Recently, Firefly Communications celebrated our 25th anniversary, a major achievement for an independent agency. With such a rich background and a variety of experience within the agency, we’re always discussing how PR has changed during our time in the industry.

Admittedly I’ve only worked in PR for just over 3 years, but even so, the change during that period has been astonishing. When I joined my first agency, social media was just something you’d engage with your friends on, now it’s being used as the bedrock of communications, with it’s unique ability to reach virtually every demographic on a global and local scale.

I’ve also noticed a growing trend of content marketing coming into play, with content such as infographics, video content, white papers and case studies becoming more popular in their use. News is no longer just focused on a press release and some images, a rich variety of content can enhance how we tell our story and we just have to be clever in how we present it.

Everyone else will have similar experiences to mine, but for those of you who’ve been in the industry for longer than me, there will have been an even bigger shift in how PR works.

The invention and application of the internet has made virtually all processes much easier for both PRs and journalists alike. Gone are the days when typewriters, fax machines and photocopiers were the norm, now we’re googling and working in the cloud.

The media landscape has also changed rapidly. Once upon a time you’d have never dreamed of placing your news anywhere other than in print, now online is part and parcel of our practise. The rise of digital media has changed how we approach getting our news out there.

At Firefly, we’re keen to know what everybody else thinks. PR has changed tremendously over the years and as a result, it’s virtually unrecognisable from how things were 25 years ago.

The past, present and future of PR is a topic that is regularly discussed and one of great interest to everyone in the industry. We’ve put together a survey, to get your opinions on how much you think the PR industry has changed, what things you don’t miss doing, what things you think you’ll stop doing and hot new PR trends that are due to explode in popularity in the near future.

Please click here to fill out the survey. We’d greatly appreciate your input and there are 5 x £20 Amazon vouchers up for grabs.

This post was written by Tom. Contact him  on LinkedIn or Twitter.