Help Yourself

As this blog now stands, there is a wealth of information on public relations, media relations and marketing that any novice or experienced PR professional can use. I hope you find it useful.  As time permits, I will continue to analyze who stepped up and who stepped in it.

January 30, 2010 | Filed Under Public Relations | Leave a Comment 

Media Relations Matter

Who Stepped In It: Regardless of the size of your business, media relations is one area that should be taken seriously.  The opportunity of success and the risk of failure are too great to do otherwise.  Apparently Lyon Shipyard Inc. in Norfolk, Virginia, didn’t get the memo.

A recent article in The Virginian-Pilot reported that five shipyards in Hampton Roads received more than $7.8 million in federal stimulus funding.

Lyon Shipyard was awarded the largest amount in the nation from among more than 500 applicants.  That’s news.  So the reporter called the shipyard and spoke with its vice president.  All is well so far.  It’s better to have a company leader speak for your business than a public relations spokesperson or a public relations consultant.

However, for success to occur, that leader has to understand the media, have a dedicated strategy for each media encounter, and give some thought to the intended results of the media encounter.  You get there by having a media relations program in place prior to any media encounter. 

Whether that media relations program is developed by an in-house public relations team or is outsourced to a competent public relations agency on an hourly, case-by-case basis, the end result is proper media relations training and effective guidance to ensure the following never happens to you.  Here’s what went wrong in Lyon Shipyard’s case.  The following quotes appeared near the top of the story:

—–
Lyon Shipyard Inc. in Norfolk received the largest award in the nation - $4.5 million for a dry-dock modernization project.

“Frankly, I was a little surprised we got the amount we requested,” said Tom Ackiss, vice president at Lyon.

When the shipyard applied to the program, Ackiss said, “we didn’t really hold out a lot of hope.”

“Nice surprises do happen,” he added.

The other local shipyards awarded grants are:
—–

I don’t know about you, but these quotes did not instill confidence in me toward  this executive, his company, or their ability to do the work.  Ackiss made it seem like it was an accident that his company was selected for this work. If Ackiss was hoping to make his company appear to be an industry leader and impress stakeholders in Virginia Beach, Norfolk, Chesapeake, Portsmouth, Suffolk, Hampton, and Newport News, he failed miserably.  If you leave room to read between the lines, people will read between the lines.  Ackiss’ quotes created enough room to drive a ship (or two) through.

During a media interview there are several fundamental media relations tactics to remember:

- Every media opportunity is a chance to get the core messages of your business to important stakeholders, including potential employees in Virginia Beach, Norfolk, Chesapeake, Portsmouth, Suffolk, Hampton, and Newport News.

- Your words will either help or hurt your business. Everything you say will be evaluated by the audience.

- Every quote should have an intended effect and move the ball forward for your organization.

-  Your words should match the actions and vision of your organization.

- Everything is on the record and could appear in print, even the chit-chat.

When you’re part of a positive story and your organization is being recognized for success, your quotes should include:

- Recognition of your people.

- Recognition of company expertise.

- Articulation of the future impact this success will bring.

Just because an executive is well educated and has reached the top of the corporate ladder, doesn’t mean he or she understands the intricacies of media relations and how to work with a professional reporter during a media interview.

When a reporter calls on deadline for a quote, who will be providing the answers that will be read by your stakeholders and tens of thousands of readers?  Will it be a smart person who wings it? Or will it be a person with media relations training and a well thought out strategy for responding to the reporter? 

August 19, 2009 | Filed Under Public Relations | Leave a Comment 

Good Public Relations Hits Back

Who Stepped Up: We’re all smart enough to know that things will not always go our way.  That’s why proactive companies with a competent public relations consultant develop a Crisis Communications Plan, allowing them to navigate through difficult situations when they arise.

A Crisis Communications Plan is essentially your Plan B.  You’ve always had a Plan B  as you’ve managed your personal career, but what is Plan B for your business?

