🏆 4 tactics to get the most out of your PR efforts

Consistency, transparency, and discovery.

The Feed is back from its summer hiatus! We hope you were able to relax and enjoy the warmer months. 

To kick off the fall season, we’re sharing how to get the most out of your communications team, whether that’s your internal point person, an outside freelancer, or an agency. 

TL;DR:

Clear and consistent communication, transparency into your business, and aligning on goals upfront will build trust, keep things on track, and help you and your comms team work together to drive your business forward. 

The details:

Communication, both internal and external, is key when it comes to scaling and operating your business. Even if you already have a long-standing relationship with a comms rep, team, or agency, it’s never too late to weave these four tactics into your operations.

1. Establish a culture of transparency. 

The more transparency you can provide your comms team into what is going on across your organization, the better. Even if you are still putting some of the pieces together, invite your comms team to listen in to the early conversations, instead of waiting until everything is fully finalized to loop in your team. This helps in a number of ways. Your comms team may be able to help identify opportunities to enhance your programs or initiatives so that they will offer compelling storylines for the media, the public, and your customers. They can see the bigger picture firsthand and have a clear view of your goals, capture insights from your team, and have a better understanding of the program before they start to draft any outbound materials, like press releases, pitches to media, social media content, blog posts, etc.

2. Create a regular communication cadence. 

Early on in your relationship, set up regular standing meetings to review initiatives, priorities and progress, share updates, and discuss any blockers or needs. Establishing regular check-in times once a week or once every two weeks provides structure to make sure that everyone is aligned on priorities and there is always a set time to go over any challenges or wins. 

3. Hold discovery sessions with key stakeholders. 

When we kick off with a client at Robin — whether it be marketing, comms, branding or design — we conduct a discovery. These are sessions where we meet with key stakeholders within a client’s organization to learn about their goals and priorities, challenges they are facing, how they describe the company, and where they see communications fitting into the fold. Ideally this can happen before any work kicks off, but in the real world, this can be challenging, especially with PR and communications when there is company news to get out! That said, it’s never too late to conduct this exercise, and once is likely not enough. Hearing from various stakeholders within the company helps your comms team to get a clear picture of how the company operates, gather ideas for storylines, and identify areas where they may be able to add value. Doing this once every six months or a year is an effective way to inspire story ideas, hear from leadership, and identify opportunity areas to help support your business. 

4. Create alignment and agreement on goals. 

PR efforts don’t happen overnight; there is a process and boots on the ground work that builds up to support broader efforts. But in the startup world things can change quickly. New opportunities arise and pivots are a normal part of business. Amidst the tumult, it’s important to keep your comms team in the loop on any changing goals so all parties are aligned with how you see PR supporting your business. Are you only looking for media coverage and mentions in the press? Do you need support with internal and executive communications? Those and more?  Giving your comms team a clear understanding of how your company evaluates its efforts will help them develop the right strategies and tactics to deliver against your goals.

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🤝Let’s work together. If you would like to learn more about Robin, or want to talk about your brand’s marketing, communications, and product development initiatives, contact us at hello@androbin.co.

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