Insights

Imagine that you were asked to give a speech.  Your first question would most likely be about the expected audience for your presentation.  If you don’t know who you’re talking to, it’s hard to tailor a good and effective message that resonates with the intended recipients.  The same can be said for all forms of communication.  In fact, knowing your audience and giving them what they want is not only the most important aspect of giving a speech, but also of creating a long-term strategic communications plan and communicating on a day-to-day basis.

As a note, although it isn’t always as easy as having an assembled audience in an auditorium for a speech as a target, we will refer to our expected audiences as a “group.”

Get to Know Them
As you embark on a plan for a communications strategy or a one-time project you must first identify your audience.  There is no official substitute for formal survey research, but when you find yourself with very little time and very little budget, there are many ways to go about uncovering the information you need without breaking the bank.

Many times you may think you have an idea of who your audience is.  However, it is imperative that you do some form of research to find out if your hunch is correct.  You may find yourself thinking that you want to reach everyone.  But, it is not always best to spread your message thin in hopes of reaching a broad base.  In fact, if you can effectively reach your most important target, you will yield greater results than just dispersing a watered down mass information campaign.  Think “targeted” communications.

At Curley & Pynn we employ various informal methods to get to know our audiences.  We’ve successfully utilized the following actions in a recent communications project including: primary and secondary research, researching the audience’s involvement in organizations in the community and then conducting research on those organizations through direct personal outreach. 

Step One:   Basic Internet Research
As you’ve probably guessed, the fastest place to begin learning about your audience and how to reach them is through the Internet.  You can conduct inexpensive secondary research by reading past news articles on the group you believe to be your audience, reviewing Web sites that mention this group and assessing the group by collecting anecdotal evidence. 

You should determine if there are commonly held beliefs within the group you plan to speak to; has this group taken a stance on a political issue?  Have they ever been profiled by a news outlet?  What is the basic demographic of this group?  It isn’t always easy to determine blanket characteristics, but it’s the best way to begin.  It can be as easy as going to Google News and typing in the event name, group name or region to see if any common themes prevail among the recent coverage.  Now you’ve completed your introductory information search to confirm or deny your initial hunch about the group.

Step Two:  Involvement Research
To know your audience, you need to have an idea where they get their information and who they regularly communicate with.  That is generally gleaned from identifying the audience’s involvement in the community or in the industry in which they work.

From a local perspective, you should look in your audience’s backyard.  Find out what organizations they are involved in or support.  Find out where their kids go to school and what activities they attend.  Do they go to church?  If so, what local nonprofits does that church get involved with?  By getting to know where the group is involved, you can identify what its members place as important and how best to get messages in front of them.  Although these associations seem simple, they may not appear on the resume or “about page” of each group you want to reach.  You have to dig to find out – and this is something else that can be done through simple online research.

In addition, knowing the organizations your audience is affiliated with gives you access to some social and demographical data.  If you find your audience is made up of people active in the local chapter of the Rotary, you may be able to immediately know some characteristics about them, such as they enjoy formality in meetings, serving the community and fellowship.

Also, if you identify the organizational involvement of your audience you may find that an organization they are involved in supports a primary charity; then find out what that charity’s annual event is, and get involved in it.  Every organization has a list of needs, whether it is fully funded or struggling, and addressing the needs of an organization important to your audience will place your message prominently in front of your intended recipient.  Sometimes all it takes is a phone call. 

It may be surprising in this Internet age, but at Curley & Pynn we sometimes actually just pick up the phone to get the information we want.  For one particular client project we called various local organizations to find out the kinds of things they are hoping to get from charitable contributions and what they really needed from the community.  In fact, the phrase “what is your wish list” was effectively used to generate the ideal situation for an organization, i.e., we identified how our client could align with the needs of their audience.  Sometimes the answer was easier than we expected.  All of this information helps to get to know our audience and then reach them.

Having no experience in a sector has never deterred Curley & Pynn from taking on a project head-on.  In the case with a restaurant client, we turned to research to find out how to best maximize the company’s announcement:  after 25 years operating company-owned units it would begin selling multi-unit franchises.  This wasn’t just about making an announcement, it was about spawning action.

