Introduction

No matter where you are in the world, business costs are rising and budgets are getting tighter. Unfortunately, PR is one of those activities that could get deprioritised if the broader economy weakens. Therefore, we wanted to write a blog that demonstrates how you can use your PR budget more effectively.

What are your key organisational goals and how can PR help to achieve them?

PR is a key staple of most industries, but it is used to achieve many different goals. For example;

• A government organisation might use PR to quickly disseminate information to the public,
• A charity might use it to raise money for a good cause,
• And a commercial company might use it to generate sales. 

Although this might sound like a simple philosophy, PR budgets are often wasted by falling into the coverage trap. 

The coverage trap occurs when press offices are solely focussed on one goal - to achieve coverage in the media. Although media coverage might always sound like a good result, it is usually a complete waste of time if it is not aligned with the overall company objectives. For example, a commercial company could spend weeks writing an educational report on a particular subject which might get some coverage. However, since the coverage did not generate any sales or commercial opportunities, it could be seen as a complete waste of time. To avoid this from happening, it’s always a good idea to write down your objectives for each campaign before you start working on them - and make sure they’re in line with your overall company goals.

Which scenario describes you best?

The next step in using your PR budget more effectively is to evaluate where you are and what needs to be fixed. Some common scenarios are outlined below:

• Scenario 1: You are part of an in-house PR team in a busy press office that doesn’t have time to do jobs like; finding journalists, building media lists, keeping them up to date and fixing email bounces.
  
  
• Scenario 2: You are using an external PR provider who delivers good results, but you can’t afford their services any more and would like to experiment with an in-house solution.
  
  
• Scenario 3: You work for a small company that doesn’t have much brand recognition as of yet, and therefore you struggle to get coverage in the media.

If any of these scenarios sound familiar, skip down to the relevant subheading below and check out our personalised advice.

Scenario 1 - Busy Press Office

So you are part of a busy press office that doesn’t have time to do all the grunt work associated with PR and communications. You send out multiple press releases per month, and you often have to react quickly to news stories. You are full of angst when sending out a story because you know that the email bounces will start flooding your inbox as soon as you hit send. At MediaHQ, we come across people like this every week. Usually they work for busy government organisations, large charities or well established PR agencies. Thankfully, we’re able to solve their problems every time (see customer success stories).

How to get better value?

Step 1 - Identify the main cost drivers for your PR spend.

Here are some areas to consider:

• Salaries: What is the cost of your team's wages? Yes, this is a fixed cost, but how could it perform better as an investment for you? Could your team be more productive? Are you addressing their training and skills needs?
• Productivity: What are the key tasks that your team members spend their time on?
• Tech Stack: What technology, tools or resources are you using and are you getting the most out of them? 
• Resources: What physical resources are you using and could you be getting better value? This could be rental of building or equipment?

Step 2 - Analyse the patterns and where you can make savings. 

Here are the key cost considerations for your 2023 budget:

• Better Results: How can I get more from my current team members? For example, redesigning a PR team role to enable a person to be more focused on media relations and getting coverage than admin work will yield more tangible results. 
• More Productive: Can you analyse the key tasks of your staff and see where they are wasting effort? One easy way to do this is to get people to do a simple end of day report for a couple of weeks. The gaps in their productivity will become obvious very quickly. 
• Wasted Time: Examine the amount of time wasted on ‘busy work’ as opposed to productive work. Busy work tends to be admin heavy and doesn't yield results. It can include filing, data entry and manual reporting.
• New Tools: Identify the tools you use and see how they could be replaced with tools that will make the team more productive. One great example here is MediaHQ - the all-in-one solution for managing your media lists and press releases.

Step 3 - Decide on a course of action

i) Training and upskilling

Although your employee wages are a fixed cost, you can get better value out of them by providing training and upskilling opportunities. This could include:

• Company policies: Putting a company policy in place that allows staff to register for courses outside working hours.
• Guest speakers: Organising guest speaker sessions for your team such as Q&A sessions with a journalist.
• Intrapreneurship: Giving staff the freedom to change the way they work if they think it will improve their productivity.

ii) Better processes

Processes can always be improved in busy press offices. If you are manually reporting, communicating or managing projects, you should look at revising your processes for increased productivity.

