Strategic Planning: Achieving a competitive position in today’s global marketplace requires coordination and sharp focus. A top-notch strategic plan combines the best of public relations and marketing research, strategies, and tactics to insure that you spend your time and dollars wisely to reach your goals. We’ll analyze strengths and weaknesses/challenges and opportunities, determine objectives, formulate a strategy, and design an action plan that is both purposeful and flexible.
Branding: Your brand is your reputation. It’s how others think of you – and value you. Creating and maintaining a strong brand is critical to your short and long-term success. PhairAdvantage President Judy Phair recently oversaw a major branding initiative at the Graduate Management Admission Council for GMAC, the leading association of business schools worldwide, and the GMAT exam, its flagship product. We’ve worked on numerous other branding programs as well, and we can help you create, refresh, or rethink your brand.
Communications Audits: It’s the right time to review and examine your communications programs and priorities if you have a change in leadership; a new strategic plan; budget cutbacks; student or member recruitment/retention issues; legislative challenges – or if you simply want to tune a smooth-running communications operation. A good audit can tell you what constituencies you’re reaching, and at what cost; what groups you may not be reaching; whether or not you’re using the right medium to deliver your messages; and how consistent, identifiable, and credible those messages are.
Global Media Relations: Print and electronic media news remain the most credible source of information; however, social media are a critical part of any media relations program. We’ll use our knowledge of local, regional, and national media, including specialized and trade outlets, as well as social media, to help your message get through to your target audiences. We’ll analyze your messages and audiences to build a sharply-focused media database, tailor pitches to the wants and needs of targeted media, and follow up to facilitate placements. We’ll also prepare you for interviews, put together media kits, and do “environmental scans” of news related to your concerns. Our experience includes extensive media relations work in Europe, China, and India, as well as North America.
Government Relations: Working effectively with legislators on the local, regional, and national levels requires research and detailed planning. We’ve organized visits to state and federal legislators and staff, written legislative testimony, coordinated site visits from legislators for colleges and universities, and put together effective letter-writing and op ed campaigns to influence legislation.
Crisis Communications/Issues Management: No response is, in fact, a response. When a crisis hits, you must get your story out quickly and accurately, while respecting the rights of involved parties and protecting your legal interests. At the same time, you need to focus on concerns of internal as well as external audiences, immediate impact, and future implications. PhairAdvantage has dealt with crises spanning the gamut from the untimely departure of a president, to a college changing from single sex to coeducational, to environmental pollution charges, to state/federal program and budget cuts. We can guide you through both short and long-term crisis management.
Attitudinal/Opinion Research: Behind all of our services are finely-honed listening skills. Whatever the target group – prospective students, parents, alumni, government or business leaders, faculty and staff – we can help you understand the needs and wants of those you seek to reach. Our services include survey design, readership surveys, one-on-one in-depth interviews with opinion leaders, and a full range of other qualitative and quantitative research tools. We’re especially adept at focus group research – not just facilitating and moderating, but analyzing, interpreting, and reporting what we hear to inform the client’s communications/marketing efforts.
Media Training: We offer customized individual and group training in dealing with today’s complex and challenging news media – locally, nationally, and internationally. Our training can help our clients communicate their messages clearly and succinctly and present themselves and their organizations effectively to a variety of media, including print, online, and electronic.
Editorial Services: PhairAdvantage recognizes the importance of telling your story so that your audiences can understand and respond to it. We offer a full range of editorial services: writing and editing op eds, speeches, annual reports, fund-raising and recruitment brochures, media releases, public service announcements, newsletters, web sites, and legislative testimony. For example, we’ve written specialized newsletters for college and university presidents, association leaders, and the CEO of Merck, Inc., as well as speeches and op eds for numerous college and association presidents and business leaders. We can also coordinate design and production of print, electronic, and web materials.
