Mobile Technology and Public Relations

Contemporary society is evolving into a hyper-interconnected and mobile community. Mobile technology refers to any hardware and software combination that allows a person to access online content without being restricted to a particular location. The social mobile Web, accessed through the use of mobile technologies like smartphones and tablets, allows users to engage and interact with data, emotions, and connections across time and place. Mobile technologies have transformed how public relations is being practiced in both the physical and digital worlds, primarily by allowing people to personalize the way they receive, create, and curate information in multiple formats.

Users are able to broadcast their opinions, acknowledgements, praise, frustration, and fears or uncertainty to not only their immediate circle of friends and colleagues, but also to the rest of the global digital community (Applin & Fischer, 2012). Mobile technologies have extended access to digital content beyond that provided by the computer. [Page 573]Jason Farman in 2012 noted, “The mobile internet has thus interceded into the global problem of the ‘digital divide’ by providing access to areas that do not have the infrastructure and wealth to support hardwired connections to the internet as used in the desktop model of computing” (p. 545).

Mobile technologies offer a number of pathways for effective communication. Traditional one-to-one verbal communication, which characterized the telephone, has been augmented with other variations. In one-to-many communication, a sender can broadcast information directly to a large segment of the population or to a large stakeholder group. In many-to-many communication, the mobile device connects groups of people using mobile applications for social networking sites like Facebook and Google+, microblogs like Twitter, photosharing sites like Instagram and Pinterest, and video sharing sites like YouTube and Vimeo. Information can be disseminated in various forms, including visual information (photos and videos) and textual information (SMSs and short press releases).

Advances in mobile technologies have stimulated development of mobile applications (apps), which are specific software on a mobile device (smartphone or tablet) designed for a particular purpose or function. Apps represent a variety of categories and functions, ranging from social media (e.g., Facebook, Twitter), photosharing and editing (e.g., Instagram), review sites (e.g., Yelp), geolocation-based applications (e.g., Foursquare), augmented reality applications (e.g., Layar), organization planners (e.g., iCal), e-commerce capabilities, mobile commerce, and many more.

In public relations, mobile technologies are used as part of a visual and contextual communication platform for businesses, professionals, and agencies to extend their reputation and brand name among relevant audiences. Mobile technologies offer both advantages such as being able to target specific audiences quickly, and challenges such as the potential for viral spread of harmful information. The evolution of mobile technologies has progressed at a rapid speed, and practitioners must stay current and integrate these emerging communication platforms into their research and practices.