• Project/team management: Managing tasks and projects can be very difficult without the right assistance, and it’s easy for things to slip through the cracks. By adopting a project management software tool, you will be able to create milestones, assign them to people and monitor your team’s progress. Teamwork is a great application for these purposes.
• Hiring: Hiring is another area that can take up time and cause headaches. HireHive is a great application that can be used to find the right people and seamlessly work your way through the hiring process.

iii) Remove the grunt work from media list management

Many communications teams are still building and managing their media lists using a mixed bag of email, spreadsheets and Google search. More efficient teams are using cloud-based media databases to handle all the busy work for them. See below for details about the cost and benefits of such platforms.‍

Cost

• An online media contacts database usually costs between €5k - €10k per annum, depending on the number of user licences and optional features you decide to purchase. 

• Once you are signed up, you can build as many media lists and send as many press releases as you like - without worrying about all the busy work that you used to do. 
• Although they might sound expensive, these platforms can replace the work of a full time team member.
  
  

Benefits

• No more searching the web trying to find relevant journalists and their contact information.
• Build media lists in seconds based on special interest tags, audience location, publication type, job title, coverage type and more.
• Everything is kept up to date for you and you are informed about job movements within the media.
• Eliminate grunt work and focus on the more important aspects of your job.
• Easily share and collaborate on media lists and press releases with your team.
• Send press releases securely from a centralised location.
• Analyse key metrics like open rates, click-through rates and delivery rates.
• Figure out the best time and day to send press releases.
• Replace the work of a full-time team member.
• Manage internal and external communications in one place.
• Automate your GDPR compliance.
  
  

Drawbacks

• If you are a small company with little brand recognition and no PR resources in place, you might find it hard to secure consistent coverage in the media by using an online media contacts database.
• Skip to Scenario 3 for our tailored advice on what you should be doing in this situation.
• Most online databases operate on a subscription basis. Therefore, they are not suited to those who only need to send out a single press release, e.g. raising awareness for a product launch. Scenario 3 explains what you should do if you find yourself in this situation.

Interested?

• Click below to sign up for a free demo of MediaHQ and see if this type of solution could work for you.

{{demo-button}}

Scenario 2 - Using an Agency

So you are currently paying substantial fees for a third party agency/consultant that manages PR on behalf of your organisation. They generate good results due to their pre-established relationships with the media, but now that budgets are tight you want to explore alternative, in-house solutions that can get you as good if not better results on a significantly reduced monthly outlay. At MediaHQ, we come across people like this every week. Usually they work for large charities or big corporations. Thankfully, we’re able to solve their problems every time (see customer success stories).

How to get better value?

Step 1 - Identify the main cost drivers for your PR spend

Things to consider:

• Fees: How much are you paying your agency/consultant on an annual basis? Is it a fixed or variable cost? What percentage of your budget is it using up? Do you pay a monthly retainer or do you pay on a project by project basis?
• Value: How many PR campaigns do you get for that price? Are you getting consistent media coverage?
• Time: How much time is spent on maintaining the relationship with your external partner? Do you have weekly meetings? Is there ever any misalignment?
• Skills: Does your agency have the right people on your account? Do you have an understanding and a good relationship?
• Reputation: Is there a reputational risk to having the PR function outside the organisation? What happens if it becomes too expensive or key people move on in the agency?
• Approval process: How much effort is spent on the approval process for PR campaigns? Do you have to write mock-ups or detailed briefs? Is there a lot of back-and forth between your team and the agency?

Step 2 - Analyse the patterns and where you can make savings 

For example:

• Agency vs In-House team: Could you replace the external partner with an in-house team? How much time and money would be saved? The answer to this is a lot. Many in-house teams spend less in a whole year than an external partner could charge for a month or two.
• Results: Could an in-house team deliver the same (or better) results with more affordable resources? How will I know if they are delivering good results? One easy way to do this is to monitor release reports and online coverage.
• Resources: What resources will I need to equip my in-house team with? How much will they cost? Will they integrate with each other? Luckily, the old days of using a mixed bag of spreadsheets, email and third party CRMs have been replaced with affordable, all-in-one solutions like MediaHQ.

Step 3 - Decide on a course of action

i) Hiring/upskilling

If you have decided to replace your agency with an in-house team, you might need to hire someone with PR expertise, or upskill your existing employees.

• HireHive is a great application that can be used to find the right people and seamlessly work your way through the hiring process.

ii) Manage workflow

PR is an activity that involves lots of planning ahead and multitasking. This can get messy if you don’t have the right tools to manage your team and campaigns.

• Teamwork is a great application that allows you to create milestones, assign tasks to people and monitor your team’s progress. 

iii) Equip your team with PR software

Some in-house teams are still building and managing their media lists using a mixed bag of email, spreadsheets and Google search. More efficient teams are using cloud-based media databases to handle all the busy work for them. See below for details about the cost and benefits of such platforms.