Last month I talked about a company in Hampton Roads that was hit with some business-hurting, negative publicity.  During that same time, Northrop Grumman was also hit with several negative media stories regarding its public-private partnership with the Commonwealth of Virginia.  Reporters were taking the company to task about a high-dollar project to improve the commonwealth’s information (IT) infrastructure, inferring that Northrop Grumman had dropped the ball.  Consumers in Virginia Beach, Norfolk, Chesapeake, Portsmouth, Suffolk, Hampton, and Newport News were all exposed to this reporting.

The coverage was ugly and impacted reader opinion of Northrop Grumman — because nothing is neutral.  Media coverage is either helping or hurting your brand.

The media will do what they are trained to do and they get it right most of the time.  But they cannot cover every nuance of a project or endeavor, and you cannot control which aspect of the story they’ll decide to focus on - the negative or positive angles.

But you can decide to have a smart public relations plan that hits back when needed.  Northrop Grumman did just that.  Within days of the negative stories, part of their Crisis Communications Plan called for running a full-page ad in The Virginian-Pilot that told their side of the story.  In their “Open Letter to the Citizens of the Commonwealth of Virginia,” the company brilliantly explained what they’re doing and the challenges they face.  Anyone who read it learned a whole new side to the story, including these paragraphs I’ve pulled from the ad:

“This progressive and comprehensive effort remains unmatched by any other state in the nation.  We believe in the innovation and value of the largest IT partnership in the nation — that’s why Northrop Grumman has invested significant resources to provide the necessary hardware and expertise to transform Virginia’s IT infrastructure and bring it into the 21st century.  This includes the construction of new multimillion dollar facilities in Chesterfield and Russell counties.  Additionally, the partnership has created new technology-based jobs in one of the most economically challenged regions in the state and helped to reinvigorate the local economy there.

“Our partnership with Virginia is addressing much more than information technology; it is helping Virginia foster significant organizational and cultural changes within the state government to improve efficiency and delivery of services.”

The message appears in the media as an ad, but it’s a public relations tool which is part of their Crisis Communications Plan.  This is how you do it right.

If the media or a competitor puts information in front of your target audience that affects your company’s reputation or brand, are you ready to strike back?  Or will you accept the consequences of being repositioned by outside forces? 

Should you have Plan B lined up before the crisis strikes or is it better to develop Plan B in a firestorm of public criticism? 

July 16, 2009 | Filed Under Public Relations | 2 Comments 

Finger Pointing Is Not Good Public Relations

Who Stepped In It: There are a lot of bad business decisions that never make it into the mass media.  But what if one of those decisions becomes “the news”?

It’s been almost three weeks since The Virginian-Pilot reported that a well-known Hampton Roads heating and cooling company has 25 law suits filed against it, accusing it of false advertising and breach of contract.

That’s a bad day.

But that bad day gets even worse when no action is taken to address the negative issues being raised in this news report.  It’s tough to measure how much negative opinion was created among potential clients and clients who were exposed to it.  Some customers may have even sought a reason to doubt the report, but no response is like admitting guilt.  Such stories and the lack of an appropriate response have sunk businesses.

The company’s attorney did not help things with an ill-fated attempt to distract people by telling the reporter that customers should focus on another, now-bankrupt company that ran the scheme. 

If you are trying to earn credibility and demonstrate concern for your customers, this approach won’t fly in our jaded, savvy and sophisticated society.  It is reasonable for customers to say: “I bought my system from you; you promised me a sweet rebate; now where’s my money? Don’t point me to some entity that you partnered with and say I’m clean, they did it.”   What this company did reminds me of third graders finger pointing when they get caught.

You might think the owner of Russell’s Heating & Cooling, or the company’s public relations consultant or lawyer, has been in contact with the newspaper to try and generate a story that reports on policy or procedure changes in hopes of righting the ship.  All indications say they’re going to sit this one out and try to weather the storm.  So far, no damage control has appeared — and the clock keeps ticking.

Handling a public relations crisis
When you become the news in a negative way, quickly and clearly shore up your relationships with your publics — customers, potential customers, subcontractors, shareholders, stockholders, regulatory boards, and more. 

