PR Success:
This is the first installment of an ongoing series of columns providing practical advice on implementing an effective PR campaign or initiative – whether you’re handling PR internally or working with an outside agency/consultant. Subsequent columns will address how to pitch stories, how to build relationships, how to “use” PR and other key – sometimes overlooked – components. The goal is to help make you more informed in the ways of PR…and dramatically improve your “game.”
I live and work in Boca Raton, Florida. This may mean different things to different people, but to me it means that I get to play – and watch – a lot of tennis. Which ultimately means that I know as well as anyone the gap between “gee, that looks so easy” and ”gee, maybe it’s time to trade in the racket for a bowling glove.”
This gap also exists in the way the PR process is perceived and its day-to-day practice. This is mainly because it looks so easy -- just ask my wife when she visits my office and mistakes the knee slapping for fun. Or executives with little to no experience with an outside agency who think you pick up a phone, dash off an email or collar a business card at a high level function and newsprint flows. Sure it’s easy…about as easy as hitting a 120 mph kick serve to your opponent’s backhand. It only looks easy because you’ve spent hours with buckets of practice balls.
Our best clients are those who’ve had some degree of hands-on media relations experience. Whether they’ve taken it on in-house or worked hand-in-glove with an outside agency or consultant, they come to us with a firmer understanding of what it takes to be successful: the right tools (e.g., www.HRmarketer.com), the right message, timing and the understanding that a PR campaign is just that -- a multi-tiered process that progresses over time.
That said, there is one thing above all else to bear in mind: as in tennis, success relies on speed and economy. Editors work on tight deadlines and you are competing with a variety of information sources – you need to get your message out quickly and concisely. This requires a communications protocol that assures your PR point person has ready access to sources (e.g., a client HR professional) and information (e.g., company sales data, a new study or a revealing statistic). Many terrific story opportunities die on the vine because sources can’t be found and vetted in time. As importantly, all communications (which will be chiefly in the form of emails) need to be on point – quickly establish your source’s bona fides, his/her perspective on the issue at hand, and their availability for an interview. Few editors have time to wade through blocks of text explaining your company’s background, its successes to date and its plans for world domination.
Charles Epstein is president and founder of BackBone Inc., a PR and business development firm with over twenty years of experience providing services to human capital and information technology companies. When he is not pitching a journalist, Mr. Epstein can be found playing tennis somewhere in Boca Raton, Florida.