Expectation-Setting Challenges in PR
When gearing up to help a client with a big announcement, we pump ourselves up at the Agency. We’re optimistic. We know we’ve got the chops, the creativity, the connections. We’ll make something good happen!
But with clients, we play the pessimist card. For as much as we feel an underlying confidence in our powers, we also know how hard this job can be; we know how fickle are the Fates. So before any big announcement, we make it a point to tell clients about all the factors that could possibly screw up their odds at coverage …
And yet … the “expectation setting” game is still tricky.
Sometimes luck and hard-work pay off, and we wind up scoring big. Sometimes we’re spot-on about the challenges, and the client news receives paltry coverage. Sometimes we simply strike out. No one bats 1.000.
The “problem” is that most often, we score. And that sets a bar that subsequent “expectation setting” conversations can’t dislodge. We become the lady that doth protest too much; the boy who cries wolf.
After we moan about the PR challenges of the client’s latest product launch plan, they start to say, “Yea, yea, I know it’s a bad idea to launch this product at a busy tradeshow, on a Friday evening, with no spokespeople available — but you guys will pull it off.”
And, thus hogtied, we screw the pooch.
Great media coverage requires careful planning. It requires spadework in the form of dozens of pitches customized for individual reporters and bloggers, and a careful logistical dance in setting up appointments. You can’t dump a press release on your PR agency a day or two before it’s scheduled to go live, and also expect them to shoot the moon.
Call this whining if you want: it’s an age-old complaint in the PR game. But maybe I can convince at least one marketer to take a breath before making unreasonable demands.
It’s not an unreasonable demand to expect great media coverage. It’s simply unreasonable to make that demand without truly listening to your PR counsel’s expert advice on how-to make it happen.
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You have a similar problem with the expectations game when you are pitching. I hate to over promise and under deliver, and have been in-house and seen consultancies pitch to me with claims I don’t believe they can ever fulfill. The flip side when you’re pitching is that if you’re realistic about the outcomes then it will go to the agency that makes the big claims.
This is a very honest and transparent post Todd. I don’t think many people would complain that they have too many clients, but I do understand that it can be hard to manage.
“Great media coverage requires careful planning.”
This is a great and important statement. It’s also important to realize that there is some luck/timing that you can’t control, even if you plan.
I think it’s hard to guarantee media coverage and most PR agencies I’ve seen have that as a disclaimer on their contracts.
Nobody says it is easy to be a winner. Just like with top athletes, you are expected to continuously beat the previous record. I bet Mr. Phelps is swimming his heart out to make sure he wins again.
Setting proper expectations early and educating the client is extremely important in this case. Humble professional will always do that. And when we do hit a snag, if we have done our best and also educated the client, we still are going to get repeat business.
Good clients know when you have done your best. They also know, though rarely voice it, when you are fighting an extreme uphill battle to make it happen for them.
Great post. Keep those brain-teasers coming!
Apolinaras “Apollo” Sinkevicius
Dear Todd, Very inspiring and great blog. Please accept my observations with best compliments from India.:
1- In my opinion the “expectation setting” game is definitely not that tricky as it appears, if you also plan some of your exclusive and situation dependent PR tricks in advance. In government set up, our basic problem is the credibility of our leaders and officers. The news media never trusts official media but they trust their bitterest competetors. So I prefer to use this weakness while handing such situation.
2- Yes, sometimes luck and hard-work pay off, but invariably it is the foreplanning that bears fruit. If we plan an assortment of different angle exclusive news and feature items then the outcome gets a boost of 40% to 60% more media attention. And this is a fact, that “No one bats 1.000.”
3-Beyond doubt, “Great media coverage requires careful planning” but most of the time we should not place media attention on the top. If we try to get ‘public attention’ and create some or the other sort of circumstancial hype, the media automatically follow the product or event.
What I believe that it is better to plan any tough PR activity like a Cluster Bomb.
Todd, I see a smile on your face. God bless you.
Yes, really it is very difficult to guarantee a coverage in the majority of communication agencies with the public. But if you wish to become the winner in struggle that it is necessary to make it. Certainly it is very difficult. But looking back it is possible to see the big done work with pride back. So everywhere in business. Yours faithfully Bronislav