Here are some public relations tactics to re-establish your image:

- Take responsibility.  If you partnered with a vendor that mistreated your clients, you need to step up and fix the problem, no matter the cost.  Word of mouth and the Internet will spread this bad news story farther and faster then ever before.  The buck stops with you.

- Make sure your public relations agency is working hand-in-hand with your lawyer, before your lawyer talks to the media, or better yet, put someone from the company leadership team in front of the media.  Many times public relations consultants and lawyers have opposing views on handling media interviews and the approach to media.  You’ll have to decide which approach to take.  A good starting point is: who’s better at crafting an effective message?

- Craft a statement and send it to your target audiences.  Whether that list is 200 or 20,000, repairing your image sooner than later will help ensure potential and current customers stay with you and do not call #2 on their list.  Waiting may be too much for your company to bear.

- Move forward. There is no sense in exposing your audience to negative information they may not have read.  Talk about solutions and stay positive; you need to instill confidence.

- Post the statement on your Web site for a limited amount of time and follow up with a short article which describes your approach to the way ahead.

- Your statement should also appear in ads in the publication where your audience was exposed to the story.  This means keeping a reserve of money for damage control ads.

We all make mistakes.  But when one of them becomes big news, you need to take visible action quickly.  Are you prepared to handle a 25″, top-of-the-page, Saturday edition negative story?

June 11, 2009 | Filed Under Public Relations | Leave a Comment 

Poor Media Relations Surface In Bad Times

Who Stepped In It: How many times have you seen a great story about a new service or product, then not a peep?  Countless is my answer.

How does this happen?  Here are a couple of thoughts:
- Business owner turns a solid idea into a product or service and starts a business.

- Business owner contacts the media and generates a nice story. 

- Business owner is too busy doing everything else and forgets to communicate outside the organization.

- Business owner never thinks about seeking public relations support.

The next part of this sad story has to do with the businesses’ second media story:
- Business owner closes door for good next week.

The firestorm eating up businesses day-by-day in Virginia Beach, Chesapeake and Norfolk is feeding on businesses with weak foundations.  A good media relations program is part of a strong business foundation.

Here are some critical errors business leaders commit by ignoring media relations:
- Business owners think the world will beat a path to their doors to benefit from their product or service.  If only it were true.  One story is a start, but information overload has everyone quickly moving on to the next cool thing.  Staying in people’s minds requires and ongoing media relations program.

- Business owners think the media will call and include them in like-kind stories.  Think again.  Newsrooms have been diminished by recent layoffs making reporters some of the busiest professionals in the world.  Getting their attention and becoming a trusted resource requires an ongoing process.  Reporters don’t call you out of the blue, unless you’ve done something very wrong … and you need smart media relations for that too.

- Business owners forget that a methodical drum beat of public credibility goes a long way to establishing long-term credibility.

- Businesses put great effort into their product/service and management/employees. But that leaves the foundation of your stool with only two legs.  Bill Gates said, “If I were down to my last dollar, I’d spend it on public relations.”  He’s talking about the third leg of the stool - the public relations leg that rounds out a strong business foundation.  Without that leg, you are invisible.  Public relations, media relations and marketing make you visible.

How can you tell a business that doesn’t have a media relations program? They’re the ones who never speak to reporters and have earned no credibility with their media. When things get tough they’ll start joining every networking organization under the sun.  Then they’ll make a last ditch effort to hire a public relations agency to generate some positive media coverage.

That’s not how you win the game.  A competent media relations professional will maintain contact with reporters who can help you.  They will help the reporter on a slow news day or when your industry is making headline news.  Good media relations is a process not an event.

Is someone looking out for your best interest in the media or are you just hoping for the best and satisfied to be in the “One and Done Media Coverage Club”?  

