To keep the nation armed and ready, the U.S. Army has to recruit
about 110,000 new soldiers each year. Recruiting efforts, however,
took on a lot more weight in late 2002, as the nation braced itself
for a U.S. offensive against Iraq. To keep recruiting numbers on
target, the U.S. Army Accessions Command (the recruiting and
training arm of the Army) brought in Manning Selvage & Lee
Public Relations to develop and implement a communications campaign
that would show potential recruits the realities of military life
and highlight the readiness of the modern Army.
"If they are interested in joining the force, they need to be
aware that they are becoming a part of something big," says Captain
Chevelle Thomas, an officer in the PR and partnership branch of the
accessions commend. "They need to know that it's not Vietnam
anymore, that we are well trained and highly prepared."
MS&L built a PR strategy that revolved around the Army's
training processes. The campaign targeted potential recruits (and
their parents) as well as educators, diversity groups and public
officials. The campaign was comprised of a two-part effort to give
the media a vivid introduction to military readiness. The first
wave focused on the National Training Center (NTC), while the
second focused on the Joint Readiness Training Center (JRTC). In
both instances, the campaign demonstrates to potential recruits the
sophisticated training and cutting-edge capabilities of the Army.
At the same time, the campaign appeals to trainees who want to make
new human connections and push themselves to new heights of
excellence.
At the NTC in Fort Irwin, Calif., the PR team brought in a video
photographer, a sound technician, and an MS&L representative
who served as producer. They captured footage of the desert
war-games landscape, with video showing American soldiers preparing
for the prospects of guerilla warfare, chemical threats, air
attacks and dealing with civilians caught in the crossfire. The
video team then moved to the JRTC at Fort Polk, La., where soldiers
learn the tactics of modern street warfare. This setting offered
footage of soldiers training for war in an urban environment,
including live explosions, gunfire, booby traps and roadblocks --
often in the dead of night.
"We really wanted to capture, both through the training footage
and through the interviews with instructors and individual
soldiers, the type of content that would focus on development, in
both the physical and mental side of what they were learning," says
MS&L Account Supervisor Brian Matakis.
After filming the training exercises the PR team developed a
b-roll package, a radio news release, a press release and a matte
release. Pitching these elements to local and national media was
not difficult, thanks to a confluence of circumstance. First, there
was a national debate in progress as to the wisdom of a war in
Iraq, and stories on military preparedness were in hot demand.
Second, MS&L was offering something few others possessed:
insider content that most news organizations could not have secured
on their own.
"It was a level of access that the ordinary media could not have
attained," Matakis says. "We were much deeper into an exercise. We
were up on the rooftops and down into sewers." Matakis recalls a
conversation with a producer from NBC's "Today Show" in which the
insider footage was the decisive factor in garnering coverage for
the story.
Although Army officials provided great access, PR execs at
Manning were careful not to take anything for granted. "One thing
that we were very sensitive to was recognizing that the soldiers
and the leaders on the ground are there to train and prepare
troops. They are not there for PR. So we wanted to offer assurances
that the mission at hand could go forward," Matakis says. "We made
a very concerted effort to get out in the field and talk to folks
on the ground about what we wanted to do, and that helped to open a
lot of doors."
In the post-9/11 environment, local military commanders were
understandably anxious to control access among any visitors to
their bases. It helped that the PR production crew came in lean and
mean, typically with a complement of just three people. "We weren't
coming in with semi trucks and a Hollywood director," Matakis
says.
By being amenable to its Army hosts, Manning was able to pitch
military footage the media could not resist. Spots ran on "Good
Morning America," the "Today Show," Fox News, CNBC, and Univision.
Radio coverage came from the USA Radio Network, Virginia Radio
Network, WVOX-New York and KFWB-Los Angeles. In addition, the
campaign generated online coverage from Yahoo! News, CBS
Marketwatch, About.com News, Lycos News and the Houston Chronicle
Online.
Moreover, the Army says its recruiting efforts remain on
schedule. "The PR campaign contributed a lot to that. It did an
outstanding job," Thomas says.
Making Nice is Half the Battle
Despite working in cooperation with the Army's own PR offices,
executives from Manning Selvage & Lee Public Relations found
they needed to make nice in order to gain the insider access that
they needed. Their advice:
- Go in early. Members of the MS&L team spent time with base
commanders, getting to know them and ensuring commanders that their
missions would not be disrupted. - Use those contacts. The PR team found that its counterparts
within the military had friends who could help to open doors.
Informal network form a vital piece of the puzzle in working with
the military. - Keep it simple. Media access to a military installation needs
to be low key. MS&L went in with the smallest possible
production team and kept its presence as unobtrusive as
possible.
Contacts: Brian Matakis, 312.861.5258, [email protected]; CPT
Chevelle Thomas, 502.626.1505, [email protected]