| |
| |
|
PR Information | Mommy Home Jobs |
|
|
|
All Youve Got To Lose Is Everything
Everything, that is, if you ignore those folks whose behaviors have the greatest effect on your business. What those people see and believe about your enterprise, pretty well determines what their follow-on behaviors will be - for example, do business with you, or move on to someone else. Is that what you want? Of course not. So let's do something about it. While I recognize that there are other factors bearing on the success of your business, this one is simply too important, and its impact too severe and too immediate, to ignore. You get this airplane off the ground by listing your top outside audiences who, when they like you OR ignore you, you feel it. In other words, they are groups of people important to you whom we refer to as target audiences or target publics. The one MOST important to you, we call your key target audience. And that's why you must list them in priority order so you know where you really need to direct your resources. How do you determine who thinks what about you? Sounds like work, but you must continually monitor that key target audience (and probably others). Are you bothered by what they tell you? Is there a perception problem? If there is, we know it usually turns into a behavior problem, so something must be done about it now, at the perception stage. What you've just done is establish your public relations goal - a specific behavior flowing from an equally specific perception, which we'll work on creating starting right now. Now that you've got a public relations goal, you need a public relations strategy. Lucky for you (and for all of us), there are only three possible strategies. Create opinion among that target audience where there may be none, change existing opinion, or reinforce it. We've picked "create" so let's proceed. With your goal and strategy in hand, you begin thinking "messages." And I mean persuasive messages carefully designed to deal with that perception problem you discovered when you interacted with your key target audience. Keep your message focused on correcting that perception problem, and keep it believable and credible. Try it out on a few colleagues to see it if really is persuasive. Now you need a few "beasts of burden," communications tactics whose job it is to carry those persuasive messages directly to the attention of the folks who make up that key target audience of yours. And there are tons of them from trade show appearances, awards programs and news releases to speeches, brochures, radio interviews and face-to-face meetings. Well, here we are again at the monitoring stage. At the start of the program, you monitored the feelings and perceptions of your key target audience so that you could identify the problem and set your public relations goal and strategy. Now, you monitor all over again to see what kind of progress you made. Specifically, you want to know how many individuals received the message, through what tactics, and how many are aware of your messages' actual content. Also gives you a chance to make mid-course corrections by adjusting both message content and your mix of communications tactics. Keep the faith! As time goes by, you'll begin noticing signs of awareness of your business, and a growing receptiveness to what you have to say. The bottom line, of course, will be welcome indications that the behaviors you have sought to modify in your direction are, in fact, doing just that. In public relations, that spells success! Please feel free to publish this article and resource box in your ezine, newsletter, offline publication or website. A copy would be appreciated at bobkelly@TNI.net. Robert A. Kelly © 2005. 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. He holds a bachelor of science degree from Columbia University, major in public relations. Visit: http://www.prcommentary.com; bobkelly@TNI.net
MORE RESOURCES:
Google News |
|
|
|
RELATED ARTICLES
Media Training: Three Reasons to (Almost) Always Stay On-The-Record The words are pop culture heroes.Movies such as "The Insider," books like "All The President's Men" and television series including "The West Wing" have immortalized them. Free Radio Publicity for Marketing-Minded Financial Planners Radio is a powerful publicity tool. Most stations offer news and talk programming. Media Release Headlines - Ten Tips to Get Media Attention So you have spent hours and hours writing, shaping and crafting your media message. You've worked on setting your objectives, identifying your target audience and working out how to reach them. How To Use PR To Build Your Business Everyone knows the value of free publicity. And given the opportunity, most businesses would jump at the chance to have a news article written about them, or to be covered by TV and radio stations. Cross Cultural Communication & PR The Public Relations (PR) industry is responsible for creating and maintaining relationships between clients and customers. Through areas such as brand management, advertising, media relations and crisis management, PR practitioners seek to foster interest, trust and belief in a product or company. Media Training: How to Tell a More Interesting Story PRESIDENT BUSH TELLS A STORYOn March 18, 2005, President Bush stood before a group of Florida voters to tout his social security plan. He did something quite ordinary during his speech. The Increasing Power Of Publicity - And How It Can Benefit Your Business The call came into my office and the voice on the other end was very energetic, almost giddy: "I have finalized my marketing