April 8, 2009 | Filed Under Public Relations | Leave a Comment 

Hiding Is Never A Good Public Relations Option

Who Stepped In It: For better or worse, our quick-moving, highly-connected society can take a limited amount of media coverage and make it seem like the story has been reported a hundred times.  That’s what I experienced as I searched for articles on the Norfolk light-rail debacle where a consultant missed 240 pilings for removal because he or she went to the site during high tide, and the HRT CEO took the heat.

All I found was a front-page story, a brief mention in a column, and an editorial in the Virginian-Pilot, plus some coverage on the local TV and radio stations.  That’s not enough media coverage to make it seem like the story had been reported day-in and day-out for weeks.  Everywhere I went, that’s all everyone was talking about. 

When you’re the company at the center of an issue going viral, you may want to take some action to stop the bleeding and protect your image.  And that doesn’t mean doing a disappearing act, which is what this consulting company did.  Hampton Roads is a small place and there’s nowhere to hide.

Norfolk city councilmembers and city staff, city officials throughout Hampton Roads, the construction industry, and business people — and everyone these folks talk to — know who the consultant is. 

These are the leaders who hire the consultant, which means they are the consultant’s primary target audience for company PR and reputation management.  As it is now, the entire community is wondering who this contractor will hang out to dry next?  If the consultant had done the right thing, people could be saying, “That is a responsible company and I respect them.  They just made an honest mistake.”

Here are some public relations tactics the consulting company could have used to do the right thing:

Plan for a crisis:  Long before you need to do crisis communications, you should have a public relations plan.  Key leaders who will serve as spokespersons should have training and you should practice for a crisis occasionally.  This ensures you have direct access to the right leaders and can move quickly.  Bad news does not age well.

Research: Determine what caused the problem.  In this case, was it inexperience, a faulty process, or carelessness?

Institute Change:  All problems have a solution.  Find the right solution and make it company policy.

Develop talking points:  All external communication should contain the key facts of the situation and your core messages.  Talking points will be used in press releases and resulting media interviews.  These talking points will help you stay on message and keep you out of trouble. 

Write and issue a news release: Write a one-page or less news release that expresses regret for the mistake, and describes how it happened and what you’ve done to make sure it won’t happen again.  Also, correct any errors in the media’s reporting.

Identify the media:  Identify who covered the story and send them the news release.  Do not aimlessly blast fax or email it.  Personally call the reporter to ask if he or she needs anything else.  Being open and honest is appealing and will help your position on the issue. 

Unfortunately, none of these PR tactics have been done up to this point.  If the consulting agency thinks it dodged a bullet by keeping its name out of the media, they should think again.  Letting the harsh spotlight fall on another professional can never help your image.  If your company ends up smearing someone else’s image, you can bet yours is being smeared too. 

If your company finds itself in a firestorm through an honest mistake, does your public relations damage control plan contain strategies to protect your reputation and the future of your company?

February 4, 2009 | Filed Under Public Relations | Leave a Comment 

Public Relations Includes The Logo Too

Who Stepped Up: Every public relations agency and small business owner has their own definition of public relations.  I define public relations and marketing on several levels, but for this discussion, I say: public relations is anything the public sees, hears, touches, tastes or smells about your product, service, issue or cause.  And that includes your logo.

Small business owners would be wise to make sure they launch their business with a polished, professional logo that connects with their target audience and serves as a PR tool.

Alperin Law in Virginia Beach recently stepped up by investing in a professional logo which is polished and strong, and contains colors that indicate trust and leadership.  When designing a professional logo, the keys to success are:

- Your logo should uniquely reflect your company and be memorable.

- Clean, simple logos present a strong identity and reproduce well in various sizes and file formats.

- Steer clear of complicated detail and special effects such as gradients and drop shadows that will not reproduce well when scaled down to small size.

- Your logo should be just as effective in black and white as in color.

Other public relations tips to consider about a logo:

- Don’t confuse a busy logo with business brilliance.  That’s like confusing motion with progress.  The fancier you get, the further you move from the rationality of most people.  Logos need to match your business.

