Creating a public relations plan takes time, knowledge, and understanding of your company or client needs and wants. Here are some steps to ensure you capture those wants and needs in the plan creation process and that you create a plan that is relevant and useful to your company or client.

1. Know your company’s or client’s current situation. This is essential to knowing where the company now stands, where the company is able to go, what the company’s market/industry looks like, and what direction the company is headed. This helps to put things in perspective.
2. Know your resources. This can be a part of the first step, as it is a part of the situational analysis needed to understand where your company or client currently stands. This can help you better build your tactics and strategies while considering the budget, time, and other resource limitations the company or client may have.
3. Know your objectives and goals. Also essential to the PR plan having success, you must know where the company hopes to go. Like driving with no directions, a PR plan with no goals or objectives is an aimless action with no knowledge of what could come, or even what results are desired. Be sure that the PR plan’s objectives are in line with the rest of the company’s overall objectives, and ensure that they are clear to all involved.
4. Know and define your target audience(s). This means that you’ve defined your target buyer audiences and target media audiences. Each audience will need a different message and a different approach. Knowing these audiences will help you to frame your strategies and tactics so that you can effectively reach the people you hope to reach.
5. List messages and strategies you will use to reach the target audiences you defined. These should be in line with the goals and objectives listed earlier; if they are not, the plan is already off to a somewhat bad start. Know that your strategies and messages also need to relate to one another, otherwise there is some disconnect happening that needs to be addressed.
6. Define the tactics you will use to make the strategies you’ve listed a reality. These tactics will take the messages and strategies listed and make them happen. If, for example, a strategy is to enhance a company’s brand awareness, tactics could include community outreach, social media use, press conferences, etc. There first needs to be a strategy defined before tactics can be addressed and assigned to a message.
7. Create a time-line for implementation. This needs to be realistic but also challenging. Remember that there should be no lapses in the PR plan where press releases are being sent out, events are taking place, or media are being engaged. There needs to be constant reminder to the public that the company is alive and well, and that can be done with constant information being sent out.
8. Delegate obligations and responsibilities to your team or your client’s team to ensure all parts of the PR plan are completed. This helps to ensure that everyone is on board and that everyone knows their own responsibilities and duties. This is crucial to seeing the PR plan come to fruition. This step should be done with everyone involved so that no one feels over-burdened, left out, or given too much responsibility. This can also help to give everyone the feeling of responsibility since the plan was created with everyone together and not just one person’s say.
9. Create measurements of results/ success. To know if your plan is effective, create measurements and benchmarks for the tactics you implement. This is a place for the PR team to gauge the success of the plan and to see if goals were realistic. Creating measurements can also help to show what could have been done with the expertise and estimations of a PR firm or team.
10. Review the plan after implementation and conclusion of the plan. This is the time when all who helped to create and carry-out the plan can come together and share their thoughts on what went well, what didn’t go so well, and what could be done differently in the future. This needs to be done to ensure that future plans have a chance of being successful. This step can help to encourage group members to continue working for the company’s success by giving everyone a chance to talk and contribute to the next planing.

The key to remember when creating a PR plan is that all plans are going to be unique and different for each company, and even within the same company, they will be different for each plan objective/goal. Do your homework before creating a plan, and be sure that you work closely with the company or client to make the plan a success.

The payoff for business, non-profit or association managers can be a real assist towards meeting their department, division or subsidiary objectives.

Playing that public relations card means they’ve decided to pursue their objectives by reaching, persuading and moving those outside audiences whose behaviors most affect their organizations, to actions those managers desire.

Here’s a blueprint to help them do just that: people act on their own perception of the facts before them, which leads to predictable behaviors about which something can be done. When we create, change or reinforce that opinion by reaching, persuading and moving-to-desired- action the very people whose behaviors affect the organization the most, the public relations mission is accomplished.

In other words, here is the PR blueprint and tools you need to persuade your most important external stakeholders to your way of thinking. And then move them to take actions that lead to your success.

First step? Shift the attention of the PR team assigned to your unit away from communications tactics and over to a more effective action plan like the one outlined above.

You’ll know it’s worth the effort when you begin to see stakeholder behaviors like strong increases in inquiries, more repeat purchases, new proposals for strategic alliances or joint ventures, a fresh round of employment inquiries, or stronger contribution levels.

