Landing a Perfect Consensus Following Situational Analysis

Everything is nicer when you get it right the first time. In order to do that for a public relations campaign, finding a consensus with your client is necessary at the beginning of the project. Without a laid out agreement, time and resources will be wasted and will not leave a great taste for you or your company with the client. Leading up to this consensus we must first take a few crucial steps.

These guidelines will help you begin your formative research on the right foot, for your client. Another term for these steps is called, “Analyzing the Situation” (Smith, 2020).

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Brenda’s Market Example (All names are made up and is not a real client)

Let’s say we have Brenda’s Market approach us for a campaign to reach a new neighborhood. As public relations experts, we already know we cannot simply make a cool event in the freezer section, we must first find out what the client is looking to gain from our help.

First we will have a client briefing, where Brenda discusses her thoughts, hopes, and concerns about her store and will expand or provide additional information deliver proper bearings of her company . This is the time to improve situational knowledge from a direct representative, of material that may not present itself during secondary research. Firstly, understanding the elements of situational information, outlines how to organize received information.

Situational Information Gathering

A client brief can build out an idea of the situation a campaign will surround. A publication by Kim and Ni, describes new information behavior for situational analyses. The previously available variables follow as, information seeking, which is planned along with a target, information forwarding, simple sharing of problem parameters, and information forefending, a preplanned avoidance by judgement of value and relevance. All of these behaviors which are proactive or active. Three reactive and passive variables of information are, information attending, newly discovered material that could led further, sharing information, similar to forwarding but not preplanned concluding of knowledge with others, and permitting information, similar to forefending but inversely allowing certain information at which it relevant. (Kim & Ni 2013). Below lays out one way to organize these six elements of situational information gathering.

Proactive/ Active	Information Seeking	Information Forwarding	​Information Forefending
Reactive/ Passive	Information Attending	Information Sharing	Information Permitting

This ensures that we have a full scope of the situation, and will be able to branch off generously in our further research following the meeting.

Client Briefing

For the client brief, Brenda will try to fulfill any questions that could arise. Our goal from this conversation with Brenda will be to understand her why (Holmes, 2022) . Why is this important to her. Why does the company need this? Why is it not happening already?

To explore these ideas, the conversation needs to cover specific details. The project scope is the lengthiest but will lay out initial thoughts. It covers what problem or opportunity the campaign will encompass? The costs are almost the most important detail. Overextending the agencies budget or the client will not bode well and should be a thoroughly discussed point. Lastly, resources the client already has to work with and what may be needed to accomplish her goals (Holmes, 2022).

The Consensus

Once the briefing is complete, a formatted collection of all the details will be presented in an additionally meeting or message. This will describe what was gathered from the brief about the situation and expectations of the project ahead. Having closely followed and extensively determined points, a consensus will be met! As mentioned by Gehrt, Moffitt and Carlos, the importance of getting this “Yes” lies in the continuation and building of relationships and not having a reduced cut in the budget (Gehrt et al., 2009). All aside once everyone can agree with the path

the rest begins…

References

Gehrt, J., Moffitt, C., & Carlos, A. (2009, October 14). Strategic public relations excerpt: Building Consensus for PR Programs. Communiqué PR. Retrieved August 31, 2022, from https://www.communiquepr.com/strategic-public-relations-excerpt-building-consensus-for-pr-programs/537/

Holmes, C. (2022, August 5), Formative Research [Lecture]. University of Oklahoma

Kim, J.-N., & Ni, L. (2013). Two Types of Public Relations Problems and Integrating Formative and Evaluative Research: A Review of Research Programs within the Behavioral, Strategic Management Paradigm. Journal of Public Relations Research, 25(1), 1–29. https://doi.org/10.1080/1062726X.2012.723276

Smith, R. D. (2020). Strategic Planning for Public Relations(6th Edition). Taylor & Francis. https://bookshelf.vitalsource.com/books/9781000201468