What would generally be thought of as the case for a mass distribution of a press release turned into so much more – by way of audience research.  We found that because our client was hoping to sell multi-unit agreements, it became clear that these potential franchisees would be investors with restaurant experience or restaurateurs expecting to find an investor.  Therefore, we researched the association of these types of people.  Through searching major franchising company Web sites and news stories, reading various news stories about franchising and profiles of current franchisees of comparable restaurant companies, it became clear that many such people were involved in one organization – the International Franchise Association (IFA).

We learned that our client’s announcement would be much more than an issued press release – it should be tied into the annual IFA event.  Not only did Curley & Pynn suggest that our client join this member organization and make the announcement there, but we developed an entire media announcement plan for engaging investment and trade media.  This gave us a chance to speak to a very targeted audience, that we were able to identify through getting to know them.

Reach Them by Creating Something Just for Them
Last summer Curley & Pynn was tapped to provide strategic counsel to a large company bidding for a public contract in order to increase that company’s chances by presenting itself as an asset to the local community.  The first thing Curley & Pynn did was identify the target audience.  In this case, the audience was small … the county commission that would eventually award the contract.  As people with a responsibility to serve their districts, we knew that the financial aspects of the bid would be only one aspect of their review; they would also be interested in the value-added benefits the company could provide to their constituents.

Each commissioner oversaw a district with at least one struggling high school – a school that is generally near and dear to their heart.  Therefore, we decided to tailor a program for students in each of the district’s lowest socio-economic public school that related to the line of business of our client.  We already knew our client was an expert in their industry and could provide on-the-job training programs and funding to professional courses at these very deserving schools.  These struggling students needed technical skills to be able to work while attending public school and to secure employment in the area after they graduated.  This was music to the ears of the commissioners, and thus a win-win.  Not only were we able to utilize the expertise of our client to relate it to the needs of the schools, but we used out-of-the-box thinking to create new community programs that in the end were aimed at reaching the audience – the decision-makers.  Not lost on the client was the reality that this outreach would benefit them, as well, by helping to train their future workers.

We found out who we were speaking to, we assessed what would be most important to them and we created a program for them.  This is a prime example of reaching the audience by knowing them.

Speak to Them Where They Are
Another aspect of effectively communicating to an audience is identifying who you want to take action.  If you have an important business announcement there is generally a goal in mind when making the announcement other than just disseminating information.  If there is a particular audience that you want to know your announcement then you need to make sure your message finds them.  This means you may have to reach out to unexpected media in a strategic way to get your message to the right people, who are potential business patrons.  It is not enough to get the word out about your news, but it needs to get to the right group.

It’s About Them:  Not You
In the end, when you are speaking at an event, or sharing a message through a communications campaign, your goal is to reach your audience and really connect with them.  In order to do that, first you have to know them.  By understanding your audience, aligning with their interests, and connecting with them in different ways you have a great chance of getting the results you desire.

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Every manager, every C-suite executive, every business owner today knows that part of his or her responsibilities is to manage public relations and marketing communications activity.

In an increasingly complex media world where the average person is bombarded with 3,000 messages per day, to the untrained eye this can seem like an overwhelming and complex maze of decisions that could go terribly wrong and have enormous bottom line impacts.

In reality, while the practice of public relations and marketing communications is complex and requires that practitioners work hard to stay abreast of ever-changing techniques and technology, there are four simple questions that drive the whole process.

The purpose of this paper is to help the non-practitioner better understand how communicators go about the development of programs that help their clients solve problems and take advantage of commercial opportunity.  In the end, it should help managers at all levels make better decisions about how their communications budgets are spent.

It Starts with Audience Identification

Think of public relations and marketing communications like bow and arrow hunting.

If you can’t see your prey, it is hardly worth pulling an arrow from your quiver.  You’ve no doubt heard the phrase “target marketing,” but what does it mean?

