Blog

How to Get Company Decision Makers on Board with PR

When it comes to PR, garnering and maintaining “buy-in” from key company decision makers is a must. While there is no doubt there’s real value in PR, your program needs both financial support and professional involvement from top executives in order to succeed.

Ask yourself these questions:

• Has one of your really great PR ideas fallen flat due to lack of engagement by key executives of your company?

• Have you ever left a meeting feeling frustrated by the lack of enthusiasm for a communications campaign?

If your answer is yes to either of these questions, here are four tips on engaging executives for better support of your PR program:

• Drop the jargon. Skip words and phrases, such as “organic reach” … “search optimization” … “traction” … and “hits.” If you want management to get behind your program, they have to understand what you’re saying and how it impacts what they care about the most. Stop with the marketing jargon and start using terms that mean more to them… like ROI and increasing website visitors.

• Connect with their goals. Work to align your PR goals with the company’s overall business goals. Increasing awareness and driving traffic can seem abstract to some executives. Define business-oriented objectives for the campaign that they can understand, relate to and value.

• Measure! Executives analyze measurement reports daily and a well thought-out plan for measuring the success of your program will lend credibility to your effort. Consider benchmarking to demonstrate the progression of your campaign. Stick with big picture, meaningful measurements that are related to overall company goals and values.

• Get together & stay on the same page. Consider hosting a short breakfast or lunch event to provide background training on the firm’s PR effort. Give your executives the opportunity to understand PR, ask questions and learn how your efforts can help them reach their goals. With a better understating of your work, they will be much more likely to support and participate in your next project.

For more insight on how to engage your company’s top executives and get them on board with your PR plan, contact Jim Bianchi at jbianchi@bianchipr.com or 248-269-1122.