Gartner Group recently reported that by 2015, 25 percent of all organizations will have a Chief Digital Officer. 

At the inaugural Chief Digital Officer Summit held in New York City on Feb. 28, conference curator David Mathison shared findings from his survey, “Chief Digital Officer Talent Map”. Mathison’s study found 40 percent of current CDOs work in agencies and agencies have had CDOs for upwards of ten years. This got me thinking; do PR agencies still need CDOs?

After 10 years haven’t we mastered digital and social media strategies and integrated them into our programs and campaigns? Aren’t we light years ahead of our clients? What is the role of today’s CDO?

I would argue that agencies need Chief Digital Officers more than ever. Today’s CDO needs to be one part futurist and one part evangelist. As the challenges and opportunities arising from digital, social, and mobile media escalate, agencies need a senior leader who is attuned to the ever change communications landscape where new technologies will continue to disrupt PR agencies’ core competencies of creating programs that reach influencers.

Near-term Trends Affecting PR

Social media disrupted the communications landscape and had a huge impact on the types of services PR agencies provide to their clients. With social media we no longer needed to go through traditional gatekeepers to reach influencers – social media enabled us to have direct conversations with them. PR professionals are experts in engaging and influencing audiences and the opportunity to continue to grow this aspect of our business looks bright. 

eMarketer surveyed 468 top marketers in February who reported their companies are spending 8.4 percent of their budgets on social media. Over the next year, that number is expected to increase to 11.5 percent, and in the next five years it will reach 21.6 percent. PR CDOs need to lead their agencies in evolving their social media practices by continuing to create meaningful conversations augmented by social media ad campaigns.

As teens begin to move away from Facebook, CDOs need to track their migration to other platforms and prepare their agencies with content strategies for those platforms. One such platform is Pheed, which was the App Store’s most downloaded social app in February.  It is a new social media platform where users share texts, photos, video and audio and 81% of the users are between 14 and 25.

Increasingly, we are seeing the rise of visual content. PR firms need to move from creating engaging written content to creating visual engagement –videos, infographics and images. Two visual social media platforms poised for exponential growth in 2013 are Instagram and Vine. Facebook acquired the 11-employee, non-revenue-producing Instagram early in 2012 and can be expected to activate the one billion people on Facebook.

Currently, only 18 percent of Americans who use social media platforms use Instagram but that is predicted to rise dramatically in 2013. CDOs can lead the charge by creating Instagram strategies for their clients. Vine, acquired by Twitter prior to its February launch, is an app that creates 6-second video loops. At RF|Binder we have made Vine a priority for our clients in 2013.

2013 is the year that B2B social media will start to see its potential. PR firms have traditionally guided our clients in creating thought leadership content. But that content should be distributed beyond print, broadcast and corporate websites. LinkedIn with more than 200 million members is the perfect platform for B2B businesses to engage with current and future purchasers of their products and services.

Publishing and content creation continue to undergo massive and continuous changes that will effect PR agencies ability to reach key influencers, policy makers, stakeholders and consumers.  Millennials cite Huffington Post and Twitter as their top two news sources.  With 175 million tweets and 450 million Facebook posts per day, how do PR agencies make sure their client’s continue to have engaging, genuine conversations? 

As media outlets such as The New York Times and BBC experiment with media that gets to know you – where you are, what subjects and topics interest you, etc., - and begins delivering relevant content tailored to your individual preferences, how do PR agencies stay ahead of this trend. The rapid growth of mobile has driven development of apps that facilitate news consumption on mobile devices. The Summly app concatenates news stories into 400 characters, while Wavvi parses news articles down to a sentence; basically a headline.

PR agencies will need to tailor new messages in ways that capitalize on the algorithms as we do for Facebook and SEO today.  

CDO as Evangelist

CDOs will continue to have a significant role counseling and guiding our client CEOs and CMOs. PR agencies will continue to need senior leadership who can educate and influence both their agency and clients on trends that are impacting the communications landscape.

CDOs need to keep their finger on the pulse of new digital and social tools and trends; articulate solutions and programs incorporating the trends; and finally communicate the value of embracing new communications approaches.