Being a top-flight researcher is without doubt one of the finest abilities you may have in your PR arsenal. It’s not solely a good way to indicate the media you’re pitching that you’ve got tangible proof and anecdotes to again up your argument for protection that you just’re attempting to make, it’ll additionally show you how to place your pitch in the very best gentle and help you in determining the place you need to place your story.
Laying the groundwork
Earlier than conducting thorough analysis, you want to know all of the related particulars in regards to the story to have the ability to correctly place it from a public relations viewpoint. First, get a agency sense of what your narrative is and determine the way it suits into {the marketplace}. You must again up your preliminary fact-finding with figures you may cite inside pitches and advertising supplies. As an example, in case you’re representing an organization with a worldwide footprint, you’ll want to do deep analysis into not solely the several types of media shops throughout the globe that may cowl your story however how they’ll cowl it from their perspective. It’s necessary to not get locked into an area view for a narrative that may have world implications, nor to disregard native media if there’s an ideal story to be advised there. A key a part of media analysis includes studying the shops you need to acquire placement in and attempting to place your self inside the perspective of the editorial crew. Search for patterns of their protection and see the place you would possibly slot in.
Media analysis ideas
Any good public relations professional is aware of {that a} deep data of potential media targets is a precursor to a profitable marketing campaign. However there’s much more to it than simply firing up a database of reporters and tossing them in a spreadsheet or retaining tabs on the trades or basic protection of the subject material you’re looking for to pitch. One technique is to search out reporters on social platforms like Twitter and get a way of the varieties of tales they’re tweeting and the fabric they’re sharing. This will add depth to the total image of what they is likely to be prepared to cowl and show you how to alter your outreach technique accordingly.
Moreover, there’s a superb probability that you just’ll run right into a reporter that freelances for quite a few completely different shops. View this as a possibility to cater your pitch round a number of angles. Your job as a PR individual right here is to supply sources to a reporter. Do your due diligence and see how the journalist’s protection and tone shift from publication to publication, and shift your pitching accordingly. The extra you provide a journo, the extra probably they’re to depend on you sooner or later for ideas and sources.
Understanding your viewers
An enormous key that underpins the complete public relations analysis course of is realizing what kind of viewers you’re going for. An effective way to do that analysis is by the creation and evaluation of surveys of your target market. This manner, you’re in a position to lower straight to the patron and see what their needs are, and you may cater your messaging accordingly. As well as, you may see what kind of media you’ve launched prior to now that’s resonated along with your goal crowd and what kind of successes your opponents are having within the media area to assist inform the way you need to bundle your messaging going ahead.
However there’s extra you are able to do to get to know your viewers past simply conducting surveys. You possibly can have interaction in social listening techniques, for example, which may embody conducting conversations along with your target market on social or the in-depth evaluation of viewers response to the content material you launch into the world, optimistic or unfavourable. As well as, think about using aggressive evaluation techniques corresponding to observing what varieties of narratives your opponents are discovering success inside the public discussion board, corresponding to posts that garner important engagement on platforms corresponding to LinkedIn. If a marketing campaign doesn’t dwell as much as your expectations or previous successes, strive framing towards extra optimistic previous outcomes and attempt to replicate the wording, outreach or viewers that you just went for earlier than. Good media analysis ought to result in educated experimentation in outreach, and going again to your preliminary findings to provide you with new methods to unfold your message is par for the course.
There’s not one precise solution to appropriately do media analysis — it could actually take plenty of completely different kinds. Deal with the qualitative or quantitative facet of issues, and be adjusted to particular conditions. However within the public relations world, there’s little question that it’s one of the necessary issues you are able to do to set your self up for achievement. Whenever you arm yourselves with data of your targets and environment, you’re more likely to benefit from the fruits of your labor.