- Don’t design a logo with every color in the rainbow.  Logos with four or more colors can greatly increase your printing costs for letterhead, trifolds, marketing folders, ads, and other PR material.  My public relations agency has designed many top-notch two-color logos for clients in Virginia Beach, Norfolk, Chesapeake, Hampton Roads, Portsmouth, Suffolk, Hampton, Newport News, and throughout Virginia that look great and are easy on the pocketbook.

- Don’t buy your logo from a logo-farm website and think you’ve gotten one over on the “expensive” graphic designers and public relations consultants.  Think a few steps ahead and you’ll discover you may need: the logo in a vector format for a business sign; the logo in black and white for simple envelopes; the logo in a jpeg for a marketing PowerPoint presentation or website; or the logo in an EPS format for quality printing.  Even worse, what if another business in your area and industry buys the same logo for $40?  Having your own unique logo is smart public relations and worth the one-time investment.

- Stay away from logos embellished with shading, shadows, and beveling, and public relations consultants enamored with them. The true mettle and power of a logo is its ability to stand on its own in black and white with no embellishments.  All the powerful logos that stand the test of time are just as powerful in black and white: McDonalds, NIKE, Prudential (The Rock), Microsoft, Rolls Royce, HBO, MTV, and Sony.

- Don’t get consumed by the colors you like.  Always look at your business from an outside-in perspective … from the client’s point of view.  Get feedback from people whose judgment you trust — family, friends, co-workers, and colleagues.  We all live in industry/personal bubbles, so outside feedback is important.  Your fetish for screaming pink may be an immediate turn-off to potential clients.

- Don’t stick to an obviously outdated logo designed 10 years ago because you think changing it will hurt your business.  You can always tweak your logo to bring it into the 21st Century and connect with today’s smart, jaded consumer.

Are you asking the right questions when buying a logo, or are you walking into a great deal that will cost you time, money and frustration down the road?

January 9, 2009 | Filed Under Public Relations | Leave a Comment 

Media Interview Prep Is A Public Relations Must

Who Stepped In It:  Fortune smiles on the prepared.  That’s particularly true when it comes to media interviews.  However, not all public relations consultants understand this universal law and believe in winging it.

Make preparation a public relations tactic for any media interview.  Whether it’s a stand-up, phone, or in-studio interview — friendly or unfriendly — preparation will determine how you influence the readers/viewers.  That influence will be positive or negative; there is no in-between.

Before you conduct a media interview, whether it’s your first or 100th, here are some public relations tips that greatly increase your odds of being successful:

- Do Internet research on the reporter’s past stories to see how deep his or her knowledge is on the subject and what angles the stories followed.

- Do Internet research on your issue.  Determine who else is reporting on this topic and how that matches up with your position?  Determine where your prospective audience stands on the issue?

- Craft two to three main communications points you want to get across in the interview.  Tactfully work them into the interview.

- Conduct mock interviews with your public relations agency.

- Prepare by speaking in short sound bites — avoid long, rambling stories.  The tighter the better.  Try to condense your thoughts into their most potent, descriptive words.  A reporter is only allotted so many words and so much time, so make it easy for him or her.  This also cuts down on the chances of being misquoted and damaging your public relations efforts.

- Prepare by using bridging statements when needed.  There will be times when a reporter knows little about your profession or the issue he or she is asked to cover.  Or, the reporter may have bad research information from the Internet, which is loaded with good, bad and misleading information.  A bridging statement gets you past those potentially damaging questions and refocuses the interview on what’s important.  This is not dodging a question.  It is helping the reporter get the story correct.

- Prepare for the unexpected.  Never tear off the mic and storm away.  No one has pulled this off in a professional manner.  Better to hold your ground, stay on message and maintain your composure and professionalism — most likely the media is on a tighter deadline than you are. 

- Prepare for the pre-interview chit-chat phase.  Establish rapport with the reporter before the interview.  Remember, the whole interaction is on-the-record.  Avoid talking about anything you don’t want repeated in the paper or on TV. 

