by
Pari
Noskin Taichert
Bad Girls
Press
When
you set out to promote, publicize,
and inform, you've got scads of
opportunities to reach your
audiences. Here are my steps for a
plan:
1.
Define the goals for your
project and then for your
PR
efforts. My daughter's school
recently had an Art-Dessert
Night. I defined the event
goals as: friendraiser,
fundraiser and bragging
opportunity. The PR goals were
clear: increase attendance,
inform new audiences, and
educate our publics.
2. Define your audiences. Our
internal audiences were
parents
and kids, teachers,
Art-in-the-school, Inc. members,
PTA members. The external
audiences were the general public, area galleries,
volunteer groups, arts groups,
restaurants,
and pediatricians.
3. Identify communications
venues and PR outlets/methods.
For the Art-Dessert Night, I
came up with nearly 30 outlets.
Here's a partial list:
presentations to community
groups; school newsletter, Web
site and school marquis;
neighborhood newsletters;
community calendars; posters in
area businesses; fliers at
silent auction donors'
businesses; press releases to
electronic community calendars
and newspapers, public
access
TV, local TV/radio stations; and PSAs to radio stations.
4. Identify who'll do what and
when. Even if you're working
by
yourself, the time line will
help organize you in the
beginning and keep you calm as
your plan nears completion.
As
you can see, my plan wasn't very
detailed. I had a sheet with
bulleted items and met with the
other people who were helping out.
We penciled in names and a time
line, crossed out items that
seemed like too much work for the
return, and used the plan as a
guide rather than an absolute
dictum.
One trick for a successful plan is
to involve other people in the
process of planning or approving
it. In this case, I was helping
the PTA at a public school.
I met with the principal to make
sure she agreed with the goals for
the event, our PR plan, and with
the language I used in my press
releases and PSAs. It might take a
little more time to work with more
people, but the buy-in is good PR
in itself.
A good PR plan will keep you
focused and effective. And just as important--it will let you enjoy
the process.
Pari
Noskin Taichert has worked in PR
for eons. Of course, she
considers waitressing, selling
textbooks, and belly dancing
part of her PR experience. Her
more traditional clients have
included corporations, small
businesses, nonprofit
organizations, writers and
artists.
Web site: www.badgirlspress.com
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