An insider’s guide to engaging with a PR agency

As we approach the new year, some of you may be thinking about starting the year with a fresh narrative for your brand. Working with a PR agency brings a multitude of benefits including tapping into the PR team’s creativity, strategic insight, omnichannel expertise, network and external perspective.

In these uncertain times, agility is a key survival technique and hiring a PR firm allows you to dial up or down your PR budget with greater ease than hiring and letting go members of your in-house team.

We often find the best work stems from having both an in-house team and an external PR agency partner. The in-house team brings in-depth knowledge of the brand, company and culture, and the PR agency brings fresh energy and expertise. PR agencies work across multiple clients and channels and are able to leverage their experience for both a macro and micro external perspective.

Here are the things to consider before you decide to work with a PR agency:

1. Do you really need to hire a PR agency?

You have four options for who performs the service.

• Do-it-yourself

If you are a solopreneur with little or no budget, this option may be for you. The upside to this option is that when you do eventually have the budget for professional support, you will be more knowledgeable with realistic expectations and therefore a better understanding of how to manage marketing and PR professionals.
In addition to your own work, you also take on the extra work of your own brand development, marketing and PR. This is the least desirable option unless you have marketing and PR experience. You will have to spend years learning about marketing and PR and in the meanwhile, your brand and communications may look amateur that can result in sluggish customer engagement.

• Hire someone in-house

If you are struggling to allocate the time to learn about marketing and PR whilst working on your brand as well as your core business, you may consider hiring a marketing and PR professional to work in-house. Since this person is employed solely by your company, you have the advantage of having a go-to person who over time understands your brand intimately. They get the right tone of voice, have a relationship with journalists who cover your industry, have got a handle on how you work, company culture and what you need, and become invested in the long-term success of the company.
It is important not to set up the in-house marketing and PR professional to fail by having unrealistic expectations. I have observed cases where frustrated senior executives blame their in-house marketing and PR person for a perceived lack of results when the reality is that one person cannot possibly possess the extensive and broad skill sets, experience and network to cover the entire spectrum of branding, marketing and PR, which is why they need both internal and external expert support.

• Hire a freelancer

If you do not wish to hire an in-house professional, another option is to hire a freelancer. As the gig economy grows, there is an increasing pool of freelancers to work with and they often cost less than hiring an agency. You may even decide to supplement your in-house team with a collection of freelancers.
While it’s easy to see the positive benefits of hiring contract workers, there are many cons that exist. You may struggle to navigate your way around choosing the right freelancers especially if you do not have experience in marketing and PR. You may end up with an unpredictable quality of work as they often juggle multiple projects and they may no longer be available suddenly if a bigger budget client comes along. Their time capacity is limited and it’s understandable that they seek to maximise their income through juggling projects and they are quicker to leave and move onto new clients. It means you may have to hire different freelancers at different periods, which means you are spending extra time getting used to sourcing, hiring, managing, and adapting to the working styles of different freelancers.

• Hire an agency

Hiring an agency gives you immediate access to a team of experts who are a part of an existing working culture and enables you to skip the time-consuming learning curve of trial and error and cobbling together a random team of freelancers. After all, teamwork makes the dream work and collaborating as a team of experts across multiple clients allows the team to work with fluidity from brand to brand with their reservoir of experience and deep expertise. An agency also has existing and refined processes in place for quality control, optimisation of results, upskilling and training, feedback loops, access to a roster of costly softwares that you can tap into through working with them. They also should be a more secure bet to work with as many have professional indemnity insurance in place that covers damages and costs incurred by you if they provided inadequate service or advice that caused you to lose money.
One of the best benefits of working with an agency is the ability to build long-term relationships on your journey to developing and building your brand. Their team should have a variety of skill sets that you can use and pivot from service to service in a strategic and sequential path. Start-ups for example often initially work with us on the foundation stage of branding. Then we move onto creating the owned digital assets for them such as website development, SEO and social media channels before moving onto outreach with media relations and events. Then we work on thought leadership for them with award submissions and securing speaker opportunities.

The downside of working with agencies is mainly to do with cost. They often cost more than freelancers and hiring an in-house professional but agencies remain accelerants. They can fast track a brand in its brand journey and build brand awareness and equity rapidly with customers and other stakeholders. So although they cost more, they end up bringing more value when you look at the benefits gained and the time saved.

