Yogyakarta, February 26th 2023─The development of the digital world makes the flow of communication more complex. Not only because of its convenience, but the digital world has also provided major disruptions in terms of advertising or image branding. This phenomenon certainly requires the current generation to be able to understand how to manage a quality self-image in society. Permodalan Nasional Madani (PNM), a subsidiary of Bank Rakyat Indonesia (BRI) which is engaged in capital and micro business development, also has a social responsibility to take part in empowering people in the digital era. Through a talk show titled “The Art of Storytelling on Image Building”, PNM fulfills this role by targeting the younger generation.
“Young people in this era, I think, should be able to tell stories, build narratives, so they can build good persuasive communications. This ability is much needed in certain companies or institutions to create a good image in society,” said the Dean of the Faculty of Social and Political Sciences, Dr. Wawan Mas’udi, S.IP., MPA., Ph.D in his speech. This talk show presented two main speakers, namely Syaifa Tania, S.I.P., M.A and a local Yogyakarta influencer, Muchamad Nurcahyo Romadhoni. The two sources provided comprehensive perspectives from the perspective of practitioners/experts and people directly involved in the world of digital influencers.
“Whose theory, what to say to whom, through what, and with what impact is indeed a classic theory, yes. But actually it is still very relevant in today’s era. Especially with the digital world now, in which channel this is very important,” said Tania. She added that communication in this digital era is closely related to public relations. Public relations is not only limited to the name of a division within a particular institution, but actually everyone carries out the public relations function. In this case, people within an institution must also establish communication with external parties, both formal and informal, and in this process, an indirect public relations function occurs.
Building self-image and branding is not only about how one can appear in front of the camera, nor is it only limited to people with public speaking skills. “Are introverts unable to carry out public relations and branding functions? Certainly can. For example through the community relationship function on social media. No matter how good the content is, if you don’t have good engagement and community relationships, then you can’t achieve self-branding properly,” said Tania.
Muchamad Nurcahyo Romadhoni or who is familiarly known as Ron Weasley is a local influencer with more than 80,000 followers. Ron focuses a lot on traveling and local culinary content in Yogyakarta through the hashtag #AnakKampungJugaKeren. “Initially, because I am a person who likes to travel, and I also come from the village, right, so the hashtag #AnakKampungJugaKeren was created. This hashtag was not only made for me, but maybe there are influencers out there who are traveling in their villages or children in villages like me can also use that hashtag,” said Ron.