Lay it all out for the PR people who work for your unit, especially why it’s a must to list in priority order those key outside audiences whose behaviors impact your operation the most. Talk about the importance of discovering how your organization is perceived by those audience members. Particularly because such perceptions almost always result in predictable behaviors that can affect the success of your unit for better or for worse.

If you have a large, uncommitted budget, you can use professional survey counsel to interact with target audience members and ask the important questions. “Do you know anything about us? Do you have an opinion about our products or services? Have you ever had a transaction with us? Was it a positive experience?” Or, members of your public relations team can handle this crucial task since perception, persuasion and behavior are prime concerns of theirs, or certainly should be.

While handling the perception monitoring chore, keep an eye out for negative comment and voice inflections. Especially watch for inappropriate assumptions, misconceptions, inaccuracies, rumors and clearly negative attitudes.

Once you collect these data, you’re ready to establish your public relations goal. For example, torpedo those false assumptions, turn those misconceptions around, or correct that unfortunate inaccuracy.

The goal by itself is not much use without a strategy to show you how to reach it. As luck would have it, there are just three strategies available in the perception and opinion game: create perception/opinion where there simply isn’t any, change the existing perception, or reinforce it. Makes things simple, but be sure the strategy you select is an obvious fit with your new goal.

The meat on this bone is the actual message you will prepare should the perceptions you discovered require some alteration. This is not a simple writing job and the very best writing talent on your PR team will be required. The message must be both persuasive AND compelling. It must be very clear as to what is being corrected and why. Factual support, of course, must be above challenge if your message is to be believable as it works to alter perception in your direction.

And now to the easy part of this public relations problem solving sequence – getting that message to the right eyes and ears among the members of your target audience. The main limiting factor will be the size of your budget since there are dozens of communications tactics available to carry that message. They range from emails, speeches and private meetings to newsletters, media interviews, brochures and group briefings. Just be sure the tactics you decide to go with demonstrate that they can reach the same kind of folks that populate your target audience.

You’ll be best equipped to answer queries about program progress after you and your PR team again interact with those target audience members asking the same questions used in the initial perception monitoring session. Big difference in the two sessions? This time, all hands will be alert to any signs that the negative perception has actually been altered.

Want things to move faster? Add more communications tactics, increase their frequencies and take another look at your message to be certain it’s really persuasive and compelling.

The good news is, when managers play the PR card, they concentrate on persuading their most important external stakeholders to their way of thinking. And then moving those target audience members to take actions that lead to the managers on-the-job success.

About The Author

Bob Kelly counsels, writes and speaks to business, non-profit and association managers about using the fundamental premise of public relations to achieve their operating objectives. He has been DPR, Pepsi-Cola Co.; AGM-PR, Texaco Inc.; VP-PR, Olin Corp.; VP-PR, Newport News Shipbuilding & Drydock Co.; director of communications, U.S. Department of the Interior, and deputy assistant press secretary, The White House.

Article Source.

Tags: public relations plans, public relations planning, public relations benefits

Public relations is a very important part of the marketing mix. A successful PR campaign provides third-party endorsement of products or services which is something no other marketing element can deliver. Many people think that once a company starts advertising, editors beat a path to your door. In some cases, that actually does happen, but it’s not the norm.

Public relations is very different from advertising. One main difference is that you can’t buy media placement. The story is either newsworthy, or it’s not. Paid placement is called advertising.

Both marketing elements are important, but public relations can sometimes be a slow build. Results don’t happen in a few weeks or in a month, especially with the three month lead time needed for magazines print deadlines. When dealing with television, newspapers or radio, the three month lead time is not an issue, but competition is an issue.

There have been situations where we’ve had an instant success story. We created a museum event in Philadelphia at a small children’s museum that was an incredible media success story. Every newspaper, ethnic publication and television station showed up for this event. Over the years, we’ve also had a number of press conferences with tons of media coverage the next day. This is expecially true if the news is sensational or the product is very popular at retail.

In one case, we generated thousands of stories for a client, but we were trying to generate an article in a major business paper. Nothing worked. The editor was interested, but he didn’t understand the point we were using as the “hook” for the story. When we finally drove home the point of differrence between mass market retailers and specialty retailers, he wrote the story and it was fantastic. Our story ended up on the front page of the business section minus one column, but it took months and months of work.

Many clients don’t understand the PR process. For example, when I was handling the marketing for a major children’s line of licensed apparel, the client had signed the advertising contract, but not the public relations contract. He just didn’t understand the entire subject and finally asked for a meeting to discuss things. Shortly into the meeting, this charming, grandfatherly gentleman looked at me with a straight face and said, “Why do I have to pay for this, doesn’t it just happen?”

