PR Brief – Why Do Your Need A Brief?

What Is A PR Brief?

When any PR agency is approached with an enquiry, the question is asked ‘do they have a PR brief’?

A PR brief is a document that is put together by you (the client) putting together ideas and thoughts on the following points

What Is A PR Brief?

A PR brief is a document that you create when you are looking to hire a PR agency.

It contains information about your business, where you are right now, and your goals for your business and public relations campaign.

You usually share the PR brief with 4-5 shortlisted PR companies that look like the best fit for you.  Agencies that are local to you and have experience in your industry sector.

The shortlisted agencies then use this brief as a foundation to create a custom proposal. The agency that has the best proposal is the one that you should select.  Proposal does not mean the cheapest PR campaign, but the one that ticks all your boxes.

Rather than a PR agency spending time researching your industry and market on their own, only you can provide answers to their questions about your business, goals and challenges.  If they have worked in your industry, that is half the battle.

When you proactively provide that information up front, you save hours in answering the same fundamental questions that any PR agency will ask you before contacting them.  

Things To Consider In The Brief

Goals – What are the goals of the campaign?  Share some information on your company and what you want to achieve out of the PR campaign.  All companies use public relations for different reasons.

Audience – Who are you targeting, remember you know more than the agency at this point.  Are you targeting a specific ethnic group here in the UK, or a specific age range?  Are you targeting a specific industry sector?

Why Media – What do you wish to communicate to your (above) audience?

Cause & Effect – What do you want to see from the audience (more sales, enquiries etc.)?

Timing – How quick do you need to see results (be realistic)?

Dynamics – What are the internal and external drivers for change in your business? Industry Target – What industry sectors do you want to target?

Media Context – What other media are you using in addition to public relations?

Budget For Campaign – What finances and resources do you have available for the campaign?

Evaluation – What metrics will you use to measure the campaign and results?

Working Together Is Key

All agencies need guidance, as opposed to ‘we need PR’, they need to have some sort of framework to put a campaign together for you.  The importance of experience with public relations cannot be overstated.

It is not the job of the public relations agency to put together the above points, it is down to you; but of course, they need to ask the questions above in order to get the answers they need to work with.

These are a few things to avoid when talking to any PR companies about your campaign:

Do not be vague – Give the media company as much information as possible to work with

Do not waste time – Be realistic, don’t waste their time or yours on unrealistic ambition

Don’t decide on price – Prices do vary, quality in public relations is not about price.

Go for skills – There are thousands of agencies, choose someone that knows your industry.  Are they linked to the CIPR?

Why is PR effective as a marketing tool?  It can be low cost and high impact.

Most public relations agencies will sit you down and run through the above points, but if you can go to them with an outline of what you are looking for, the funds to pay for it, and realistic goals, then the campaign is half way there to being a success.

When it comes to briefing a PR agency it’s a case of rubbish in rubbish out!

If you are unclear about what you are trying to achieve, who you are trying to reach, your issues, challenges, competitive situation and so forth then you can’t possibly expect a PR agency to miraculously come up with a brilliant proposal for you.

A PR agency’s pitch can only really hit the mark if the brief is good. So we’ve come up with 10 steps to ensure your PR brief is brilliant and the pitching process is perfect!

Research your PR agencies properly to make sure they are the right ones to be on your list. Don’t just have a load of major names.  All PR companies are different, all with different backgrounds and experience.

What About Budget

All PR agencies when you first contact them will ask you about your budget.

Giving no budget indication, because you want to see what an agency comes back with, is utterly pointless.

You’re not trying to catch the agency out, or grab yourself a bargain. You are trying to find a PR agency to partner with. So state your PR budget or at least provide a range.

Some PR companies will happily handle 1 press release a month or per quarter, some will issue daily press releases.  For this reason giving a budget range of £500 a month or £5,000 a month gives them a feel for what the workload will be.