The most basic question you have to ask is simply “Who Do We Want To Communicate With?”  Your answer could be as simple as a list of a half dozen key decision-makers on a city council who will vote a project up or down, or it could be a list of special interest groups who could influence their decision … such as:

• Neighboring Voters
• Conservation Groups
• Growth Management Advocates
• City Staff & Advisors
• News Media

It could be even more complex and you might have to break those groups down even further, either due to strongly held opinions and positions determined by research or because of different media needed to reach them, i.e.:

• Neighboring Voters
• Longtime residents (mostly elderly)
• Newcomers (The New Meadows subdivision)
• Hispanic residents
• Conservation Groups
• Sierra (very opposed to new construction)
• Audubon Society (concerned only with water issues)
• Arbor Club (demands tree planting by all developers)
• Growth Management Advocates
• Council for Planned Growth (60-member pro developer group)
• Citizens Against Concrete (have petitioned for building moratorium)
• City Staff & Advisors
• Planning Department (bitterly divided staff)
• Environmental Protection Department (anti growth)
• Tax Assessor/Collector (concerned about deficits)
• News Media
• The New Town News (cautious growth advocate)
• The Old Town News (opposed to all growth)
• Verdad (caters to Our Town’s rapidly growing Hispanic sector)

 

It is easy to see that each of these subsets will need a strategy if you are to communicate effectively for your project.  But before you start, there are other questions to answer now that you know who you want to communicate with.

Hold that Arrow Just a Second

Just as it goes without saying that you don’t want to pull back your arrow before you can see the target, you probably want to know a little more about the target before you let it go.

For instance, you’d want to know how far away the target is so you know how far back to pull in order to get the arrow to go the distance.  In communication, the one thing you have to know about the people you want to communicate with is “What Do They Know About Us?”

This is what communicators call the Research Phase … and it is incredibly important.  Think for a second, you may perceive that everyone is opposed to your project and set off to convince them otherwise without doing any research when in fact if you conduct a survey you’ll find that all they want is for you to make a commitment to landscaping and water retention ponds.  In the case of our town council example, it would probably require the use of several tools, such as:

• A telephone survey of a statistically accurate sample of the population (probably 400 interviews) that allows you to find out what they know about your project, what attitudes they hold about development, conservation and other issues, whether they are, in fact, predisposed to support or oppose you and what it would take to make them want to support you.
• The results of this could be cross tabulated by demographics to tell you what opinions are held by special interest groups:
• Older Longtime Residents
• Newcomers
• Hispanics
• A series of one-on-one visits with people identified as opinion leaders to determine how they might influence media and those who will actually vote.
• A focus group … a private session with a small sample of citizens to review your messages with them to determine how they resonate and which ones to use.

Now that we know our prey …

It is time now to ask ourselves “What Do We Want Them To Know?” and “What Do We Want Them To Do?”

This is the beginning of the campaign … where you determine the key messages that your research has told you will resonate, will respond to the public’s concerns and will help you either convince them to change their mind (if you find they were opposed) or will reinforce their positive disposition to support you.

 Here’s an example of how that worked in a project we managed for the Economic Development Council of St. Lucie County on Florida’s Treasure Coast.

St. Lucie County, Florida, for years had a tax abatement incentive program to drive economic development, which was set to expire.  Continuation of the program, which provides tax relief to companies relocating or expanding in the area, required a public referendum.

County leaders believed it would be a tough sell, and that the message that would resonate with voters is how incentives create increased tax base.  But, they had forgotten the most important part of any communications strategy … research.  They were basing their strategy on their own experience, rather than on the perceptions of voters.

We conducted statistically accurate research that showed voters overwhelmingly were in favor of the program; but that they were unaware it was up for renewal or even where the referendum would appear on the ballot.  We also found that “jobs,” not tax base, was the real issue.

Armed with this information, we conducted a county-wide campaign to communicate two key messages.  What we wanted them to know was:

• A “yes” vote meant new jobs; and,

• The referendum was No. 12 on the ballot.

What we wanted them to do was simple:

• Support new jobs by voting yes on No. 12.

 

The referendum passed with more than 66 percent of the vote.

