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With the New Year only a few weeks away, now is an ideal time to reflect back on the past year and look ahead to 2017. The public relations industry saw its importance elevated in 2016 due to a number of high-profile corporate missteps. There are a variety of lessons 2016 taught us but one thing is inarguable: The PR industry is primed for significant growth. Here are five PR trends that will help shape our work as PR pros in 2017.

As organic reach increasingly becomes a thing of the past, winning a budget for paid social—and proving out its value—is a must for any brand’s social strategy. But that doesn’t have to be a scary thing for those making their foray into the paid social world. As Facebook continues to roll out product updates—and other platforms grow more sophisticated in analytics, tracking and even marketing automation—the opportunity to leverage paid social content into real-world results has never been better. Here are some tips on how to approach promoted posts.

Google Analytics can be a powerful tool for measuring the effectiveness of PR work—but only if you know where to look. New users can easily be overwhelmed by Google Analytics, falling prey to “analysis paralysis” in trying to navigate its many moving parts. Here’s a quick checklist of where to look, and what to look for, as a primer on navigating all of that data.

The choice to use a picture without any dark-skinned people to pat oneself on the back for “diversity” is an odd and ill-informed one. The lesson that communications pros should remember is that visual storytelling is a language—a language that, though as rich and nuanced as any language can be, relies heavily on the first impression, the momentary glance.

Live streaming has seen a huge surge in popularity this year, and Facebook Live has provided communicators with a powerful new platform to share their brand stories. Despite its popularity, it’s difficult to show ROI with Facebook Live campaigns, and it can be tricky to ensure your audience is ready and waiting when you go live. Karen Vega, director of social and earned media activations at Viacom, has brought a potent combination of influencer marketing, measurement and media outreach to her Facebook Live strategy. She offers some tips here.

What would you do if you found out you had a life-threatening disease? Another question: What would you do with your life if you’d overcome the disease, at least for the time being? About two-and-a-half… Continued

Anne Glauber is using her 30 years in PR and communications to offer a hand to people like her. In truth, of course, there really are not many people like her. It’s become her mission to inform pancreatic patients of the possibility of clinical trials and experimental treatments.

Facebook has reported more metrics troubles for those who use its mobile platform (read: most Facebook users). The social platform has reported a discrepancy between Like and Share counts when a user enters a URL into the search bar in its mobile app. The true count of shares could be above or below the number reported; Facebook says it is working to resolve the issue.

When it comes to framing news in a flattering light to the right audience, Boeing has just pulled a deft PR judo maneuver that’s worth studying. On Dec. 11 Boeing signed a deal to sell 80 aircraft to Iran for $16.6 billion, a deal only possible because of the nuclear deal framework the Obama administration negotiated in 2015, which lifted economic and financial sanctions against Iran. But there’s a huge obstacle that could cause trouble come Jan. 20: Donald Trump.

While the world of public relations is often fast-paced and exciting (what most of us love about it) there is plenty of maintenance work that goes into the job as well, and some of that includes taking very unsexy topics and turning them into something that people care about. Next time you’re faced with writing about something that may seem dry or uninteresting, be it a byline, press release or even a presentation, consider these tips to spice it up for your audience.