At first, I thought he was kidding, but then I could see that he simply didn’t understand the process, or the discipline. After a rather lengthy discussion, he signed the contract. The campaign was a big success and so was the clothing line.

Some clients don’t have the budget for the entire marketing mix of trade advertising, consumer advertising, sales promotion, web site development and PR. Many will start with PR and trade advertising and then increase their marketing budget over time.

How To Choose An Agency

When you are ready to consider an agency, what should you look for in a PR team? For starters, the chemistry has to be there. You also need experience and media connections. Don’t hesitate to ask for client references. Once you have them, pick up the phone and make some calls.

Don’t assume that the new business people will service your account. If there is one account person that you feel has the expertise you need, consider requesting that this individual be the point person on your account. The agency should be willing to agree to this request in your written contract. Beware of bait and switch, where you are courted by the new business people who will never be seen again after the contract is signed.

What You Can Expect

Some points to remember:

* Nothing kills a bad product faster than excellent PR and advertising. Customers may purchase the product once and then, that’s it.
* When products are photographed, the samples must be in perfect condition. The camera picks up and magnifies very tiny flaws. Retouching is expensive, so be careful when you select product samples for photography.
* PR is not a tool used to force retail distribution. If you try it, the move will come back to haunt you. When an editor asks for information about the retail distribution of a product and/or service, the PR agency had better have answers or the ability to obtain the answers quickly. Reporters and editors always manage to call for this information when they are on deadline so everything is a rush. A response such as we’re planning to open outlets soon in your area is not the correct answer.

Put yourself in the editor’s place. He/she is interested in writing about your product and the readers expect to be able to find the item in local stores, on respected web sites, or in catalogs. If they can’t do any of the above, the editor will not write about the product.

I have had consumers track me down because they wanted a specific product and could not find it at the retail store mentioned in the article because the item had sold out. One Christmas, I was practically running a mail order operation out of the agency because frantic consumers were calling for one specific product that did not have wide retail distribution.

* Trade books usually publish one month in advance. Consumer books publish three, yes three months in advance. If you’re hoping for a December magazine story, you’d better start planning in July or August.
* If your agency is creative, it will come up with innovative “hooks” for your products or services.

PR is a wonderful marketing tool, but you must understand the basics to understand how it can work for your company.

Diane T. Creston – Creston & Associates, Ltd.

About The Author

Diane T. Creston has over 25 years of marketing experience covering a wide range of products and services. She has handled campaigns for Fortune 500 companies as well as companies with new product/service introductions. If you are interested in learning more, please visit her website.

Article Source.

Tags: public relations planning, planning for PR, public relations

For those business, non-profit and association managers committed to PR tactics like radio and newspaper plugs, it can come as a surprise to discover where public relations value REALLY lies.

Truth is, your PR budget can deliver results far beyond such limited publicity placements.

For example by embracing the kind of PR plan that persuades those important outside audiences to your way of thinking, and moving them to take actions that help your department, division or subsidiary succeed.

Then by using the high-impact, fundamental premise of public relations to deliver external stakeholder behavior change the kind that leads directly to achieving your managerial objectives.

And finally by revving up the creative potential of your assigned PR team or agency and involving them in a way that positively impacts the behaviors of the very outside audiences that MOST affect your unit.

Perhaps then you will find yourself with a basketful of results such as prospects starting to do business with you; community leaders beginning to seek you out; newly arrived proposals for strategic alliances and joint ventures; customers starting to make repeat purchases; membership applications on the rise; politicians and legislators beginning to think of you as a key member of the business, non-profit or association communities; welcome bounces in show room visits; and even capital givers or specifying sources starting to look your way.

Spend a moment here and read that fundamental public relations blueprint referred to above: People act on their own perception of the facts before them, which leads to predictable behaviors about which something can be done. When we create, change or reinforce that opinion by reaching, persuading and moving-to-desired-action the very people whose behaviors affect the organization the most, the public relations mission is accomplished.

This lets you broaden your public relations field of fire, putting its primary focus where it belongs, on your units key external stakeholder behaviors.

A caveat here: be sure that the public relations personnel assigned to your unit really believe deep down — why its SO important to know how your most important outside audiences perceive your operations, products or services. Be certain they accept the reality that perceptions almost always lead to behaviors that can help or hurt your unit.