The Great Prophet Howard Hill

Every project … every company needs a strategy … and that strategy always begins by asking the four questions we’ve reviewed:

• Who Do You Want to Communicate With?
• What Do They Know About You?
• What Do You Want Them to Know?
• What Do You Want Them to Do?

 

I’m reminded of the great bow and arrow hunter Howard Hill who said:

“Unless you know your game’s feeding, sleeping, and daily habits, unless you plan your hunt in great detail and follow your plan with precision, you are not hunting at all ... You’re just walking in the woods.”

About the Author

Roger Pynn, APR, has been part of Florida’s professional communications community since the late sixties ... beginning his career as an award-winning journalist with the Orlando Sentinel, where he rose from reporter to metropolitan editor. Since the early 1970s, he has been involved in both consulting and corporate-based public relations, and prior to establishing Curley & Pynn, he directed public relations for Westinghouse Electric Corporation’s Power Generation World Headquarters in Orlando. Pynn is accredited by both the Florida Public Relations Association and the Public Relations Society of America.  A former president of both organizations’ Central Florida affiliates, he served three times as a statewide vice president of FPRA, and has co-chaired the Ethics Judicial Panel of PRSA for Florida. He is a frequent speaker before national trade and professional associations, public relations organizations and college classrooms on topics of ethics and issues management in public relations.

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1. Write the headline first, last and throughout your white paper.  The headline will grab the attention of readers and tell them what’s in it for them.  Remember to point out throughout your paper what following your advice will do for them.
2. Format and presentation count … because in effect your white paper is a standalone brochure.  If you aren’t adept at using word processor formatting tools, seek the help of someone who is.  Better yet, adopt one of the many MS Word or other program templates.
3. Open with a challenge the reader faces and promise to provide answers.  People are looking for problem solvers and they turn to professionals in specific fields to share insights into a world the reader doesn’t understand.
4. Don’t give away the farm.  The purpose of the white paper is to show them that you have expertise and knowledge and to get them to call you to put those to work for them:  for a fee.  Don’t solve the problem.  Solve their need for reassurance that there is a solution.
5. Do a jargon mouthwash.  Your reader will not understand the knowledge of your professional field, any more than you are likely to understand the terms they might use from the worlds of rocket science, nuclear physics or crucial steps in Native American Dance.  Use plain English and stay away from technical or industry-specific terms.
6. Grammar and punctuation count.  Even though day-to-day conversation and media may lead you to conclude that we have forgotten how to use the King’s English, assume that the people you are writing to are an educated audience and that they appreciate proper use of the language.  Be sure to have someone check your paper for this all-important element.
7. Make sure your writing flows.  Everyone needs an editor, so turn to someone else and ask them to be honest and offer constructive criticism.  “Does this make sense to you?”  “Is it easy to read?”  A great way to ensure that the answer will be “yes,” is to start with an outline of your topic:
1. The problem
2. Why the problem exists
3. Ways to solve the problem
4. Why you need to take action
5. Where you can get help
8. Empower the reader to solve the problem.  Offer tangible solutions.  While the real purpose is to get someone to engage you to help, don’t let them think they can’t do something themselves.  Considering providing a list of resources.  Direct the reader to others upon whom you have drawn for your paper … they reinforce your judgment and give the reader a sense of value for their time spent reading your opinions.
9. Check lists are an important tool of white papers.  Consider offering one as a tool to help the reader assess the problem.  Assigning numerical values to the weight of individual problems can help them determine if they really need help.
10. Draw strong conclusions.  Readers have invested time when they peruse your white paper.  Tell them what you think they should do, what the consequences of taking an alternative course are and what the benefits are if they follow your advice.

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With Gen X and Y fairly well assimilated into the business world, Millennials are presenting boomer executives with the latest infusion of confusion … and with them has come a world of media options and habits many 50-something business leaders simply don’t understand.

I confess to being one of them, but I have found hope: many of these kids are really patient and seem to get their professional pleasure from simplifying their world for the generationally challenged. And better yet, even though things are changing, they seem to stay the same.

