CHAPTER 1 What Public Relations Can DoThe second guideline is equally uncompromising: whatever the pressures and temptations, never deceive yourself. Come to think of it, that also means tell the truth (in this case to yourself). I hope The Management and Practice of Public Relations will answer many of the more common questions about what working in public relations is like and how PR can permeate every aspect of a business. But please do not rely only on my answers. Challenge them and check them out. If this book is to be of lasting use to you, it must encourage you to find your own answers, and, more important still, to ask your own questions. Of course, we might not be able to trace the simple steps that constitute a perception or an opinion, or precede or bring about an action: but underneath there is no doubt that they are there. (P.W. Atkins)What Public?Every business has a range of publics. These include the institutions and individuals who provide the finance for the business, the men and women who work in it and the families living near it. The customers who buy from it and the suppliers who sell to it, the consumers who actually use its products or services, and the competitors who want those customers and consumers for themselves: these, too, are publics. Nor should we ignore, even if they'd let us, the politicians and officials who legislate on the business and who take taxes from it. All these, and more, are publics. With each and every one of them the business has a relationship, either direct or through intermediaries, who are also publics in their own right. A very important public, though not always as important as they think, is that amalgam of press, television and radio known collectively as the media. What determines the success or failure of the business is the way these publics behave towards it, and this behaviour is determined, or at any rate influenced, by attitude and by perception. These in turn are shaped by reputation. Managing the causal linkage between reputation, perception, attitude and behaviour is what PR is all about. It is not a matter of choice. PR is the one business function that organisations cannot decide to do without. Their only option is whether to manage and practise PR as a conscious and deliberate activity, or to leave it to chance and hope for the best: a sure route to the worst. Public relations can: support business objectives

explain policies

increase awareness focus attention on issues encourage informed discussion help to change perception, opinion and behaviour influence attitudes motivate staff reinforce the marketing and sales effort build and sustain a reputation, over time help to restore credibility have some effect on the values of a particular group or of society as a wholeManaging PR To do any of these things successfully, PR has to be managed, and the way to do that is fundamentally no different from the way any other business activity is managed: realistic objectives are agreed a programme to achieve the objectives is put together, and costed adequate resources are assigned and responsibilities agreed the programme is carried out, to a timetable reliable methods are devised for measuring programme performance and verifying that objectives are attained emergencies are anticipated (which means that not only are they expected but that forestalling action is taken) results are evaluated and fed back, so that all six previous steps are continually repeated in an endless cycle of constant improvement.The Personal Portfolio of PRPublic relations consultants and in-house practitioners like to get involved in the planning and programme stages. It gives them lots to do and makes demands on their expertise. In doing so, especially at the less senior levels, they run the very real risk that they not only can't see the wood for the trees, they can't see the trees for the twigs. You won't want to get yourself in that position. Here's what you can do. Start developing a PR portfolio of your own. Put together summaries of PR projects and programmes, including ongoing activities. You don't have to be involved in them directly yourself: as long as they are by or for your company, into the portfolio they go. You will probably find it helpful to categorise each summary into a few broad types, such as: corporate PR customer relations internal PRIn each category, each summary should show: business objectives PR objectives budget strategy programme PR techniques key events timings responsibilities evaluation methods resultsA simplified version of this structure is used in most of the cases in this book. You could add those cases to your portfolio, too. The better you build your portfolio, the better you will see and understand the total PR function and your part in it. But don't worry if your entries are less than perfect: do the best you can at the time and improve the information as and when. Using the portfolio will enable you to check that PR strategy is consistent with overall business strategy. You should be able to compare the scale of effort on PR - money, time, and other resources - with that on other mainstream activities and with turnover. You will get an idea of cost/benefit and also of cost/risk ratios. By measuring gains achieved against those intended, you will know where the shortfalls are and what to do about it. Your portfolio should have lots of practical entries: press contacts the key people for you: who and where they are; telephonenumbers; deadlines; type of material they like; and so on contractors who; where; specialisms; strengths; weaknesses; who else they work for budgets typical costs: for example, how long/how much to produce apress notice? What does a minute of finished video run out at? guidelines and checklists encapsulations of lessons to learn, good ideas to borrow, mistakes to avoidTake whate information is useful from wherever you can find it. Physically, the portfolio could be a Filofax or similar, but it doesn't have to be. An ordinary A4 ring binder, of the sort you get at the cut-price stores, is fine; plastic pockets to fit; 2-hole pads; an indexing system. You could put most of the information on a personal computer - which makes it easy to weed out and update - but in some cases, such as colour samples, there is no substitute for the real thing. Later chapters in this book suggest ways of developing your PR personal portfolio into a working tool of life-long value. There are case histories, checklists and guidelines - look for the identification PORTFOLIO. Here is the first one.Setting Realistic ObjectivesWhat do we mean by realistic objectives? Opinions will differ and it is easy to let enthusiasm over-rule realism. These guidelines will help you take a detached, professional view.PORTFOLIOGuideline 1.1 - Realistic objectives1. Be definite and precise. Always set specific objectives.2. Specific objectives work best when they are action-orientated (a named person doing something).3. Specific and action-orientated objectives need to be quantified. How many? How much?4. PR objectives are only worth pursuing if they make a contribution towards the attainment of specific action-orientated and quantified business objectives.5. Make sure that your objectives are clearly and simply stated.6. They also need to be known and understood by all concerned.7. Objectives must actually be attainable within an acceptable timescale. Short term objectives are those you intend to achieve within, say, six months and certainly within a year. For medium term objectives, your timescale might