Social Media : the Impact on Public Relations Practices in the Service Industry

The purpose of this research is to identify impacts of social media in public relations practices in Malaysia service industry. Social media became a common communication medium among Malaysian and this phenomena led to the changes of public relations practices. This research has gathered opinion and information regarding the transformation of public relations practices after the emergence of social media, impacts of social media and challenges faced by public relations practitioners when using social media, these information provided by 10 public relations practitioners in different organizations in the service industry. The development and increasing users of social media definitely brought significant impacts to the service industry in Malaysia mainly due to the unique functions of social media that did not offered by other media platforms. Therefore, it is important for public relations practitioners to understand these impacts in order to develop the potential value of social media and handle it strategically.