The CSR press release should be a mainstay of your CSR communications plans and be treated strategically. It can help a company stand out from the muckraking and reinforce the larger CSR strategy, message, and progress to journalists, business ratings analysts, activists, opinion makers, customers, and shareholders.
Public relations and marketing practitioners increasingly need to recognize that CSR press releases must articulately and concisely position CSR subjects within the context of overall business strategy. Doing so avoids the danger of being categorized or dismissed by editors and reporters as "soft news," "damage control" or "spin." Doing it this way benefits a company's credibility and prevents it being stuck in debate. And, it pinpoints what is changing or happening along a greater panorama.
CSRwire, an exclusive CSR news service based in Springfield, MA, and Ethical Corporation (London, UK) currently each get an influx of approximately 200 CSR press releases a month.
Despite growth in the dissemination of CSR press releases, when you cruise through them you frequently find "one-offs" that annoy reporters. This is okay for appearance on the corporate Web site so that jobseekers or researchers interested in companies with strong CSR practices can find information, but they create an overload of paper on journalist's desks.
The December 19th, 2005, CSR press release headline, "BAE SYSTEMS makes year-end donations to local charities; Company gives locally in addition to international contributions in 2005" is not candy to the media's eye. It's another one of those one-offs that will make its way to the trash. Think instead in broader CSR context and link the subject matter to what the company is doing overall in community relations, CSR, or in strategy, why, and to what effect. Or, tell what is a new or different.
The ability to articulate and differentiate your company's CSR position and progress is critical to how it is perceived.
Tobias Webb, the editor of Ethical Corporation, says, "Only when companies come clean about their failings as well as their successes will they get credibility with their CSR work." Let transparency become a working strategy. The lack of transparency is not necessarily a shield. The rules of the game are changing when it comes to the nature of CSR communications.
Shape Your CSR Press Release For Strategic Success
When you sit down to write a CSR press release, ask "how does a given CSR topic hook into organizational strategy, mission, values, trends, and innovation? How does it link to practices and measurements in areas such as: ethics, accountability, human rights, governance, financial returns, employment practices, business relationships, diversity, products, community involvement, and environmental impact? What's changed?"
Says Christina Siun O' Connell, CSR communication consultant at Flagg, a UK-based communications and design firm owned by Pepper Global with Chicago offices: "Several years ago, UPS announced a change in their fleet management maintenance schedule through CSRwire. This is not a "sexy" announcement. UPS provided context in terms of how their new maintenance program decreased negative environmental impacts and in terms of their overall corporate approach of managing and improving environmental performance."
Adds Bill Baue, writer with Social Funds (Brattleboro, VT,) "You need to know what your critics are going to call you on and address this in a forthright way. If you're looking to reach mainstream writers you need to educate them about what CSR is, and more importantly what it isn't, such as philanthropy, a waste of time, or a feel-good activity."
Moving business journalists off the dime and getting buy-in for CSR is really tough. Most prefer to write a junkyard report than cover new and emerging business models and practices for mainstreaming CSR. Relayed one business editor of a major daily newspaper, "You need to tell me something I don't know and not what you're supposed to be doing."
Consider behemoth Wal-Mart, which announced a new healthcare plan for employees, along with its intention to invest $500 million annually in energy efficiency and slash its solid waste and greenhouse-gas emissions. This garnered more "blog buzz" over Wal-Mart's motives and fewer news-breaking headlines. When a California jury awarded Wal-mart workers millions for alleged unpaid lunch break pay violations, on the other hand, headlines were plentiful. So, where's the coverage of a company's successes as well as failures as it takes steps to improve in CSR?
With the global economy, the problems and pressures faced by corporations, governments, and society are converging. How individual companies as well as the sectors unite on CSR is news since it represents the shifting trend towards new practices and multi-sectorial collaboration.
Greg Schneider, CSRwire director, says, "It's important to talk about CSR whether there is a full plan developed yet or not. Companies can communicate their CSR process from birth, evolution, to maturity. Starting down the CSR road can be an important component of a company's competitive advantage."
This article was written by Susan Nickbarg, principal of CSR consultancy SVN Marketing, and was excerpted from PR News' 2006 Guide to Best Practices in Corporate Social Responsibility. Buy it online at http://www.prnewsonline.com. Nickbarg can be reached at [email protected].
CONTACT:
Greg Schneider, 802.251.0110; Christina Siun O' Connell, 312.588.4765; Bill Baue, 802.251.0500; Marjorie Kelly, 978.594.1096; Tobias Webb, +44(0)20.7375.7156