Put yourself in the reporter’s shoes.  If an expert gives you great quotes or analyses which easily fall into place, chances are you’ll call that person again.  However, if an interviewee speaks in jargon with rambling, incoherent sentences, you’ll never call that person back because you’ll find someone just as good who understands your needs.

Are you torturing or helping reporters with your media prep habits?

November 5, 2008 | Filed Under Public Relations | Leave a Comment 

Website Newsrooms Essential To Great Public Relations

Who Stepped Up: I recently had a conversation with a gentleman who’s been in public relations for more than two decades.  Lots of information and ideas were flowing and then we got on the subject of website Newsrooms.  When I explained how I manage them for clients he said, “I don’t do that IT stuff.”  Wow!  Get me a phone!  I’d like to order one ticket to the future for my colleague, please.

Public relations agencies and public relations consultants need to be updating client website Newsrooms and not outsourcing the work.  Why?

- Newsrooms are the bread and butter of a timely and informative website
- Technology has made updating website Newsrooms fifth-grade easy
- It eliminates outsourcing and leaves more money in the pockets of you and your clients
- It keeps your value to the client high and relevant
- It saves your IT folks for the big, fun stuff

Newsrooms are the bread and butter of an informative website
One of the most important sections of a website is the Newsroom, which should contain a minimum of a News Release section and a Media Coverage section.

The benefits of the News Release section are:
- Businesses and organizations always have a ton of legitimate things to write about.
- Post those items as consumer or media news releases.
- This highlights your expertise in a particular area.
- It also updates your website and makes it look fresh and timely.
- Plus, it adds a new, relevant page for search engines to find.
- SEO is the name of the game on the Internet. Gone are the days of loading your business name with four AAAAs and listing high in a phone directory.  The new game is: who has a correctly built website and knows how to optimize it by adding new pages that are correctly coded for high search engine results.

The benefits of the Media Coverage section are:
- Demonstrates your organization’s relevance to customers. 
- Allows a credible third-party to talk about your product, service, issue or cause — not just clients talking about their own accomplishments.
- Shows reporters who may want to use you as an expert resource that you’ve been quoted by other media and indeed are an expert in your field.
- Updates your website, making it look fresh and timely.
- Adds a new page for search engines to find; Google likes big, relevant sites.

Technology has made updating website Newsrooms fifth-grade easy
We’ve all pretty much come to the conclusion that the Internet is not a fad.  That’s great news for PR agencies and PR consultants who know how to update websites.  If you don’t have that ability yet, don’t hyperventilate on me.  It’s so simple I could teach a fifth-grader to do it in less than an hour. 

The only tool you need is Adobe Contribute, which costs around $160 and is a game-changer.  This tool allows you to instantly edit the text on most websites.  It also allows you to add pages, photos and graphics.  And, the public relations consultant needs absolutely no IT/webmaster experience.  It is one of the most powerful PR tools I’ve come across in a long time.

It eliminates outsourcing and leaves more money in the pockets of you and your clients
Updating the Newsroom on your own saves time and money for you and your clients by cutting out the webmaster or IT person.  Their feelings won’t be hurt (more on this below).  This also removes one more person from the communications loop.  Keep your operation tight, efficient and profitable.

It keeps your value to the client high and relevant
If you’re not consistently relevant to your clients, you’ll find yourself in a vicious cycle of clients constantly coming and going through your front door. 

One important way to stay relevant is through the Newsroom.  You’re only going to get so many bites at the media apple, and in-between those bites, you need to be providing value … not just waiting around.  Those who wait around get kicked around.

It saves your IT folks for the big, fun stuff
When you update client websites with day-to-day items, you save your IT folks and webmaster from being tortured.  What’s gold for us is junk for them.  They hate being burdened with little things and would rather be challenged with the big stuff.  Plus, they’re not trained in public relations and a website is a 24-7 PR tool. 