Figures Don’t Lie

If you don’t regularly read blogs, can’t fathom why someone uses “social networking” sites on the Internet, or see any reason to include outlets like MySpace.com as part of your media strategy, consider these factoids:

• The number of blogs has been doubling every five months since 2003
• The 50 millionth blog was tracked on July 31, 2006
• Today, the blogosphere is doubling in size every six and a half months
• There were more than 60 million profiles on MySpace.com as of August 2006 … up from 24.2 million in November 2005
• According to YouTube (which was recently purchased by Google in a $1.65 billion stock deal), people are watching in excess of 70 million videos daily.

Oh, and if you’re among those who don’t know what a blog is … it is short for Weblog. A blog is a personal Web site with its content displayed in reverse chronological order. Blogs are joined together via hyperlinks, and these links are part of the global network called the “blogosphere.”

I have also found that having your own page on MySpace.com is commonplace. “I’ve used MySpace to keep in touch with fellow members of the PR profession from college, and monitor how companies are increasingly turning to MySpace to send messages that will reach their targeted audiences. In fact, this has played a major role in the development of an internal study at our firm on innovative uses of social networking sites for clients,” says Dana Johnson, Communications Specialist.

For business owners, deciding what to pay attention to can be a tough call. But in business, numbers speak and these numbers make it clear that a huge element of society is using new communication tools. It is essential that we understand those tools and learn how to fit them into our business and communication strategy.

Parental Press Kit

Take for example Justin Campfield, one of our Communications Strategists at Curley & Pynn who learned that he and wife, Hillary, were about to become the parents of twin girls: “besides worrying about the usual new parent anxieties – finances, work arrangements, remodeling the newly deemed nursery – we quickly found another stress … how to communicate all the changes coming our way to family spread out from the Pacific Coast to New York City.”

Their answer: “our blog updated every doctor’s visit and new sonogram image and when the big day arrived, the Campfield girls made their world wide debut courtesy of a Casio digital camera and YouTube.com within their first 24 hours of life. Now, our blog and YouTube uploads chronicle their big achievements and sleeping habits, while videoconferencing gives grandmas thousands of miles away reassurance that their new grandkids won’t forget their faces and voices.”

And Justin was quick to explain to me that he can employ those same tools for our clients: “you could build consumer interest by blogging and video chronicling the development cycle of a product or service; much like a pregnancy is the development of babies. It could either be real time (i.e., allowing the consumer to sit in on the brainstorming, design and manufacturing processes) or it could be a ‘look back’ once the product or service enters the marketplace, sort of like a ‘making of’ documentary that you find on most movie DVDs.”

Practicing What You Preach

In much the same way, our Manager of Interactive Creative, Chris Riedel, related that in order to ratchet up the creative elements of his family’s Christmas card (not to mention saving him from being late with the cards once again) he developed an online video greeting featuring his son and daughter. “Not only did I for once get our cards out on time, I saved on postage,” he explained.

Now, Chris is at work on just such a project for our firm’s holiday card … “a gift that will keep on giving,” he calls it, with a holiday blog and interactive desktop widgets … a tiny program that launches from your desktop. If you’re interested, check back at www.TheStrategicFirm.com.

We are also using some of the new media tools that are available to our clients’ advantage. Our account teams have a practice of using Google alerts and RSS feeds to track our clients and their industries in both the media and the blogosphere, making it much easier, faster and cheaper to keep up with their media coverage. As Dana mentioned, we are also engaging in an internal study that will allow us to provide more knowledge and services to our clients on new media including an understanding of how to use blogs to communicate key messages.

Not Such Bad Space, After All

Another of our Communications Strategists, Kelly King, told me “I’m old enough to be removed from the young tech-savvy students, but young enough to feel the pull of social media.

“As someone passionate about communication, I knew I needed to get a clue about what I was missing, so I relied heavily on one friend who started her own personal blog to introduce me to blogging. My friend also convinced me to check out MySpace. I had been convinced by increasing mainstream media reports that MySpace was harmful, but I quickly learned that it is THE relationship management tool for teenagers, 20-somethings and beyond.”

