Two years ago my business took the plunge and made the decision to get a great PR firm on board to help us to reach our business goals. After many meetings we eventually settled on the amazing team at Interdependence PR, who have given our business a new lease of life since they have come on board. Before we got to this brilliant team however we had to sit through so many meetings as we were trying to find the very best which met our needs. As such we have learned exactly what to look out for during a meeting with a PR firm and what to focus on during such a meeting. If you are looking for a PR firm then here is what you should be looking to focus on during the meeting.
Quality of Service
It is amazing how many of those companies who we met with had poor customer service skills and this was a real red flag early on in many meetings. I don’t know the reason behind this but it is important to remember that they are operating in a service industry and as such you should expect to receive a warm welcome and a high level of service. If you don’t feel this then it should set off alarm bells about what else the company may shirk on.
Market Knowledge
A public relations firm which is at the top of their game in the tech industry is not going to be able to give the same quality of results if they are operating in finance or manufacturing. You need a public relations company which knows your market and which understands how that market works and how to speak to those within it. Each market is very different and when it comes to the things that the PR company is going to be doing for you, it is even more important that they grasp it.
Transparency
An experience which we had many times was this attitude of ‘don’t worry we’ll take care of it’ when it came to understanding how and on what the company were going to spend our money. You deserve to have absolute transparency from a PR firm and given that it is your cash, you also need to know where it is going to go. The companies I met with may well have handled their business but as a paying customer I had the right to know what their strategy was to achieve the goals that we were aiming for. If they cannot be transparent then it gives off an air that they don’t really know what they are going to do just yet, but they’ll figure it out. This of course is not what a business wants to hear when they are trying to find a service who will be acting as their mouthpiece.
From my experience these were the key things which I learned to focus on when meeting with a PR firm.
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