The difference a day makes

What difference to an organisation can a few days per month of PR expertise bring? Fractional PR Director Gina Hollands takes a look

So, if you’re not here full time, what kind of impact can you realistically make?

This is a question I get asked a lot before starting work with a client. They’re keen to do PR. They know they need to raise awareness of their company and build trust among stakeholders, and they don’t have anyone in-house with highly developed PR skills. But they’re still not sure how much they’ll actually achieve by partnering with someone for just a few days a month.

I’ll come back to that in a moment. First, let's look at another common question, which is connected:

How much of your time do we need to make a difference?

This is a simple one. The more time we have, the more we can do, but as a basic starting point, 4 days a month will get you some very good results. If you really want to go for it with your PR campaign, investing even more – 6-10 days a month will generate spectacular results. Yes, it’s that powerful that for less than half a normal working month, PR can transform the perception and reputation of your organisation, which leads to huge. I repeat HUGE, business success.

Sounds confident? I am. Because having worked in PR for over 20 years, I’ve seen just how much of an impact it has on organisations and the people within them.

Returning to the first question...

What kind of impact can a fractional PR Director realistically make?

What we do for you depends on what you want to achieve. But that’s no answer, so here I've taken three different scenarios based on having a fractional PR Director supporting you for a basic four days in a month.

1. Your objective is to achieve top media coverage

Then you need a fractional PR Director who focuses on media relations and gets a buzz from getting you headlines. In this scenario, the focus is on generating positive media coverage for you in the titles you want to appear in, be it print, online or broadcast. Expect them to talk to you in depth about your media wish list and the topics you feel passionate about. They’ll also find out from you what’s going on in your organisation so they can explore opportunities for publicising them through the media.

To give you an idea of the type of results you might expect from a senior PR, I’ll pull from real life examples. For the first client I worked with when I became a fractional PR almost three years ago, I generated over 70 media cuttings in the first quarter. This included radio interviews, national press and local publications in relevant regions. For my newest client, in just four days, I generated hundreds of cuttings. That’s because the story went global and caught the attention of an international news agency.

The quality of the story helps determine the outcome, but so does the experience and skills of your PR. A PR Director with decades of experience knows how to make a story land and has spent years nurturing relationships with key media contacts.

2. You want to win awards

If gaining credibility through award wins is your focus, that’s what your fractional PR will do for you. They’ll likely begin with an in-depth discovery session to find out about your organisation and the characters within it, and what makes them special. Armed with that knowledge, they’ll research awards you could enter. I always advise my clients which awards I recommend they go for based on cost, timing and likelihood of success, so they can point resources to best potential outcomes.

In four days, your fractional PR Director could enter you into one or two awards. If you’re shortlisted, the PR opportunities can be phenomenal – your social channels can be brought alive with the good news, there’s the networking opportunities the event brings, and the finalist assets you can brandish proudly across your website and other owned platforms.

If you win, the magic really happens. You start getting noticed by people who weren’t aware of you before, you can say the special words “We’re award-winning" and you can tell the world your great news through press releases, articles and media interviews.

3. You want to become a thought leader

How come your peers and competitors are finding ways to share their expertise and knowledge via opportunities, such as speaking engagements, being podcast guests, media interviews and professionally sounding articles which achieve high engagement?

Probably because they’ve discovered the power of great PR and making it work for them. Your fractional PR director can do all this and more for you. Can’t write (or hate it)? That’s what your PR is for. They’ll interview you and ghostwrite articles so they're written in your voice. Cringe at the thought of asking a journalist or podcast to feature you? Let your PR be bold on your behalf. That’s what we do.

What can we do in four days? As an example, for one of my current clients, in this timeframe, I secured opportunities for them to judge three industry awards and appear as guests on two target podcasts.

Next month, we’ll be working on securing opinion pieces in key media and getting them lined up for speaking gigs so they can showcase their brilliance in front of a captive audience.

What can a fractional PR director do for me?

Almost certainly more than you’d ever imagine. PR stands for ‘public relations’, but I often think ‘powerful results’ would be more apt. The question is not what your fractional PR can achieve, but where you want to go. It’s our job to get you there.

Author bio

Gina Hollands is founder of Hollands Associates, a PR & communications agency offering media relations, PR strategy, crisis communications and fractional PR services. Her mission is to make the world more human, one story at a time.