be two or three years. Anything over that is a long term objective, to be worked towards, without prospect of early attainment.8. However, by the very nature of things, long term objectives become medium term objectives over time, while medium term objectives become short term objectives quite rapidly. Before you know it you can be at panic stations, dealing with an emergency or crisis, whereas you ought to be properly prepared for anything that could happen. The two crucial points are that 'long term' doesn't mean 'never', and 'short term' doesn't necessarily mean 'now'.9. If your objectives meet all these criteria none is more important than another, and none less they will be verifiable.Supporting Business ObjectivesPublic relations objectives should always bear a relationship to business objectives, and the closer that relationship is, the more effective the programme will be. Third Wave advertising agency Elgic Stewart Smith had four very clear business objectives: to acquire new clients; to take initiatives in the financial sector; to target financial institutions; and to sustain long term business growth. Their PR objectives were equally clear: to attract potential clients; to create awareness of Elgie Stewart Smith's business initiatives; to promote the agency's expertise in financial advertising; and to raise and sustain the profile of the agency over time." Robert Worcester's objectives for Market Opinion Research International (MORI) associate reputation with performance: to earn a superior reputation; to provide an outstanding level of quality; to create a satisfying working environment; to enrich the wider community's knowledge and understanding of research. The British Maritime Charitable Foundation claimed to be the only organisation undertaking detailed research across the wider maritime economy. The Federation looked 'to demonstrate the industry's contribution to the overall British economy' said to be around 30 billion (thousand million) a year - and to 'halt the current decline'. Can I be the only one who thinks that the first of those objectives was more realistic than the second?Awareness and PerceptionIn Shandwick's 1992 programme to introduce the new lOp piece, the key objective was to raise awareness of the coin as legal tender among the general public before its introduction on 20 September. Sub-objectives were to orchestrate a smooth transition to the new coin, encouraging acceptance and negating any criticism of Ministers, and to generate positive perceptions. The four main programme elements were as set out below.1. 1200 information packs were issued to a wide range of media, resulting in extensive coverage in September 1992. The kits contained a short news release; photographic comparison of old and new lOp coins; Royal Mint background leaflet: Questions and Answers; and a Did you know? bullet points list.2. Four months earlier, the Royal National Institute for the Blind was issued with 1000 of the new coins, to aid familiarisation amongst blind and visually impaired people.3. Building societies and major multiple retailers were asked to include information about the new coin in their house magazines and also to display on-site posters provided by Shandwick. Sixteen out of 20 top building societies and 10 out of 12 top multiple retailers agreed.4. A taped interview with the Deputy Master of the Royal Mint was syndicated to local radio stations, and 24 ran it. In addition, over 70 other interviews were set up and used on television and radio.All objectives were achieved. British Airways' (BA's) PR objectives were nothing less than to achieve worldwide recognition and approval. It may well be that BA achieved one but, to judge by the so-called dirty-tricks episode, it could have been at the expense of the other.Pulling People InIt is sometimes argued that PR can influence opinion but cannot actually shift goods off shelves or put bums on seats. The Harrogate-based Northern Lights consultancy wouldn't agree: they have proved that PR can pull visitors in. Their campaign for the launch of Eureka!, the first UK museum for children, achieved the full-year objective of 200000 visitors in the first three months, and on the tightest of budgets (see Case 12.1, Chapter 12). The organisers of the Royal Tournament likewise had a specific, numerical, objective: they needed to achieve an attendance of at least 10000 people for every one of the 21 scheduled performances, at a time when awareness and understanding were falling off, and when fewer and fewer people had Service connections. How Kestrel Communications tackled that, and what results were obtained, are dealt with in Case 3.5, Chapter 3, and Table 14.3, Chapter 14.Internal PRPolitical, military and market changes forced British Aerospace's Military Aircraft Division to make tough decisions on site closures and redundancies which could only be carried through if the workforce understood and accepted their reasoning. A communications programme was devised, with half-a-dozen interdependent objectives: enhance the flow of focused information; create a communication; involve employees, their families and local communities; and maintain cost-effectiveness.Caring PRTo help recruitment of nurses, Hampstead Health Authority wanted to overcome a local shortage of suitable accommodation available to staff. Dr Barnardo's decided to correct misunderstandings about what the charity actually did, and in the process dispel any stigma there might be about being helped by it. Hands up those who think Hampstead set themselves a more realistic objective than Dr Barnardo's. By a programme of face-to-face contact, posters in health centres and GP surgeries, Open Days, liaison with a major building society, local advertising and a 24-hour inquiry service, Hampstead won a 60 per cent increase in the amount of accommodation offered to the Authority. Dr Barnardo's change of name campaign was quite successful temporarily, but since then a revamped strategy proved necessary, with Fishburn Hedges as the chosen consultancy.PR and MarketingWhoever it was who first defined marketing as 'the entire business seen through the customer's eyes' probably thought that was an unreservedly good thing. Companies that are marketing-driven focus on the customer to the exclusion of almost all others who have a stake in the business. Clear customer strategies; well thought out programmes for customers; tightly controlled, customer-weighted budgets; saleable, customer-friendly products; good outlets in places convenient for customers; prices acceptable to customers; when firms which do all this are successful, they can be very successful indeed. During economic recessions, when budgets are tight, there can be an increasing tendency to use PR to launch niche products, premium products and new concept products. This objective is most likely to be attained when PR is part of a balanced marketing strategy. There could hardly be a more narrow product definition than premium brand ice creams. Haagen-Dazs's television and cinema ads campaign raised the brand's 1991/93 market share from 9 per cent to 20 per cent. But what got the brand to its 9 per cent position in the first place? Public relations. Biss Lancaster had the job of educating a public to pay 40 per cent more for Haagen-Dazs than for the market leaders like Walls and Mr Whippy. If premium brand ice cream is a narrow product definition, what about self-assembly salad dressing? HP Foods salad vinaigrette 'just Add Oil' was launched by Welbeck Golin/Harris, using media relations.1