Cost

• Online media databases usually cost between €5k - €10k per annum depending on the number of user licences and optional features you decide to purchase.
• This is significantly cheaper than ‘paying per campaign’ to an external partner because once you are signed up, you can build as many media lists and send as many press releases as you like.
  
  

Benefits

• Eliminate slow waiting times that are associated with using an external partner. No more going back and forth until a final version is approved.
• React quickly to news stories and get your release out before competitors.
• Take control of how your organisation is perceived in the public eye.
• Build media lists in seconds based on special interest tags, audience location, publication type, job title, coverage type and more.
• Contact information is kept up to date for you and you are informed about job movements within the media.
• Easily share and collaborate on media lists and press releases with your team.
• Send press releases securely from a centralised location.
• Analyse key metrics like open rates, click-through rates and delivery rates.
• Figure out the best time of day to send press releases.
• Replace the work of a full-time team member and focus on the more important aspects of your job.
• Manage internal and external communications in one place.
• Automate your GDPR compliance.
  
  

Drawbacks

• If you are a small company with little brand recognition and no PR resources in place, you might find it hard to secure consistent coverage in the media by using an online media contacts database. Skip to Scenario 3 for our tailored advice on what you should be doing in this situation.
• Most online databases operate on a subscription basis. Therefore, they are not suited to those who only need to send out a single press release, e.g. raising awareness for a product launch. Scenario 3 explains what you should do if you find yourself in this situation.

Interested?

• Click below to sign up for a free demo of MediaHQ and see if this type of solution could work for you.

{{demo-button}}

Scenario 3 - Limited Internal Resources

So you work for a small company that has big ambitions but is still relatively unknown to journalists and the wider public. You recognise the importance of PR, but you’re not sure which route will take you to the front page of your key publications. You would like to send out a release or two over the coming months, but you don’t have any internal PR resources in place. At MediaHQ, we come across people like this every week. Usually they work for start-ups or SME’s that have big ambitions for growth. Thankfully, we’re always able to advise them on what to do.

How to get better value?

Step 1 - Identify your Key Costs

For example:

• How much are we spending on PR at the moment? 
• How much would it cost to hire a dedicated PR employee?
• How much would it cost to train them into the company?
• What resources would they need and how much would they cost?

Step 2 - Analyse the patterns and where you can make savings 

For example:

• Could we outsource our PR work to an external consultant rather than hiring and training someone?
• Could an existing employee manage the consultant relationship?
• Could an external consultant deliver the same results as an in-house team?

Step 3 - Decide on a course of action

If this scenario sounds familiar, we recommend that you hire an external PR consultant/agency to handle this work for you.

Benefits

• External PR partners come in all shapes and sizes. From one-man-bands to giant corporations, you should be able to find a partner that meets your requirements.
• You can ‘piggyback’ off pre-established relationships that have been built up by your partner over years of interacting with the media.
• Save time spent on writing press releases and finding the right journalists.
• You can use an external partner for your ‘headline stories’ in conjunction with a media contacts database for everything else.

Drawbacks

• The use of external partners is more expensive than managing your PR & communications in-house.
• External partners have other clients and therefore your project may not be prioritised.
• Usually they will not allow you to react quickly to news stories and get your press release out before your competitors.
• Many external partners charge on a ‘per campaign’ basis, which might limit the number of press releases you can send.
• You may have to go back and forth until both parties are happy with a particular campaign.

Interested?

• Our sister company ‘All Good Tales’ is always taking on new clients. Email info@allgoodtales.com to set up a free consultation.

Summary

• If you work for a busy press office that doesn’t have time for all the grunt work associated with PR and communications, you should consider using an online media database.
• If you are using an expensive external PR partner and your budget has been reduced, you should also consider using an online media database.
• If you work for a small company that has little internal resources for PR, you should consider using an external PR agency or consultant.

About MediaHQ

Designed for PR and Communications teams, MediaHQ is the all-in-one media contacts database and press release distribution software with the mission to connect your story with your audience.

It was founded by entrepreneur Jack Murray in 2009. Our cutting-edge software is the best, fastest and most accurate way to find the right journalists, build media and pitch lists in seconds, send press releases and get results.

The comprehensive MediaHQ database lists the details of over 60,000 journalists and media outlets across Ireland and the UK and is full of time-saving features.

{{demo-banner}}