It doesn’t matter if you have a large business or a start-up, at some point in time you will need a PR agency for your brand or services. Every business requires brand awareness, publicity of its brand, and maintaining a positive reputation. With the help of a PR consultancy firm, this can be easily achieved. There are various benefits of hiring a PR firm as
- They are well-connected with various organizations and their leaders.
- If they have the same background as your industry, it will save you a lot of time and money.
- PR agencies provide a neutral perspective.
But it is always a point of discussion that how to identify which leading PR agency should be hired. Here are some tips which can help you in hiring a PR agency for maintaining a positive reputation of your brand and much more.
Goal Setting
Before hiring any PR agency, you must be clear about your goals. Jot down all the important points which you want a PR agency should achieve and then from all those points, find out the most important one and set a goal accordingly. Your objectives may include
- Product launch for a particular set of customers.
- Increase in productivity.
- Drive buzz around the brand.
- Increase the awareness of the already existing brand.
- Attract visitors to an event.
PR Budget
It is very important to set a budget before hiring a PR agency. It saves the time of both parties. For long-lasting results, you need to lose your pocket as hiring PR agencies is a bit expensive. While preparing a budget include these points in it:
- Overage, i.e., the extra money that you have to pay if the budget gets increased due to some reason.
- Base retainer
- Expenses/incidentals
Drafting a Request for Proposal (RFP) Process
It is a good practice to go through an RFP process before hiring a PR firm. The standard process includes these points:
- Decide what are you expecting from a PR agency and highlight your goal accordingly.
- Create a list of at least 10 prospective PR agencies.
- Contact those PR agencies and try to find out if they are interested in taking any new client or not. Find out every single detail and qualification about those agencies.
- Select the best 3 among them and request a proposal from them.
PR agency: Big or Small
There are both large and small types of agencies and both have their benefits. Before selecting them, it is important to understand the key benefits of both. Never decide based on the size of your business. It is not necessary that if you own a small business then large size PR agencies are not for you. Larger agencies have larger networks and broader reach while small agencies have their expertise in a niche industry, local expertise, and are better at making personal relationships.
Your PR agency is a kind of extension of your team. So, be very careful while selecting them.