So what does all this mean to her as a communicator?

“It’s interesting to think about the way MySpace and other forms of social media are helping to form the relationships of our youth. Openness, communication and instant connection has not only made MySpace what it is today, but it has also helped many young people develop more meaningful relationships that place value on staying in close communication.”

You only get a glimpse of Kelly’s page at MySpace. Since she only uses the service for social interactions with those she knows, Kelly keeps her page set to “private.” This is a little known protection tool that MySpace offers and it means that you can’t read any information about Kelly: “until I’ve approved you as my friend.”

In Black and White

My father of twins, Justin, gave me the best advice: “study, study and study some more, and then hire what you don’t get.”

There’s a lot I don’t get, but most of the young people I’ve surrounded myself with have to ask me about things, too … like: “there really was such a thing as black and white television?”

I just smile and take the opportunity to tell them about my recollection of what Bill Gates has called “the world’s first interactive video game.” It was a Saturday morning cartoon show that ran between 1953 and 1957. It was called “Winky Dink and You.”

For fifty cents they would send you a “Winky Dink Kit” that included a clear plastic screen to place over your black and white television and a set of “magic crayons.”

“We sold millions of those kits,” said the show’s host Jack Barry. “It was well thought out.”

Kids would place the static cling plastic over the television screen and connect the dots to create a bridge or some other device so Winky Dink could cross to safety.

Then they’d trace portions of letters on screen to read “secret messages” broadcasted at the end of the show.Even in 1953, business leaders were probably overwhelmed by this new “technology” and the idea that they too had to figure out how to become interactive to compete. But I think you would agree they succeeded. We’ve come a long way since then with Atari, then Nintendo, and now Xbox and Playstation, and I have confidence we’ll figure this one out too.

There is no doubt that 50 years from now, business leaders will chuckle about the first and very primitive blogs and social media sites in 2006 and the challenges they presented. Even if this is all new to you, it will just take a little bit of motivation to put your uncertainties aside and get involved and you will soon be on the path to successful understanding of this new age of interactive media.

Keeping Pace

Here are four things you can do to keep pace with what may seem like an out-of-control explosion:

1. Check out Technorati.com … to bring the blogosphere into a controllable environment. You can find 57 million blogs by topic and track blog mentions of your company, product or other keywords. Interested in wine country tours? So are millions of others. In order to get really targeted, I searched for “California wine + travel” only in tagged blogs. This one – Basic Juice – is a fascinating compilation from “guest authors” and you can sign up to be one, too.

2. Visit YouTube.com … and maybe even MySpace … to get familiar with the sites and how you may be able to integrate them into your strategy. On YouTube, I searched for “wine country” and found 167 videos including this one titled “an awesome weekend in wine country” . Not all of my search results were relevant to my interest in the Napa/Sonoma area – many dealt with Italy – but you’ll find a lot to pique your interest and develop your understanding.

3. Don’t forget good old Google … which can help you keep up in several ways. There’s so much more to Google than a simple search. For instance, you can set up alerts or Really Simple Syndication (RSS) feeds to track “wine country” or Wine Country Living magazine’s Web site, and you can search images, video or maps with a simple click of the mouse. Why not set up a Google Alert for “social media” to keep up with news about the ever-changing phenomenon? By the way, you can also read all about the adventures of Winky Dink on Google … just type in “Winky Dink” and you can learn all about that marvelous invention from my childhood.

4. Finally, as Justin said and I am learning, take some time to study, and then hire the rest … surrounding yourself with information, and better yet, those who “get it” naturally, can help defuse the new media confusion, and simplify the increasing complexity of developing a strategy for communication in an interactive media world.

As someone once said, “the more things change, the more they stay the same.”

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“This proposal is so bad, so anti-competition, and hinders local governments so much, it defies logic that anyone would want to bring it back. Yet it actually may be worth another debate just so the public knows who’s in the pocket of the rich, powerful telecom interests.”