2. What is your budget?

There are a significant number of new business leads we receive that do not share their budget. This makes it difficult for a PR agency to send a proposal that is aligned to the lead. If you do not feel comfortable sharing the exact budget, try to share at least a range to give direction to the PR firm to create a proposal that fits within your budget. Also, some PR firms have a minimum monthly retainer or a project fee, so sharing your budget can save both parties time if the budget falls under their minimum fee levels. For example, we have a minimum monthly fee level for £5,000 plus value-added tax (VAT) and a minimum project fee of £15,000 + VAT. Our proposals vary enormously based upon the budget as PR firms often have multiple services and varying levels of seniority in their teams that they allocate according to a budget. Proposals take time to create and not knowing the budget is a little like shooting in the dark. In the past, we have had monthly fees with a client from £5,000 to £50,000 and the scope of work for either end was dramatically different. If you share your budget, a PR agency could offer you a proposal that would be most suitable for you. It helps you save time and back-and-forth at a later stage.

3. Write a brief or a request for proposal (RFP)

You will earn instant respect and come across as more professional if you approach a PR firm with a brief. PR firms often assess a lead’s behaviour pre-contract in the business development stage and their perceptions often shape the proposal, fee and contractual clauses. Leads who take the time out to prepare a brief are naturally considered as potential clients who are experienced in working with PR firms, organised, considered, clear in their ask and professional. A brief can include important information such as the objectives, target audience, preferred channels, highlighting which services they are interested in, budget, important dates and milestones, the process of selecting an agency along with timelines, the key information they require in the proposal, their selection criteria and sometimes they include a copy of their contractual clauses in case it may serve as a deal-breaker at a later stage.

4. Create a shortlist

Create a list of around 5-6 agencies to send an RFP. You can find PR agencies in a multitude of ways including scanning the industry award winners, recommendations from marketing and PR contacts, researching the agencies that work with other brands in your industry as well as good old-fashioned Google.
Analyse their website and social media to see if they present in a manner that is aligned with you. Some leads look a bit deeper into creating their shortlist to see if the firms have shared values, others look for firms who have worked with clients in the same industry whilst others specifically look for a non-industry PR partner for a fresh perspective for a challenger brand.
Don’t be surprised if some agencies turn down the offer to participate in the pitch process. This may be due to the firm being at full capacity or they do not feel it is a good fit or there may be budget issues. Remember, it is a two-way process where both parties have to be comfortable at the prospect of working together. The reputable agencies often have a stable client roster and can be discerning on which new clients they take on. There are some firms I know who avoid taking on start-ups for instance as they can be perceived as difficult clients due to limited budget, high risk of failure and ‘needy’ due to lack of in-house infrastructure.
You may wish to work with a multinational PR firm or a boutique PR firm – they both have their pros and cons usually around fee levels and global reach.

5. Engaging with the shortlist of PR firms

It is important to remember that the firms are taking out time to create the proposals. Therefore it is good practice to contact them before sending an RFP and ask if they would be interested in participating in the PR pitch. You can also suggest a meeting or a call as PR firms value interaction with the lead other than just a written brief. Once you have had a call with them, you can send the RFP. Some leads send across a non-disclosure agreement (NDA) before they send the RFP if there are confidentiality issues. A part of the process should include the opportunity for PR firms to ask questions, which can then be compiled in a document with the answers and shared with all participating agencies so that there is a level playing field in terms of information sharing.

Give the agencies at least 1-2 weeks to create the proposal. It will enable them to have the time to research and create a proposal aligned with the RFP. Once they have submitted their proposal, it is a good idea to let them present via a video call and ask them to have the potential team present who will be working on the project. You do not want to be in a ‘bait and switch’ situation where the stellar team you meet at the business development stage disappears as soon as you sign the contract and you are stuck with a team that you never met beforehand.

6. Onboarding the selected PR firm

Once you have chosen your PR firm and you have a contract in place, the onboarding process is critical for the success of the ongoing relationship. Well-prepared and organised leads would send an onboarding pack with key information such as the brand book, market research, previous campaigns and metrics, etc. This will enable the firm to learn about the brand so that they are aligned. PR works best if it is a long-term sustained campaign. As part of the onboarding process, you can also consider offering interviews with key internal and external stakeholders to deepen their understanding of your stakeholders and perceptions.

Work together on an agreed plan with clear deliverables, KPIs, measurement methods and timelines for evaluation. A strategy created together is always more effective than a strategy created solo and pinged over to the team to ‘execute’. Building consensus is critical for working with both the internal teams and the external PR firms. PR works best when there are consistency and long-term relationships between a client and an agency. I wish you all the best in your journey of finding the right PR partner.

I hope the above does not sound too onerous. It is a best practice guide based upon my 11 years of past experience. It has been a privilege working with clients to support them in telling their story. I look forward to continuing partnering with clients in the future.

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Curzon PR is a London-based PR firm working with clients globally. If you have any questions, please feel free to contact our Business Development Team bd@curzonpr.com