Thursday, November 10, 2011

Highlights of PRSA’s Recent Advocacy Work

Rosanna Fiske, APR, PRSA chair, presented the state of the society in the opening portion of the international PRSA Assembly. One of the highlights was the work PRSA has done this year in advocacy for the profession, including several actions related to U.S. regulatory affairs. Here are some examples.

Letter to U.S. Senate Subcommittee regarding GSA’s use of PR firms – The Senate Subcommittee on Contracting Oversight was investigating the use of PR and public affairs firms by government agencies. PRSA’s formal letter discussed the substantial public interest served by PR and PA on behalf of the federal government. As a result of the letter and other work, PRSA successfully discouraged the committee from restricting the U.S. government from using approved PR and PA counsel.

Comment on FTC’s ‘Dot Com Disclosure’ guidelines, ‘Green Guides’ for environmental marketing – The Federal Trade Commission invited comments about its planned overhaul of “Dot Com Disclosure” guidelines regarding advertising, marketing and sales on the Internet. The PRSA website describes: “PRSA submitted comments noting that its 32,000 members believe strongly in online consumer protections and are seeking clear guidance from the FTC regarding how businesses can appropriately communicate and market consumers online. PRSA also noted that disclosure of relationships, motivation, compensation and other pertinent factors should be the basis of all forms of marketing and communications, including emerging practices like social media and online contests. Finally, PRSA requested the FTC host a public workshop on online advertising disclosure to obtain the full input from all stakeholders.”

Letter to FDA urging publication of social media guidelines for pharma/health care – In April took action to urge the FDA to release its long-delayed guidelines for the health care industry’s use of social media. With strict regulation in place regarding patient privacy and other policies with implications for social media use.

1 comment:

Keith Trivitt said...

Thanks for providing this excellent highlight package of some of PRSA's most successful advocacy initiatives in 2011. It certainly was a busy year for us in terms of advocating on our members' and the profession's behalf, and you can look for many more important advocacy initiatives to come forward in 2012.

Keith Trivitt
Associate Director
PRSA