As a B2B PR agency, research is one tactic that we turn to regularly to help generate awareness and column inches on behalf of our clients. Whether we uncover data that our clients are already sitting on or commission a market research company to undertake a survey, the beauty of a piece of research is that it forms the basis of a PR campaign and can help generate press coverage, content and social media engagement.
From start-ups to well-established corporates, from B2B to consumer, there’s potential for any business to carry out a research-based campaign, and from the nation’s favourite song to the amount of debt the average household has, the potential for a piece of research to strike a chord with the media is endless.
Here are just a few examples of research projects we’ve carried out on behalf of our clients and what we achieved as a result. We saw that our cloud provider client Redcentric was part of a crowded market and decided to carry out a research-based project that would help them stand out amongst competitors. This campaign was called ‘Journey to the Cloud’ and saw us commission a research company to survey 200 UK IT decision makers on how well-established their cloud technology implementations are. In a series of press releases and articles, we announced Redcentric’s findings to give a snapshot of the private and public sector’s use of cloud technology at that time. It went down well with the press, generating 50 pieces of coverage, and it even appeared in their core media Cloud Hosting and Cloud Pro. Getting access to a wealth of data, there was scope for us to create content too, and so we created infographics, ‘travel guides,’ and a report that encompassed all of the findings. The results of the survey fully supported our hopes for the campaign and fuelled a host of coverage and content.
Another successful research-based campaign we carried out was for our client Grass Roots, an employee benefits provider. We commissioned a research company to survey over 1000 employees and HR managers to see what benefits employees were currently offered, whether this has changed over time, and what benefits they’d like in the future. We wanted to show that benefits employees demand don’t always cost the Earth, and that companies like Grass Roots can roll out a benefits package for any organisation. With the answers and views from a cross-section of people, we drafted a series of press release releases targeting a variety of press. We secured an exclusive with a top employee benefits title, and generated 17 more pieces of coverage. The research was also used to inform further pieces of content: a guide, an animation, and ‘perk profiles’ which were infographics that pigeon-holed different types of workers and their stance towards benefits.
These are just two of our examples, but they clearly show why research is a worthwhile route to take. Carrying out primary research particularly gives you great control over the content you push out and means you align yourself with industry issues or hot topics and give yourself a wealth of data to support your key messages. You’re in the driver’s seat. The press has long been interested in a good set of data, and if you look at any publication chances are it won’t take you long to find a survey-led story.
Even if you’re a small business, if you choose your survey sample wisely and find some interesting results, you have every chance of grabbing the headlines. Carrying out a research-based campaign has the potential to open the doors to a wealth of content for use by both PR and marketing. What are you waiting for?
Alex Brown enjoys being one of the Skout blog’s most regular contributors.
