Dear Colleague:

Strategic PR: What it is; how to create it.

“Strategy” — intellectual force, mental energy — is in vogue. Companies want strategic PR and marketing communications, which encompasses:

- broadcasting their core message concisely;
- differentiating them from competitors;
- positioning them as their market leader;
- enhancing their bottom-line;
- targeting their prime audiences in a cost-effective manner, devoid of fluff and the extraneous.

Strategic PR requires skillful planning and management. You create it by first understanding the organization thoroughly, then by inventing the message and the delivery mechanisms.

“Message” does not mean slogan; it refers to the organization’s internal and external communication and dialog. “Delivery mechanisms” broadcast the message through memos; documents; your business card, stationery and mailing labels; your web site and all other external communication.

Now, how do you “invent” your strategy? Try a brainstorming session in which people blurt out ideas without any evaluation whatsoever. Often, we don’t create because we self-censor. And when we self-censor, we don’t give another person an idea to build onto. By eliminating all positive and negative comments on ideas, we generate a wide range of raw material to evaluate in another session later on.

Second, simply dictate or type ideas yourself — without self-criticism. An ex-client of ours, Dr. Edward de Bono, coined the term, “lateral thinking,” and wrote numerous books on this technique. When tenants of an office building complained about slow elevators, the building owner installed full-length mirrors at each waiting area rather than changing the elevator system. People didn’t mind the wait when they could look at themselves.

For one current client, strategic PR means limiting the message to one core competency rather than muddying the story trying to cover the company’s entire capability. In another case strategic PR means diversifying the media to include moving billboards, a blimp and smoke signals to attendees on their way from an airport to the company’s key exposition.

Stratetgic PR may be as simple as identifying critical growth messages and tying them to every press release, article, speech and analyst meeting. Of course, online and offline communication must tell the same message.

Planning

How much PR will your organization require next year? How will you know if it’s enough or too much?

Unfortunately, PR budgets (like those of advertising, legal, accounting and many other functions) have no ground rules. But there are useful measuring techniques:

• Compare the editorial coverage of four direct competitors and your company.

• Survey 100 prospective customers and ask them to rank your company and four others in terms of awareness, growth outlook, technical leadership and product reliability.

• Evaluate your growth rate and other companies with similar product lines to determine relative visibility.

• Call experts in the field and ask them what your PR budget should be.

At the beginning of every planning process, pinpoint PR objectives. You can’t forecast publicity volume or the number of speaking engagements, but you can compare results year to year and program to program.

The effectiveness of your recruiting effort ties to your public relations performance.

Investors in a venture capital fund complained that the firm was getting too much exposure, not spending enough time on its investees. That PR program was too “successful.”

When you hire a PR firm (like any other service firm), you are buying hours of staff time. The more you buy, within reason, the more you get. Most firms have a minimum below which a client won’t reach the critical mass required for productivity.

One proviso: PR is slower than you think because of the lag time for articles to be published. Also, you can’t delegate it completely: top management must stay in involved, and internal staff will have to provide information and approve materials.

However, one indication of effectiveness is that the PR business is booming, and firms are raising prices. The $3,000 and $4,000 a month programs of a decade ago are now $10,000. Smaller clients and dot-coms regularly pay in advance.

Case Histories

A European company mainly serving the call center industry is trying to build its American market. We have achieved a great deal of coverage in the trades.The challenge now is to accomplish more. We’re proposing: more people-power doing the same thing; more media; a newsletter; a small advertising program; publicity on the channels of distribution; a bigger splash at trade shows; greater web promotion; and a new series of user case histories.

For a systems company selling to consumer goods manufacturers, we’re suggesting an improved web site; incognito user case histories; closer relations with industry analysts; more publicity; a newsletter for both users and prospects; and a one-on-one relationship building effort.

For a prospective client with a highly experienced PR pro running an internal but understaffed department, we’re reviewing their marketing public relations plan and making suggestions.

For another prospective client without experienced marketing/PR staff, we’re outlining a PR plan which will become the skeleton of their new program.

Increasingly, companies will blur the line between PR and marketing, and a larger portion of the PR effort will serve corporate objectives. CEOs realize they have a greater responsibility to represent their companies before external and internal audiences as well as the media. For example, the new chairwoman at Hewlett Packard has done a superb job in this area.

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