All Rourk Public Relations’ clients have stepped up and embraced active Newsrooms.  Here are three Newsrooms to browse through that help make my point: 
L. Steven Emmert
Tidewater Bariatrics
Bay Capital Advisors

Each of these clients takes their Newsroom seriously and each has enjoyed the fruits of continually gaining inches and relenting none on the public relations front.

Websites are either alive or stagnant.  A Newsroom adds timely, relevant information.  How is the world seeing you?

October 15, 2008 | Filed Under Public Relations | 1 Comment 

Public Relations As An Afterthought Is Costly

Who Stepped In It:  What incident or event would cause the most damage to your business if it happened right now?  Quick, think about it.  Now, if that crisis happened today, what would you say to multiple news organization covering it?  Far fetched?  No way.  Just ask Agriprocessors Kosher Meat Packing in Postville, Iowa.

In May their meat packing plant was raided by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and 400 of their employees were arrested in one of the largest single-site immigration raids in U.S. history. That was bad, but it gets worse.   A number of activist groups began a negative PR campaign about the company including claims that the meat they were producing was not kosher.  That’s a big deal to their customers, who ultimately say whether that business exists or not. 

The ensuing media coverage was a disaster for the company and their reputation, and there’s no end in sight.  The Virginian-Pilot’s Sept. 10, 2008 issue reported that the owner and managers of the plant are also being charged with 9,000 misdemeanors alleging they hired minors and had children handling dangerous equipment such as circular saws, meat grinders, and power shears.

You really can’t make this stuff up.  Yet many businesses are sitting on similar powder kegs in one form or another.

Agriprocessors responded by firing their CEO, hiring an expensive compliance officer, and finding a high-priced public relations agency from New York City.  Then they began trying to rebuild their credibility. 

Their marketing included a nationwide advertising campaign, media access to their facility, and tours of their plant and the community they reside in by a group of 25 prominent Rabbis.  The Rabbis had unfettered access to the plant, spoke with Agriprocessors’ employees, and met with community leaders. 

The media and Rabbis found a clean plant that was packaging quality Kosher products, contented employees, and a community that loves the company.

So why is their business on the brink of becoming number two, or three, or worse? Competitors are just waiting in the wings for the eventual miscue and an ever-so-slight opening.

It’s the same old song and dance:
- CEOs and “their” people run the business without thinking about the impact of all their actions

- These leaders make mistakes they should have discovered and corrected on their own

- They get exposed and then spend a bunch of money buying a slick advertising campaign and impressive words to gain back credibility

Sometimes it works, but why let things get to that point, especially when the company is pretty much doing the right things in the first place.  Good PR looks like this:

- Let it be clear that actions speak louder than words.  A proactive public relations strategy involves saying things that the company really stands for.  A company’s public relations strategy should reflect all of the values that leadership holds dear. 

- A good public relations consultant can sniff out the BS and feed back to senior leadership that the messages he/she wants to use are not reflected in the reality of the company.  When a company learns this reality, they can change directions and adjust their actions to the words they want to say.

- Be prepared for a crisis.  Every company should have an idea of the five worst things that can happen to them.  A PR response plan should be developed around these crisis situations and they should be practiced enough times to know you’ll get it right when THE day arrives.

- Get ahead of the bow wave of publicity.  Don’t wait for some hidden adversary to fill the void.  The issue for Agriprocessors was illegal immigrant labor, not the quality of their product or kosher status.  Why allow activists to use your company to further their cause.

- Every business regardless of size should have consistent access to professional public relations consultants.  This alleviates all the mistakes that inherently come from living in the industry and company bubble, and losing sensitivity to the outside world, which is ultimately the world you need to succeed. 

- To operate a business without the strategic insights of a public relations expert is asking for trouble.  Not only are you unprepared for a disaster, you’re missing things that could have avoided the crisis in the first place.

Don’t read the newspaper and say, “I’m glad that’s not me.”  Odds are, it will be some day.  It’s Murphy’s Law and no one is immune to it.  If that day is tomorrow, will you be ahead of the curve, or suffer a major, expensive setback?

September 16, 2008 | Filed Under Public Relations | Leave a Comment 

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