deal with employees, investors, consumers, community members, and government officials, so we see a broader picture.

Q. Tell us something about your agency. How has it been performing?

We are part of a large holding company called Publicis. They own very large and successful PR firms. The PR firms are doing very well, they are growing and are profitable and are among the best performing businesses in the group.

Q. You are saying that clients are not able to evaluate the return on their investment?

Exactly. I love the P&G model by the way. I think it is the best model for evaluation.

Q. What are the factors that will drive growth in this industry in the years to come?

As India and China grow, so would the public relations business, in fact, disproportionately I think, because there is a strong appreciation in business of the value PR has. So, as your industry develops and becomes more international in their own right, they are going to disproportionately use public relations services. We see enormous growth markets in India, China, Brazil and Russia.

Q. What are the emerging trends that you foresee in the PR industry?

I think that the most important trend that is emerging that will influence communications for the coming years is the empowerment of consumers, the democratisation of brands. The truth is that consumers are taking control of brands and the brand managers don’t own the brands anymore, the consumers own the brand and that democratisation is fundamentally changing the way companies think about communicating. I think now brand managers need to understand that they need to engage in a conversation with their consumers, that’s going to drive their behaviour in communications and create terrific opportunities for public relations.

Q. According to you, what are the essential qualities one needs to have to become a successful PR professional?

I have a list – writing, journalistic skills, business skills (understanding of business), managerial skills, the ability to motivate people, to help them develop and to retain them in your company and create an environment in your company where people want to come and want to stay, that’s a very critical skill because there is a lot of competition for talent.

Q. What kind of vision have you outlined for your agency?

I run three agencies. We have two global networks – Manning Selvage & Lee, Publicis Consultants and Freud in London/US. Freud focuses on highly creative work and mostly handles consumer segments, Publicis focuses on corporate communication, Manning Selvage & Lee is a full service global PR firm.

Q. What is the vision for your agencies?

Well, I like to do all those that I talked to you about what I think the industry needs today. I would like to make it a great place to work, attract top talent. I would like to have measures in place for clients that help them understand the contribution that we make to their business. I would like to do highly impactful work for clients that deliver results.

Q. How this issue is being tackled?

Firms are building serious training programmes. They are working very hard on recruiting. Trade associations are also working hard on training programmes, development programmes, programmes to encourage people to come into the industry. So, not only are the firms working on it, the trade associations are also working on it. It’s a big effort to try to bring people into this profession and to help them learn and grow within the profession.

Q. How would you differentiate the PR industry in India vis-a vis the global one?

The industry in India is much younger and less well developed, but it’s growing fast. The industry in the West is more evolved, more sophisticated, well developed and well penetrated into a client’s organisation.

Q. How would you relate public relations with media relations?

Media relations is an important part of public relations. It is sort of a core tactic of public relations, so if we define public relations as an alignment process, one of the most pivotal skills is media relations. So, if you say behaviour is the first level of work in public relations then you have to have a message and you have to understand what that message is going to produce in terms of an outcome, and then you have to be able to anticipate the reaction, so that’s what public relations is about.

The skill of media relations is in terms of understanding how to craft the message that the media will accept. It’s an important part of being able to give the right advice, that’s why management consultants can be in the public relations business. To be in the PR business you have to know these things because they are all inter-related.

Q. What are the challenges confronting this industry? What steps are required to overcome them?

The challenge is clearly to be able to find and develop and retain excellent people in the industry. Evaluation is a critical issue for us. We need to be able to prove the value of what we do. We need to have industry wise accepted practice for evaluating public relations.

Q. How can the effectiveness of PR be measured?

I am not sure we have a definite measure or need a definite measure. We just need some basic measures that people can subscribe to, whether that’s measures of output, measures of outcome, measures of behaviour. There are plenty of measures that exist, we just need to adopt a universal standard.

Q. Out of these three agencies, which has been driving the maximum growth?

They are all growing strongly.

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