PR Guarantees

I hear it all the time from companies just about to hire a PR firm. “What can you guarantee me?” No matter how tight the publicist may be with the journalist, there are no guarantees. Whether you handle it in-house or work with a freelance publicist or a PR agency, expecting feature coverage in desired media right away may be unrealistic, and you could likely be setting your publicist up to fail. The level of your company’s brand awareness and news worthiness will be a factor.

Unless you’re a well-known brand with “stop-the-presses” news, you’ll more likely need to entice the journalist with how your news or story fits into their plans. This requires the skill to develop and position your message, and the savvy to craft relevant story angles targeted to audiences, which will differ from business media to industry trades. Most likely, the journalists have already mapped out the pub and decided the agenda; your company may or may not be relevant. But your firm might fit in nicely with a story they are doing—months from now, which means being on top of editorial calendars matters and why PR is a long-term process.

Media tends to covers other media. So, if your company isn't widely known and hasn't been covered by analysts or the trades, media interviews need to be happen, first. Then, when there’s a relevant, you’ll have a better shot at being included. Media-trained spokesperson great at giving sound bites helps, too.

A myth I’ll debunk: the biggest agencies do not have an advantage. What they do have, is more brains and bodies—a larger team to pitch your business. If you have a vast news pipeline with lots of activity, lots of different target audiences and a huge footprint, a larger agency may be necessary. It all comes down to how much time and talent is needed to effectively pitch your company.

Contrary to popular belief, it doesn’t matter how well the publicist knows the journalist; there’s no guarantee of getting an article. Leveraging the right relationships with journalists that cover your industry certainly facilitates the conversation. Contacts are useful, but virtually useless without the skills to pitch—and that comes from experience. A small and senior “A” team will get better results than a large and junior “B” team, every time. Guaranteed.