It may be getting harder to find real-life media people to relate to, but keep at it because connecting effectively with journalists is still the core skill of public relations. That’s the heart-felt message from PR Newser: forget the “grunt work”.

"Here’s the thing, though:” the PR Newser post says, “the contacts who stand out to us in our experience are those who simply GET media relations. Lots of people can pull up spreadsheets and hit send, but the process of building legitimate relationships with other human beings requires skills that some people have inherently, be they in-house comms or account managers. A single back-and-forth via email or social can, in most cases, demonstrate which pros are great at this kind of thing and which ones are doing what their bosses consider to be ‘grunt work.’

“Can you guess which ones journalists prefer to work with?”