Planning a Public Relations Campaign

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Are you thinking about planning a public relations campaign? Before you go door-to-door with flyers, we would like to give you a few tips to not only quick-start your campaign, but also give a firm foundation for you and your company to build upon.

 

First of all, what is public relations? Since public relations is fairly new in the world of communications, there are a lot of definitions floating around. Here at the Refuge Group we like to stick to the definition that the Public Relations Society of America has put in play. It is as follows: “Public relations is a strategic communication process that builds mutually beneficial relationships between organizations and their publics”. That is simple enough. Now, let’s get down to the gritty part.

 

1) Do your research. This includes, but isn’t limited to, the organization, relationships with the existing publics, the resources that are available, the competition and what the target market is going forward with the campaign. Research is critical as it lays out what you have to work with and what you need to work on. The research stage can also involve a SWOT analysis, which is an easy way to see the bigger picture

 

2) Write a situation analysis and core statement. The situation analysis can be a short paragraph that highlights the components that need improvement. The core statement is usually a sentence that summarizes the big picture. You can follow this with a goal statement, which states the goal that you would like to obtain through this campaign. You can find more information over a situation analysis here.

 

3) Come up with the objectives and key publics. The objectives that you come up with should be measurable as this will help with the evaluation process later on. Plus, how else will you know how successful the campaign is?

 

4) Evaluate who the key publics are and create messages for each. The key publics include groups that this campaign will target with each having a strategized approach. Each key public should have a key message and some may have secondary messages.

 

5) Use your creativity to make the strategies and tactics. The best way to differentiate between these is thinking of the strategies as the what and the tactics as the how. A strategy can be as simple as “Increase awareness among church leaders”. The tactic is how you will do that so posting an info graphic to social media may be a tactic for that strategy.

 

Those 5 steps make up the foundation of your public relations campaign. Other components to keep in mind are the budget, calendar and evaluation method, which will indicate how successful you are. To learn more about PR campaigns, click here.