Alex T. Williams, Pew Research Center

One factor behind the increase in public relations jobs has been digital technology. Agencies and companies are now able to reach out directly to the public in any number of ways and are hiring public relations specialists to help them do so.

Lindsay Groepper, Vice President, Blastmedia

When I first began my career in PR more than a decade ago, we would e-mail or fax (gasp!) the full press release text to the press. What we see now is new methods of distributing the info, driven by social media. Rather than e-mailing a press release, PR people are sending journalists to custom landing pages created just for that specific announcement, contacting them via Twitter with a BudURL link to the release, or even directing them to a YouTube video with a message from the CEO making the announcement.

Cara Stewart, Founder and Principal, Remarx Media

The most important platforms for PR pros in the future will be the ones most targeted for their clients. Twitter, LinkedIn, and Facebook are “fun”; getting nitty-gritty into community sites that are industry-specific is less “fun,” because PR pros have to really understand clients’ technologies, business models, services, and more. Really, it’s more about PR pros becoming better PR pros and understanding their clients’ businesses, as well as what their clients do. . . . Social media is not a one-size-fits-all solution.

Erica Swallow, Owner, Southern Swallow Productions

There is also a growing demand for social platforms that make it easier for journalists and PR reps to contact one another. Help a Reporter Out (HARO), PRNewswire’s ProfNet, NewsBasis, and Media Kitty are all enabling the communication lines to run in both directions. Rather than having PR reps make the first moves all the time, now members of the media can put out requests for pitches from particular types of experts.