At Hugoversity, we live by the mantra that failing to prepare is preparing to fail.
That’s why one of the key services we offer is strategy development, because any successful PR campaign needs to start with a plan.
Maybe you’ve taken on someone less experienced in a PR role and they need a helping paw with the higher-level strategy? Or maybe it’s you who wants some fresh ideas for your communications plans?
Or maybe you want to have a go yourself? In that case, the Prefects have developed a handy guide on strategising – you might as well learn from the best!
At the beginning
Let’s start at the start; to create a strategy, first off you’ll need to establish what you want it to achieve. Essentially, what does your business do and what do you want your PR to do for it.
Now’s also the time to go over what you’re already doing, rooting out what works and what doesn’t; you may find you’re already doing a pretty good job.
Next up you need to establish who you’re talking to – your target audience – as this will inform every other step of your strategy.
What do they want? What can you offer them? What are their likes and dislikes? Where do they get their news? What time are they online, and which platforms are they using?
All of this will help you target your strategy more effectively and make sure you get results.
Who are you?
You’ve established your audience, so now’s the time to really dig deep and get to know yourself – or rather, your brand.
As Simon Sinek said, people don’t buy what you do, they buy why you do it, so that’s what you need to establish early on.
This is also where you’ll start looking at things like your tone of voice and brand language, as well as setting out your mission and values – what does your brand stand for? Are you light-hearted? Serious? Trustworthy? Loyal?
Here’s your chance to pin down every aspect of how your brand should appear and the great thing is this can now be shared with everyone who works for you too, to make sure you’re all on the same page.
Making a move
So you’ve done all the background, what’s next? Well, now it’s time to get a little bit more practical.
Start by developing some ideas for getting publicity; maybe you’ve got some big news coming up, or you’re appearing at an event – all great ways to get you known.
However, don’t go in all guns blazing just yet; first you’ll need to research your key media. You’ll probably know your own industry’s publications, but it’s worth looking further into it. With so many online news outlets springing up all the time, it’s a changing landscape out there and you don’t want to miss any.
Don’t just restrict yourself to traditional media either; social media and websites are a low-cost, high-return way of getting you known, so keeping both active should definitely be part of your strategy.
Added to this can be things like awards, sponsorship opportunities or speaking engagements – it’s not all about the media.
Measuring up
Of course, you’re going to want to know if what you’re doing is working or not, so, as the final part of your strategy, you’re going to want to set some targets or KPIs, as well as establishing how you’ll measure them.
Social media is easy enough: simply measure your followers and engagement. You can also keep track of media coverage in terms of how many outlets you feature in and how many backlinks you’re getting.
You might also consider measuring share of voice: that is, how much media attention your brand gets compared to your competitors.
However, we’d caution against using sales as a metric, as PR is not about selling, certainly not in the short term. Instead, it’s about telling your story and building your place in your audience’s hearts and minds, so that when they do finally want to make a purchase, you’re the first brand they think of.
Sound tricky? Well, if you want to leave it to the experts to put a bit of strategising in your life, email study@hugoversity.com or call 01325 486666.
