How to Write PR and Content Goals and Actually Achieve Them

PRWriting Tips

18 May

How to create your PR and content goals, plus your cheat sheet to tracking and achieving them!

Learning how to write PR and content goals is your key to getting started, and your best approach to seeing smashing results from your hard earned PR and content efforts!

In this post, I’ll share why goal setting is so important whether you’re doing your own PR or outsourcing it and what you need to know about creating them.

And I’ll also share some key ways to get started right now in our PR and content goal setting checklist!

Why should I set PR and content marketing goals?

There are a couple of reasons why setting goals with your PR and content efforts are essential.

And the first is for purpose!

If you have no idea what “success” actually means to you – how do you know if your PR and content goals are worth the effort – let alone whether the direction you’re taking is the right one?

It’s like getting in a car – and just driving – with no end destination in mind! (Unless of course, you’re a mum in business like me and the goal is just for a moment’s peace and quiet in the car!)

So you need a destination – your ideal PR goal – to know where you’re headed with your PR and content.

This diagram gives you just some of the key ways PR can help your business!

And for a rehash on what is PR and why you should do it – check out my blog.

Goal setting is backed by neuroscience

And the second reason is thanks to neuroscience research. Studies show writing your goals down will have a far more likely chance of you remembering, and sticking to them!

In this Forbes article, the author shares how actually writing your goals down sparks a biological phenomenon known as “encoding”.

Encoding involves our brain’s hippocampus deciding whether things we perceive are worth being stored in our long-term memory, or being “thrown out”.

And the research shows writing helps improve the encoding process.

There are endless studies showing the impact of writing on memory and success – with one study sharing “people who very vividly describe or picture their goals are anywhere from 1.2 to 1.4 times more likely to successfully accomplish their goals than people who don’t.”

That’s a big increase!

So, now we know how important it is to write them down, how do you create your PR and content goals?

How to create your PR and content goals

1) Conduct a PR and content audit

Before you can started, you need a clear picture of where you stand right now.

And this is where an audit of your PR and content landscape comes in!

A content and PR audit will help you record all your existing content, engagement and activity done to date – in comparison to your industry and competitive market.

You’ll also get a sense of your current level of performance, which you can use as a baseline.

I’ve got a download that walks you through listening checklist to help you know what to look for.

2) Make your PR goals SMART and business focused

PR is absolutely not about getting 15-minutes of fame.

Your PR and content marketing must ALWAYS be tied to your business goals (you can read more about what is PR and why it’s one of the fastest ways to grow your business here).

So get 100% clear and what your business needs and challenges are and how you’re going to use PR to address this.

For your PR and content marketing goals to be useful, they need to be specific, measurable, attainable, realistic and timely – otherwise called SMART objectives.

So what do I mean by this? Let’s work through it:

Specific: Get clear. Does “increase brand awareness” mean you actually want 10 pieces of your ideal media coverage? Making your PR and content goals specific helps you track progress and measure success.
Measurable: Make sure every goal has a metric. “Improve your reputation” is a great concept, but it’s not a goal unless you have a way to measure your improvement.
Attainable: It’s great to set goals to get you to stretch yourself – but make sure they’re within reach if you put in the work, otherwise, those “failure” feels will dominate. For example, unless you have a team of 10 communications managers, it may be impossible to set a goal like “create 100 new pieces of new content a month to share across xyz”.
Relevant: This is the piece tying your goal-setting back to your business objectives. If your goal involves “increasing coverage” for example, make sure you understand how this will help the business.
Timely: Deadlines keep you accountable! Set a timeframe to complete your goal so you know when to check in on your success. You might also want to include some milestones along the way for incremental check-ins.