Media relations is the core activit

Media relations is the core activity in many public relations jobs (Wilcox, 2005).
One of the participants of this study remarked, “Media relations has over the years
become an increasingly significant profile and has added value to the business bottomline”.
To understand this strong link between the media and public relations, the
researcher examined Grunig and Hunt’s (1984) view on how public relations originated.
According to the authors, in the constant effort to get free space in the media for their
clients, press agents or publicists used every possible trick to take advantage of the
newspapers and other media. This was called “flacking for space” (Grunig & Hunt,
1984, p. 30). Although these press agents frequently got the publicity they sought, the
authors indicate that the media and the public have never forgotten the press agentry
origins of public relations. Hence, this explains why media relations is considered to be
the most traditional, visible and prominent of all public relations functions.