Tag Archives: Independent Public Relations Alliance

Add an Indie to the Holiday Shopping List

As holiday shopping shifts into full gear, many companies’ PR departments are making their 2013 wish lists, filled with ideas, projects, campaigns, goals, and deliverables.

When the list is complete, they may discover that their current workshop of elves isn’t shoppingbagslarge enough to complete the tasks. If your organization is one of these, then the questions you need to ask are:

  • Should we expand our staff?
  • Do we need to hire consultants?
  • Should we bring on a firm?
  • Do we need to shorten our list?

For these projects—big and small, there’s a segment of PR professionals within PRSA-NCC that can add tremendous value and experience.  These are the members of the Independent Public Relations Alliance, a group of 63 entrepreneurs who own their own small or solo PR firms.

These “indies” have impressive credentials; with experience in many disciplines and industry sectors.  In fact, many held leadership roles before starting their own businesses in corporations, nonprofit organizations and government agencies.

These seasoned pros average 24 years of experience, nearly half have advanced degrees, and many hold APRs, according to IPRA’s October 2012 member survey.

IPRA member firms use various models to conduct their business.  Some act as subcontractors to other firms, some work alone, and some put together customized teams for each client.   Most “indies” offer full-service PR—which includes strategic communications planning, issues management, writing, branding, media relations, speechwriting, social media and marketing.   Many have specialties by issue area, skill and industry.

Flexibility is a key word for IPRA members.  “IPRA-ers” are very flexible in terms of what they can offer clients and enjoy the life of an indie with flexible hours. This flexibility also is reflected in how IPRA-ers work: by the hour, by the project or on retainer.  In addition to flexibility, members also cited senior level experience at competitive prices as advantages of hiring an independent practitioner.  Customers agree as IPRA member firms have been in business nine years on average.

As your organization’s wish list grows this holiday season, consider starting your shopping spree at the IPRA web site, which has a searchable database to help find the perfect match for your PR needs.   The quality of the talent, products and services of an IPRA member may provide just the jingle you need to make 2013 a happy new year.

Shawn Flaherty

2012 IPRA Chair

President, Creative Strategies PR

Creative Strategies gives ideas life through strategic, creative, and effective communications. We provide a range of PR services, including our specialty: media relations.

Thoth winners and the art of storytelling

Thoth winners (l-r) Adam Shapiro, Jewel Jones and Juanita Thompson spoke at a recent IPRA luncheon.

By Jay Morris

In public relations, a good story wins the day every time. Whether it’s pitching to a reporter, making your case on Capitol Hill or influencing public opinion, a compelling personal story always trumps the dispassionate recitation of facts and figures.

At last month’s IPRA luncheon, Adam Shapiro, senior vice president at Lipman Hearne, credited good storytelling for the success of a Thoth Award-winning campaign his firm created for the Hispanic Scholarship Fund. He stressed that PR practitioners need to be good storytellers and should always look for the “human interest side” of a client or issue.

“Look for unusual stories or contrarian views,” he said. “Think about the people behind the headlines.”

He gave as an example getting a Powerball lottery winner on the “Today Show” who had agreed to donate his winnings to establish scholarships for local high school Hispanic students. As a result of this segment, Chrysler decided to become a Hispanic Scholarship Fund donor and is now the Fund’s largest contributor.

In encouraging IPRA members to “think behind the headlines,” Adam cited advice from NBC News Correspondent Bob Dotson, who says any good story contains four key elements:

  • Scene setting
  • Foreshadowing
  • Conflict
  • Resolution

Adam said that every news story or marketing message, no matter how short, should contain these elements.

Of course, even good stories can miss their mark if they aren’t delivered by an appropriate spokesperson or if they fail to reach their intended audience. Building trust with an audience is absolutely essential, as evidenced in another Thoth Award-winning campaign by Senior Account Executive Jewel Jones and Senior Art Director Juanita Thompson at Ogilvy Public Relations Worldwide.

In their remarks to IPRA, Jewel and Juanita stressed the importance of understanding cultural values when targeting minority and ethnic communities. The two are the architects of the “Kidney Sundays” outreach campaign aimed at the African-American faith community on behalf of NIH’s National Kidney Disease Education Program, and they won “Best of Show” at this year’s Thoth Awards.

They stressed the need for authenticity and compassion in partnering with Black churches to explain the high risk of kidney disease among African-Americans. The Ogilvy team found success by encouraging church members to discuss kidney health in small group meetings called “conversations” where members could share stories and a volunteer, using a toolkit developed by Ogilvy, could provide useful information.

Juanita and Jewel also talked about the value of partnering with other groups and described how they leveraged the networks of the American Diabetes Association, Chi Eta Phi Sorority and BlackDoctor.org. By utilizing their partners’ channels, they were able to tell their client’s story to a lot more people.

Ultimately, good PR is about telling good stories that resonate with an audience. Quoting from the celebrated director Frank Capra, Adam noted, “Drama isn’t when the actors cry, it’s when the audience cries.”

Jay Morris is president of Jay Morris Communications LLC in Alexandria, Va. He is on the PRSA-NCC Board and can be reached at jmorris@jmcomllc.com.

Podcasting: Beyond the iPod

If blogs can transform people into journalists, does podcasting transform them into TV or radio personalities?  It sure looks that way, based on a presentation by Richard Harrington of RHED Pixel at a June 4 lunch program of the Independent Public

Mary-Jane Atwater

Mary-Jane Atwater

Relations Alliance, a committee of PRSA-NCC.

Several at the meeting were podcast veterans, including Mary Fletcher Jones of Fletcher Prince, who has created PR Conversations in Public Relations, a podcast featuring what Mary says are “DC’s most interesting public relations professionals.”  Others at the IPRA meeting have just begun to create podcasts.  But the majority of us were podcasting rookies, eager to learn about how podcasting technology can be used to benefit our clients.

If anyone thinks that podcasting is tied to iPods and Apples, think again.  Rather, podcasting is a highly targeted, syndicated series of video or audio shows available online to people who subscribe to them (usually for free and through an RSS feed).  And unlike videos posted on YouTube, podcasts can be downloaded from host sites to all types of consumer electronic devices (TVs, computers, mobile phones, gaming systems) to watch when it’s convenient.  That means no more email blasts or expensive postage to ship DVDs.

A quick check of the podcasts available for free download from the iTunes directory shows that there’s no limit to podcast topics:  action sports, arts, crafts, cooking, the environment, how-to, hi-tech, parenting, world news and more.  Since 85% of all Americans can now get online whenever they want, and 82% of U.S. homes with Internet now have broadband, the market for podcasts is enormous.  According to Richard Harrington, 35-44 year olds are the largest groups of podcast subscribers.

With an opt-in audience and the ability to target niche markets, it would seem that podcasts are a smart move for many businesses and nonprofits.  But Harrington cautions that podcasts are not for everyone, especially those who don’t have the time or resources to create new episodes and add new production features.  Podcasts can’t stand alone to establish your brand (but they can help extend your brand), and they certainly aren’t for those who like to keep things private.

Still, podcasting appears to be a great, relatively low-cost way to grow an audience and provide information, including showing how a product is used or describing a service. As PR professionals, we need to know when podcasting should be part of a PR plan and be comfortable explaining this technology to our clients.  IPRA’s program helped move us in that direction.