If you are a pr client, or an ad agency, or even a publicity person, these tips can help you organize yourself to create a solid publicity plan. Although these may seem basic, they are the key essentials for any publicity plan.

For PR Clients, you need to have your key personnel in the marketing and sales departments become part of this process. For all pr agency staff, take notes; maybe even compare a recent pr plan you had prepared to compare it to this checklist.

First, you need to:  SET GOALS and OBJECTIVES.

Sounds easy, but this is the core to most failures of a publicity campaign. For example the goals and objectives should be something that can be achieved with a good plan, rather than a “wish list”. If you are a food company, or a retail store, it would be to “increase traffic and sales”. Other goals and objectives could be to “generate awareness to the brand(s), or to the name”.  Write at least three of the goals and objectives that are most needed at your company, or for your pr client.

Keep in mind that the publicity campaign should be part of your overall marketing plan. You need to work with marketing in order to see how your publicity plan can fit with the marketing initiatives.

When writing the publicity plan you should include these OBJECTIVES:

• Target Audience (identify them, even B2B companies have a target audience)

• Tactics (what are the means of media, such as TV, radio, newspapers, internet social networks, etc) Some of the best pr tactics to use are News Releases, Media Press Kits, Articles, News Conference, etc. It is very important that one person be the main contact at the company. This assigned individual needs to be available, and be knowledgeable of the products, or services you are promoting in the campaign.

• Timing (when are you planning to implement the publicity campaign) if this is about a special event or specific launch of a new product, then timing is critical and you need to plan well in advance.

• Measurement (have a process to measure the results) you can monitor the publicity campaign throughout the duration of the campaign. For example, how many interviews have been conducted? How many stories, or releases have been published, or placed in the different media–broadcast, print, Internet.

Each of these areas can be detailed and explained further. But my goal and objective for this blog is to get you started in the right direction. You can build upon these parts as needed. If you are a pr client or a publicity person that needs help in creating a publicity campaign, then give Carson Marketing a call. We can help your publicity campaign reach the goals and objectives set forth.