Review with them your blueprint for monitoring and gathering perceptions by questioning members of your most important outside audiences. Questions like these: How much do you know about our services or products and employees? How much do you know about our chief executive? Have you had prior contact with us and were you pleased with the interchange? Have you experienced problems with our people or procedures?

When you think of it, youre fortunate that your PR folks already are in the perception and behavior business so they can jump right on the perception monitoring assignment. If your budget can handle it, you can always use a professional survey firm, but they can be very expensive. Nevertheless, whether its your people or a survey firm asking the questions, your objective is to identify untruths if not outright lies, false assumptions, unfounded rumors, inaccuracies, and misconceptions .

Now you must carefully select which of the above aberrations qualifies as your corrective public relations goal for example, clarify the misconception, spike that rumor, correct the false assumption or fix certain other inaccuracies.

Now, if you pick the wrong strategy to show you how to reach your goal, it will feel like youre eating Roast Turkey without the stuffing. Fact is, you can only achieve your PR goal by picking the right strategy from the three choices available to you, change existing perception, create perception where there may be none, or reinforce it. And take care that your new strategy is a natural fit with that new public relations goal.

Sooner or later you will have to address your key stakeholder audience in a way that will help persuade them to your way of thinking. So assign the task to your very best writer because s/he must put together some very special, corrective language. Words, by the way, that are not only compelling, persuasive and believable, but clear and factual if they are to shift perception/opinion towards your point of view and lead to the behaviors you have targeted.

Here you take an easy step select the communications tactics needed to carry your message to the attention of your target audience. Checking, of course, that the tactics you select are known to reach folks like your audience members. Dozens are available from speeches, facility tours, emails and brochures to consumer briefings, media interviews, newsletters, personal meetings and many others.

Because HOW one communicates often affects the believability of the message, you may wish to deliver it in smaller meetings or presentations rather than high-profile media such as a news release..

Questions will arise as to indications of progress. That will be your signal to schedule a second perception monitoring session with members of your external audience. You will use many of the same questions as in the first benchmark session. But you will now be watching carefully for signs that the offending perception is actually moving in your direction.

A fortunate reality in the public relations business is that these matters usually can be accelerated by adding more communications tactics as well as increasing their frequencies.

Yes, as a manager, it may surprise you that a workable public relations blueprint like this one will help you persuade your most important outside stakeholders to your way of thinking, then move them to behave in a way that leads to the success of your department, division or subsidiary.

But its no surprise that the people you deal with behave like everyone else they act upon their perceptions of the facts they hear about you and your operation. Leaving you little choice but to deal promptly and effectively with those perceptions by doing what is necessary to reach and move those key external audiences to action.

Please feel free to publish this article and resource box in your ezine, newsletter, offline publication or website. Robert A. Kelly 2004.

About The Author

Bob Kelly counsels, writes and speaks to business, non-profit and association managers about using the fundamental premise of public relations to achieve their operating objectives. He has been DPR, Pepsi-Cola Co.; AGM-PR, Texaco Inc.; VP-PR, Olin Corp.; VP-PR, Newport News Shipbuilding & Drydock Co.; director of communi- cations, U.S. Department of the Interior, and deputy assistant press secretary, The White House. He holds a bachelor of science degree from Columbia University, major in public relations. bobkelly@TNI.net. Visit his website.

Article Source.

Tags: public relations, public relations planning, PR plan

Powerful is a strong word. But it fits here. As a business, non-profit or association manager, you create powerful advantage for yourself when you do something positive about the behaviors of those important outside audiences of yours that MOST affect your department, division or subsidiary.

That’s because you are using the fundamental premise of public relations to deliver the kind of external stakeholder behavior change that leads directly to achieving your managerial objectives.

And perhaps most powerfully, you do so by persuading many of those important outside folks to your way of thinking, then by moving them to take actions that help your unit succeed.

Yes, that’s powerful! Especially when it leads to advantages like these: membership applications on the rise; customers making repeat purchases; fresh proposals for strategic alliances and joint ventures in the inbox; community leaders seeking you out; welcome bounces in show room visits; prospects starting to do business with you; capital givers or specifying sources looking your way, and even politicians and legislators beginning to view you as a key member of the business, non-profit or association communities.

