Advertising is Selling the Milk, PR is Promoting the Cow

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To anyone not in this industry, there can be a lot of confusion between public relations, advertising and marketing. My professor in college gave us this catchy little tagline to quickly clarify the difference: "Advertising is selling the milk, PR is promoting the cow."

This saying quickly became a favorite and I included it on all the PRSSA materials when I held my presidency, and it helped a lot of students understand the very basic nature of PR.

Now with social media (wow - is this dating me?!) where does that fall in this tagline?

I would propose to say "Social media is talking about the milk, the cow and the farm" - and it's a whole lot of fun!

What do you think? How do you use social media for business?