Demystifying the term “strategy”, this guest article is by Jessica Lobendhan, PRCA Training Manager.

Everyone in business seems to want to be ‘strategic’. It is a word with near magical qualities. If your work, or even better you as a PR professional, can be described as strategic you are well on the way to higher status and higher fees. 

And yet a common criticism of PR people by CEOs is that ‘My PR people are not strategic’. But what does ‘strategic’ or ‘strategy’ really mean? And how do you plan a strategic PR campaign? 

The answer to these questions can be found in the highly regarded and very popular one day PRCA course, Planning a Strategic PR Campaign. 

Clarity and simplicity

Because the word strategy seems to have near-mystical powers it is overused and misused which results in great confusion about what it really is. But strategy becomes much less intimidating when you realise it is just a plan of how you are going to achieve your objectives. In essence if you have a plan you have a strategy. However there is a big difference between a good plan that works and one that doesn’t. 

The reality of any good plan is that you need to know the following six things: 

1.   Where you are (the current situation)
2.   Where you want to be (the objectives)
3.   How you are going to get there (the actual strategy in terms of who you are targeting, what you want them to think, feel or do and what media or methods you are going to use)
4.   How you are going to make the strategy work in practice (tactics…the creative element)
5.   What you need to get there (money and manpower)
6.   How you will know you are there (evaluation)

The problem with a lot of PR plans is that they go straight to the tactical creative details before developing a proper understanding of the bigger picture. 

To plan a really good strategic PR campaign you need to understand: 

1.  The overall environment in which the organisation is operating. Sales may be the goal but are there political or social issues that might impact on the plan?
2.  Who the key stakeholders are and what they think about the organisation. Is the staff on side? Could your proposal provoke an attack from a pressure group or NGO?
3.  Where the PR objectives fit in with the overall organisational objectives
4.  How to generate and test creative ideas that will work
5.  The importance of having a thread of steel that runs from your objectives through to the evaluation 

Pitch, presentation and psychology 

But even if you have taken all of this into account success is not guaranteed. In reality all good plans appeal to the heart as well as to the head. So you also need to know what will motivate and engage the people you need to persuade to adopt your plan. Presentation psychology matters. 

The success of pitches and presentations is often determined in the build up to the big day. Speak or meet with people involved as early, and as much, as possible. During the presentation itself don’t bore them to death by telling them how wonderful you are – they want to hear about them not you! And always finish with a summary of your strategy and creative ideas. Budgets and evaluation are important but they don’t win pitches, they just lose them. 

All this and more is part of the PRCA’s best-selling course Planning a Strategic PR Campaign – maybe the time has come for you to plan on booking a place.