You need two lucky breaks here: first, a PR blueprint you can rely on, say, like this one: people act on their own perception of the facts before them, which leads to predictable behaviors about which something can be done. When we create, change or reinforce that opinion by reaching, persuading and moving- to-desired-action the very people whose behaviors affect the organization the most, the public relations mission is accomplished.,

And second, PR team members who understand that blueprint and commit themselves to its implementation, starting with key audience perception monitoring. Let’s face it, your PR people ARE in the perception and behavior business to begin with, so they should be of real use for this initial opinion monitoring project.

But remember that just because someone describes him/herself as a public relations person doesn’t guarantee they’ve bought the whole loaf. Make certain the public relations people assigned to your unit really believe – deep down — why it’s SO important to know how your most important outside audiences perceive your operations, products or services. Make sure they accept the reality that perceptions almost always lead to behaviors that can help or hurt your unit.

Discuss with them your plan for monitoring and gathering perceptions by questioning members of your most important outside audiences. Questions like these: how much do you know about our chief executive? Have you had prior contact with us and were you pleased with the interchange? How much do you know about our services or products and employees? Have you experienced problems with our people or procedures?

While, as noted, your PR people are in the perception and behavior business to begin with, professional survey firms are always available, but they can be very expensive. Nevertheless, whether it’s your people or a survey firm asking the questions, the objective remains the same: identify untruths, false assumptions, unfounded rumors, inaccuracies, misconceptions and any other negative perception that might translate into hurtful behaviors.

Your PR goal, of course, will be to do something about the most serious distortions you discovered during your key audience perception monitoring. Will it be to straighten out that dangerous misconception? Correct that gross inaccuracy? Or, stop that potentially fatal rumor dead in its tracks?

As it turns out, you won’t get there at all without the right strategy to tell you how to proceed. But remember that there are just three strategic options available when it comes to doing something about perception and opinion. Change existing perception, create perception where there may be none, or reinforce it. The wrong strategy pick will taste like lemon sauce on your chocolate ice cream. So please be certain the new strategy fits comfortably with your new public relations goal. You wouldn’t want to select “change” when the facts dictate a “reinforce” strategy.

At this juncture, you must put together a superbly moving message and aim it at members of your target audience. Always a challenge to put together action-forcing language that will help persuade any audience to your way of thinking.

You need your first-string varsity writer for this one because s/he must create some very special, corrective language. Words that are not only compelling, persuasive and believable, but clear and factual if they are to shift perception/opinion towards your point of view and lead to the behaviors you have in mind.

After bouncing it off your PR colleagues for impact and persuasiveness, it’s on to the next selection process — the communications tactics most likely to carry your message to the attention of your target audience. You can pick from dozens that are available. From speeches, facility tours, emails and brochures to consumer briefings, media interviews, newsletters, personal meetings and many others. Just be certain that the tactics you pick are known to reach folks like your audience members,

Since the credibility of the message is always at stake, you may wish to unveil it before smaller meetings and presentations rather than using higher-profile news releases.

Calls for progress reports will soon appear, which signals to you and your PR team to get busy on a second perception monitoring session with members of your external audience. You’ll want to use many of the same questions used in the first benchmark session. Difference this time is that you will be watching very carefully for signs that the bad news perception is being altered in your direction.

I’ve always considered ourselves fortunate that such matters usually can be accelerated simply by adding more communi- cations tactics as well as increasing their frequencies.

What you want the new PR plan to accomplish is to persuade your most important outside stakeholders to your way of thinking, then move them to behave in a way that leads to the success of your department, division or subsidiary.

Yes, powerful is a strong word but certainly not too strong when the people you deal with do, in fact, behave suspiciously like everyone else – they act upon their perceptions of the facts they hear about you and your operation. Leaving you little choice but to deal promptly and effectively with those perceptions by doing what is necessary to reach and move your key external audiences to actions you desire.

Please feel free to publish this article and resource box in your ezine, newsletter, offline publication or website.
Robert A. Kelly © 2004.

About The Author

Bob Kelly counsels, writes and speaks to business, non-profit and association managers about using the fundamental premise of public relations to achieve their operating objectives. He has been DPR, Pepsi-Cola Co.; AGM-PR, Texaco Inc.; VP-PR, Olin Corp.; VP-PR, Newport News Shipbuilding & Drydock Co.; director of communi- cations, U.S. Department of the Interior, and deputy assistant press secretary, The White House. He holds a bachelor of science degree from Columbia University, major in public rlations.

Visit his website here.

Article Source.

Tags: public relations planning, PR, public relations

Public Relations Planning tips – when to do what and how often?