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Developing a Successful PR Strategy in 2022

Developing your 2022 PR strategy

With business and media trends evolving rapidly—and reputation accounting for 63% of companies’ market valueorganizations can’t leave PR to chance in 2022.

That’s why brands, now more than ever, need an effective PR strategy to achieve communications and business objectives.

However, what actually is a PR strategy? And, how can you build a successful one in 2022? Keep on reading to find out.

What Is a PR Strategy?

In a nutshell, a public relations strategy is an actionable plan that organizations utilize to structure their PR and media relations activities, with reference to specific, pre-determined objectives. A successful PR strategy aims to achieve said objectives, effectively communicate with target audiences, and boost brands’ visibility and reputation through publicity and coverage on relevant media and industry publications, podcasts, and social networks.

Why Is a PR Strategy Important for Your Brand? 

In PR, the goal is to interact meaningfully with and bring value to target audiences. At the same time, PR promotes brands organically and enhances brand recognition attracting more potential clients. In this process, a PR strategy gives communications teams a clear direction on which steps to take to achieve just that.

And if this is not enough, here are a few more reasons why having a PR strategy is crucial for your brand:

Define your target audiences

Creating your PR strategy gives you the opportunity to identify and define the right audiences for your brand. As a consequence, you will be able to determine which media and influencers will best connect, and select the right channels as well as the key messages that will most likely resonate.

Formulate your key messages

Within the PR strategy formulation process, you will be able to establish your brand’s key messages. Simply put, such brand messages refer to what you want your target audiences to hear, understand, and act on, through your PR activities.

Build relationships with the media

Once you have determined your target audiences and key messages you can start thinking about establishing valuable relationships with journalists. Share relevant news, other content, and context to increase the likelihood of stories being featured. 

Be prepared to manage crises

A comprehensive strategy must include a crisis prevention and crisis management plan. In the event of a crisis, a proactive approach can give you and your team the opportunity to mitigate risk and safeguard your reputation.

Measure PR effectiveness

A PR strategy will help you identify relevant metrics to understand how your PR activities perform. 

Determine your communications goals and business impact

A strategy will help you set relevant goals, metrics, and KPIs. After all, how can you know that your PR efforts are producing results if you don’t benchmark your performance against clear objectives?

5 Trends to Consider When Developing Your PR Strategy

1. Personalization is the new key to productive media relations

The pandemic contributed to a spike in newsroom layoffs that also resulted in a shortage of reporters. Because of this, in order to still provide trustworthy content, journalists seem to be increasingly playing the role of gatekeepers for audiences. In fact, they screen and rectify news reported by multiple sources, such as blogs, podcasts, and others. This content avalanche that journalists are now forced to handle requires PRs to craft highly personalized stories in order to make the cut.

2. Creators will dominate the PR arena

Influencers, bloggers, and vloggers make up the “creator economy”, one of the fastest-growing economies, now worth an estimated $10 billion. Whether it’s a series of engaging Instagram stories, a well-thought-out Twitter post series, or a TikTok video, content partnerships between brands and influencers are on the rise and remain a powerful PR (and marketing) tool for brands.

3. Social media is booming

There are more than 4.62 billion social media users worldwide today, half a billion more compared to 2021. However, having an account just for the sake of it won’t help your brand. The goal of social media is to convey your key brand messages, actively connect with your network, engage in conversations, provide value, and offer service and support.  

To maximize your efforts, leverage social listening tools and monitor mentions of your brand, products, and services in real-time. 

4. Look out for disinformation and cyberthreats

Disinformation has shifted to the corporate sector and, with the support of technology, morphed into its more subtle and dangerous evil twin Disinformation-as-a-Servicecosting organizations $78 billion a year in stock market losses, loss of revenues, and drops in reputation. Driven by ransomware attacks, the number of cyberattacks grew by a whopping 158% since 2019 alone. That’s why PR pros need to start working with new tools and data points to discover and fight such threats.

5. ESG will become the new normal

When planning communications activities around ESG themes, PR specialists should not stop at intent. Instead, they should illustrate a roadmap of real actions the organization plans on taking. In fact, the global investment community is expecting organizations to disclose their ESG commitments and actions. As a result, if an organization fails to keep its promises, it will expose itself to reputational and investor risks. It comes as no surprise, therefore, that today a whopping 99% of business leaders worldwide take into account ESG topics and their organization’s reputation when it comes to decision-making.

Interested in ESG? Then listen to this Plotlights webinar:

[Webinar] Supercharge Your CEO Comms With ESG

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Plotlights supports your PR efforts with the technology and the PR expertise you need to succeed. Reach out to us today to learn more.

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