budget and need your help launching an advertising campaign for my new product," he breathed. "Congratulations," I replied, "but before we implement an ad campaign, I want to make sure you have explored potential PUBLICITY opportunities that could generate some cost-efficient media exposure first. How PR Makes a Managers Life Easier Things are pleasant for many business, non-profit or association managers when their public relations people deliver newspaper and talk show mentions, informative brochures and videos, and special events that attract a lot of people.But things could be much more pleasant for those managers if their PR teams were to deliver the kind of behavior change among their key outside audiences that leads directly to achieving their managerial objectives. Effective Media Relations - You Won't be Talking to the Media Without It! The media's role is to package and spread news, current affairs and public interest information to the public. They have great power to shape and influence public opinion, to target and exploit audience reactions, emotions and opinions. Is The Traditional Press Review Still A Business Tool Of The Future? Press reviews are a common and basic feature for surveying the market situtation, your company's public image and the coverage of your competitor's business. Only if you are well-informed about theses topics, you can make sound business decisions. Ignore PR at Your Peril! If you do, it means:you don't value tracking the perceptions of important outside audiences whose behaviors could sink your ship:you don't care about setting a public relations goal designed to correct misconceptions, inaccuracies or rumors that can hurt you;you care even less about strategies to get you from here to that PR goal you already don't care about;and you certainly don't value the persuasive messages you need to convince your key outside audiences that their damaging perceptions of your enterprise are dead wrong.Man, that's risky and an awful lot not to care about!Actually, I don't believe you don't care, and I don't believe you're really ignoring public relations. Promote Your Products With A Press Release Writing an effective press release is a way to draw attention to the products you sell and do so at a local level, nationwide and even get internationally. You don't need to be a writer, but you need to clarify exactly what it is you are selling. Publicity - What to Say to a Reporter You can have dozens of marvelous ideas to get free publicity, but nothing will happen unless you pick up the phone and call a reporter.Here's where the publicity game gets interesting for marketing-minded financial planners. Media Training: When Reporters Bully You UNDER FIREA friend whose organization is often in the media spotlight recently told me a story about her boss. Her boss, let's call her Susan, is on the leadership team for a lobbying group that represents a somewhat unpopular industry. PR tips for business Question: Why should your business issue a press release? Answer: because you have something to say, you want to say it in public and a press release encourages the press to say it for you. And because you want to show your business in a favourable light from the outset and begin the longer-term process of building awareness and understanding of your product or service. Public Relations 8 Fix Factors I say to business, non-profit and association managers, a key part of your job description is - or should be - do everything you can to help your organization's public relations effort as it strives to persuade important outside stakeholders to your way of thinking. Especially when it's YOUR PR program that is tasked to move those stakeholders to behaviors that lead to the success of YOUR department or division. Get PR Off the Bench Something that results in your most important outside audiences doing what you need them to do should not be warming the bench.But that's exactly what's happening at organizations that allow their public relations people to play games with tactics like newsletters, press releases and brochures instead of aggressively pursuing the major benefits PR can provide. Media Training 101: When 60 Minutes Knocks On Your Door You never know when 60 Minutes will knock on your door and if not them, then maybe a local investigative reporter. A little media savvy is a valuable skill for executives and their image-conscious organizations. Dont Do This to Your News Release! Hundreds of thousands of News Releases are sent out all the time and many people will show you different ways to write a news release in a way that will result in publicity for you or for your company. However, many people over look the 17 Deadly Sins that you should never do or have in a news release. Can Your PR Do This? Can your PR do something positive about the behaviors of those outside audiences that most affect your business, non-profit or association?Can your PR deliver external stakeholder behavior change -- the kind that leads directly to achieving your managerial objectives?Can your PR persuade those important outside folks to your way of thinking, then move them to take actions that help your department, division or subsidiary succeed?Or does the money you spend on public relations pretty much buy personnel mentions in the newspaper and product plugs on radio talk shows?If you want the real thing - the public relations performance described above - start with this reality: 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.
|
| Mommy Home Jobs | Mommy Matters | index | site map |
| Copyright © MommyHomeJobs.com |