That statement, made in regard to a proposal to limit municipalities’ ability to provide wireless Internet and other telecom services, was not made by a local activist, a city attorney or an outraged citizen. It was made by the Ocala Star-Banner, a daily newspaper serving more than 50,000 readers.

Newspapers, through their editorial writers, make such strongly worded – and often slanted – statements every day. They carry tremendous power to advance issues or destroy proposals, to help organizations succeed or fail. Yet many of us strangely ignore this audience when developing communications plans.

A news article will present objective facts, which is important to build awareness, but editorial writers tell legislators, community leaders and the public at large how they should think and act on those facts.

If your organization or client is seeking a change in public policy, trying to motivate the community to take action on some issue or simply trying to educate the community about an important topic, the editorial writers must be a part of your outreach.

But how do you do it?

First, determine your objectives:

• Support – Are you asking for vocal, editorial support for your issue … a written editorial asking the community to get behind blood drive efforts or to ask city and county leadership to fund economic development incentives?
  
  
• Education – There are times where you may not be seeking vocal support, but simply want to educate the editorial writers about your position in case they decide to weigh in on an issue.
  
  
• Response – You may not always get to them in time. Sometimes editorial writers weigh in without your input. Your objective may simply be to make sure that future editorials are based on a full review that includes your organization’s position.

Next, it’s time to research your audience. Consider this like any other publicity effort in which you first research a reporter’s interests.

Go back through editorial archives and see who they have supported in elections. Do their editorials tend to be pro-business or pro-environment? Do they support government spending for arts and cultural events, or do they prefer private investment? The opinions in the newspaper often reflect the long-term bias of the organization.

Look at whether and how the newspaper has covered similar issues in the past. Do they generally side with your organization or industry, or with the organizations that oppose your issue?

Next, decide what it is you want them to know.

In this case, the KISS (Keep It Simple, Stupid) rule always applies.
Editorial space is limited … most editorials are only a couple of hundred words, and even if the editorial supports your position, there is only room for a couple of your key messages.

If you have 14 reasons why citizens should support the arts, start with items 1-3 and stop talking. Put the rest into a Q&A, or develop written backup materials that clearly outline all your key points. Too many messages in your presentation and you risk confusing your audience.

Most importantly, don’t be shy. Use the opportunity to counter your opponents’ arguments.

We often are afraid to bring up what the opposition says about us for fear of lending credibility to their arguments. But if an editorial writer is going to weigh in on an issue, chances are they’re going to hear those opposing arguments anyway. Isn’t it better to get those arguments on the table yourself, and use the opportunity to respond?

Once, we were meeting with editorial boards around the state, trying to drum up support for a new kind of power plant that sells electricity only on the wholesale market.

We knew our opponents were telling legislators that our plans were to ship the electricity out of the state for huge profits.

We started our editorial board meetings with written backup, footnotes and charts to show this allegation didn’t hold water … partly because our opponents had already locked up transmission space to ship their own Florida-produced electricity out of the state.

How do you think the meeting went when our opponents sat down with the editorial board and made their allegations? They were hit with our charts, our footnotes, our messaging.

Next, tell them what you want … if you’re there to ask for their support in a written editorial, ask them. If you simply want to keep them in the loop, with a promise to provide updated information should they decide this is an issue for them, make that clear.

After you meet with them, keep providing updates on your issue: have other newspapers written editorials you’d like them to see, have new bills been proposed that warrant their attention, are your opponents issuing new allegations to which you need to respond?

Don’t get cute. This is certainly not the time for spin. The people who sit on the editorial board take their responsibility very seriously, and so should you. Expect them to ask tough questions, and prepare to give them open, honest answers.

Finally, set realistic expectations. Just like with any publicity effort, you won’t win every time. Sometimes the editorial writers may simply thank you for your time and do nothing. Sometimes they may side with your opponents, and write an editorial detailing the ways in which you are wrong.

So … determine your objectives, research your audience, develop your messages, advocate for your cause, take your audience seriously and set realistic expectations for success. That’s a good guide for just about any public relations plan, and it’s especially important when trying to influence public opinion through editorial placement.

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