These have been the scariest words for me till date as I have no shame in admitting that I have never truly understood what it actually means. While in an agency, my boss once called all the Account Managers in his cabin and asked us ‘Explain, what do you mean by a PR Strategy?’ We all came up with one smart answer, which were basically what we can tactically do achieve PR coverage. So after ridiculing us for 15 minutes, he explained us that Strategy means an ‘Art of War’, it means the macro plan of what you will do to achieve the desired results. And the activities? That you will execute on a daily basis are all tactical approaches to achieve the overall strategic objective. Rest of the managers must have got enlightened with this thought but I could only understand that whatever we have been suggesting to our clients till date was only a tactical approach and not a strategy. Clients who bought our plans were probably as smart as us, but I still couldn’t figure out what Strategy actually means. Request all readers to help me in building my understanding on this super buzz word of our business. All the PR books that I read, conferences and seminars that I attended again and again repeatedly claim that Media is just one component of a well thought our PR Strategy. It is about deploying a combination of communications tactics used across mediums to continuously shape and influence public opinions. And in reality all these years I have been running behind media only to get what is obviously expected out of me i.e. Coverage. Even when I moved to the corporate side, no matter what is suggested in the plans, what we actually run behind is the laundry list of things that can be done to get more and more and more Coverage. Does Strategy include coming up with few bright ideas that are synergistic with branding/business objectives of the company? Does it mean that the ideas suggested should communicate the key messages that the brand wants to share with its publics/stakeholders? If the above is correct then the starting point in developing a PR strategy is to first understand the company’s business and communication objectives, and what is the overall marketing plan but how many of us really have access to the above information. Ofcourse if we are part of an Integrated overall marketing approach then we can easily come up with a plan on how we can integrate PR in the multi-layered marketing plan.

1. What is PR Strategy?
First Published in Imagemanagement.in http://imagemanagement.in/?p=4022
These havebeen the scariest words for me till date as I have no shame in admitting that I have never
truly understood what it actually means. While in an agency, my bossonce called all the Account
Managers in his cabin and asked us ‘Explain, what do you mean by a PR Strategy?’ We all came up
with one smart answer, which were basically what we can tactically do achieve PR coverage. So after
ridiculing us for 15 minutes, he explained us that Strategy means an ‘Art of War’, it means the macro
plan of what you will do to achieve the desired results. And the activities?That you will execute on a
daily basis are all tactical approaches to achieve the overall strategic objective. Rest of the managers
must have got enlightened with this thought but I could only understand that whatever we have
been suggesting to our clients till date was only a tactical approach and not a strategy. Clients who
bought our plans were probably as smart as us, but I still couldn’t figure out what Strategy actually
means. Request all readers to help me in building my understanding on this super buzz word of our
business.
All the PR books that I read, conferences and seminars that I attended again and again repeatedly
claim that Media is just one component of a well thought our PR Strategy. It is about deploying a
combination of communications tactics used across mediums to continuouslyshape and influence
public opinions.
And in reality all these years I have been running behind media only to get what is obviously
expected out of me i.e.Coverage. Even when I moved to the corporate side, no matter what is
suggested in the plans, what we actually run behind is the laundry list of things that can be done to
get more and more and more Coverage.
Does Strategy include coming up with few bright ideas that are synergistic with branding/business
objectives of the company? Does it mean that the ideas suggested should communicate the key
messages that the brand wants to share with its publics/stakeholders?
If the above is correct then the starting point in developing a PR strategy is to first understand the
company’s business and communication objectives, and what is the overall marketing plan but how
many of us really have access to the above information. Ofcourse if we are part of an Integrated
overall marketing approach then we can easily come up with a plan onhow we can integrate PR in
the multi-layered marketing plan.
Then comes creating those key messages and I am sure that most of the PR plans fails to achieve its
desired objective because the messages that we create sound like Advertising Slogans and fail to
create messages that resonates with the target audience?. Why should a journalist turn into a
company’s sales representative and start broadcasting your ad messages? Hence understanding and
drafting the appropriate key messages becomes the most critical part of a PR Strategy. To do this
probably we need to dig deep into the company’s business, understand the objectives, challenges
faced and link it up to the industry that it operates in and the overall environment that can impact
the business sector.

2. Next may be to try and figure out how we disseminate these messages using various tools that are
not as misused, abused and beaten to death like our poor Press Releases. May be through creating
Industry relevant White papers, case studies, hard hitting opinion pieces that can go on to establish
the company as anindustry thought leaders. Working along with the media or industry bodies in
creating round tables for industry relevant discussions can also go a long way in extending credibility
amongst the company’s stakeholders. Tracking and negotiating speaking opportunities in seminars,
conferences can also increase the chances of company spokespeople to been seen as opinion
makers by the journalists.
But to achieve the above it is important that the company top management works with its PR
partners more actively. They may agree with you but in the end nothing may actually happen and
the reasons can be many such as lack of content, lack of time quick approvals from the company’s
end on content that is quintessential to drive the above. Spokespersons may not be adequately
trained or lack confidence to speak at various forums etc., So the responsibility of the PR partners is
to then gauge the problems and help bridge the gap by aiding the client to develop the required
materials using their own in-house resources and domain expertise. Invest in training the
spokespeople and help build their confidence.
Again easier said than done but if we are able to do that then, we would be the most valued
partners for the company and the CEO. We would not be seen as postmen/vendors/aggregators but
knowledge partners.
Now, coming back to my earlier question. Do the above qualify to be called as a PR Strategy? If not
then please enlighten me and folks like me and help to understand howto draft a PR strategy? Your
comments, feedback will be most welcome. You can leave your comments on my blog
www.vikypedia.in or just drop a line on Twitter @vikramkharvi.