For the Love of the Launch: How Product Launches Can Instigate Integration

Raise your hand if you are tired of the constant lip service that's paid to the integration of PR and marketing. (Ours are raised.) It's been a topic du jour for more than a

decade (or two) and, while progress has been made (albeit out of necessity--thank you, digital communications platforms) on the integration front, there is still a lot of shared

strife among PR professionals and marketing executives, and very little effort to join forces.

But enough lamenting, because there are more and more opportunities for PR to collaborate with marketing. For starters, at the CMO Leadership Forum held in New York City on

January 17, the dominant sentiments were those of confusion and anxiety surrounding the following challenges: how to regain the control lost to consumers at the proverbial hands

of digital communications platforms; how to quantify the success of marketing efforts when traditional ad measures are irrelevant; how to leverage social media to connect with

consumers; and how to differentiate brands in a competitive environment.

Do these sound familiar? They should, because they are the very challenges that PR executives face--and the same challenges that said executives are overcoming with powerful

communications strategies. What this suggests, then, is that both parties are more open to collaboration; it's just a matter of pinpointing a place to start.

Launch A Partnership With A Launch

You have to crawl before you can walk, so it's only natural to apply that principle to business. The most natural starting point for collaboration between the PR and marketing

functions is a product launch, as executives from both disciplines will find each other to be very useful.

Plus, product launches are truly collaborative across organizations because of all the functions inherently involved: research and development in creating the product; public

relations in uncovering users' needs for that product; marketing for building the creative; and so on.

"When you are launching a product, you first figure out what you can do to introduce that product to your target audience," says Jeffrey Julin, president of MGA Communications

and CEO of the Public Relations Society of America. "Then you identify tactics. Integration will happen around the programs themselves, [especially] as marketers realize that it

always has been about building relationships."

OK, so the theoretical reasons for integrating over a product launch are there. Now, there's the question of taking action.

*Speak the same language. It seems like a given, but it's hard to work with someone when you speak English and they speak Chinese. In the same vein, various communications

functions have different interpretations of everything from social media to their own disciplines.

"The biggest issue in the advertising industry is collaborating," Tom Carroll, president and CEO of TBWA Worldwide, said during the CMO Leadership Forum. "But no one speaks the

same language. We have to define a vocabulary."

The question, then, is what words need defining in the first place.

"The biggest challenge right now is defining marketing," Daniel Kelley, partner, Heidrick & Struggles, said during the forum panel called "Creating the Marketing

Organization of the Future."

All this confusion with terminology (and the protectiveness it sparks) is evidence enough that semantics need to be laid out before any meaningful collaboration can occur.

Julie Crabill, account director and manager, industry relations, SHIFT Communications, offers these tips for defining terms related to product launches:

• Tier out needs and opportunities in a way that marketers will understand;

• Ask, "What is the upside of doing something a certain way, and what is the negative impact of not doing something that PR advises?"

• Give the marketing department finite information on investments (in terms of time, money and resources) needed to make the launch work.

*Understand their business. Whether it's really the case or not, marketers and PR executives still think they have different business concerns. Because of that, Crabill says,

"Listen and understand the needs of the marketing department, and agree to a give-and-take. When does PR need to come first, and when should it take a backseat in the bigger-

picture marketing needs?"

This is extremely pertinent to product launches, because these initiatives are all about getting the maximum exposure of a product to the target audience ("target" being the

key word). There is any number of ways to conduct this outreach, and some will be more marketing than PR-oriented; however, the most important thing for PR executives is to ensure

message consistency regardless of the approach or delivery vehicle.

*Bond over the mutual love of celebrity. Celebrity spokespeople are often key components of product launches, and they are something both PR and marketing executives can

appreciate. For marketers, they are natural hooks for advertising initiatives; from a PR perspective, they represent the brand and deliver key messages to audiences. In both

cases, then, a celebrity spokesperson must be chosen carefully. For a list of best practices to consider and questions to ask when choosing a celebrity spokesperson for a product

launch, see sidebar.

*Take ownership online. If PR people are looking for an answer to the online conundrum of how to regain control, then they shouldn't look for it in the marketing

department.

"Everyone is in a panic about digital. Well, everything is digital," Carroll says. "The ones in panic are the ones in trouble.The people with the steadiest hands are the ones

who win."

Now that PR executives can rest easy knowing they are not losing an impossible race to their marketing counterparts, they can step up with digital communications strategies

that marketers have no choice but to stand behind. A product launch is an especially opportune time to do this, because new products can be tested by very specific, rapt audiences

via online channels. Plus, PR execs can leverage the digital tools they are already accustomed to: social media press releases, blogger relations, social media newsrooms, social

networking groups, etc. Because PR is all about building relationships and engaging consumers, it has a head start in all social media initiatives.

"As marketing organizations inevitably focus on consumer centricity, there is concern that attention is being diverted away from two key constituents: the rest of the

organization, and actual customers," Kelley admitted during the forum. "With everything that technology enables, it's easy for attention to be diverted."

Thus, public relations professionals have the opportunity to be the glue that holds it all together. PRN

CONTACTS:

Julie Crabill, [email protected]; Jeff Julin, [email protected];

Daniel Kelley, 212-867-9876; Kim Friedman, [email protected]

Questions To Ask Before Signing A Celebrity

Celebrity spokespeople can boost a product launch from marketing and PR's perspective, but choosing the wrong one can result in major crisis management. Kim Friedman, SVP,

consumer practice co-director, Manning Selvage & Lee, recommends asking these questions before signing a celebrity:

• Do I have a spokesperson who is more credible than a celebrity?

• What does celebrity mean in relation to my product?

• What does the celebrity add?

• Will my audience believe the celebrity message?

• Can the celebrity become an integrated part of the product launch?