Brad Walker

Integrated Marketing Communications (IMC) is arguably the single most important concept in the field of communication studies. If you’re not familiar with IMC, it’s the integration of every department: marketing, public relations, advertising, promotions and personal selling in an effort to boost efficiency and maintain a single, unified message across all communication outlets.

While this country recovers from a devastating recession, proactive companies have learned that integrating these fields of communication prove to be more effective and less expensive than the alternative. Too many times we see companies fail at delivering a powerful message that stays the same across these disciplines. If the message isn’t clear, concise and controlled, audiences will be reluctant to support your company and what it stands for. Poor execution of message delivery can also hurt the one source that can change the game for a small, start up company, which is word-of-mouth communication.

In today’s communication landscape, we need to be a jack of all trades. Cross-functional teams are the norm in today’s business environment, and the fields of advertising, marketing and public relations can no longer work independently. Integration is key, and if you want to succeed in this industry you need to be a jack of all trades. A well-rounded professional is a threat and an asset.

When we want to become more familiar with a client, identify a target audience or pitch a reporter to cover your stories, doing a little homework can go a long way. Research is the key to any successful campaign, and if you’re not thorough with planning and research on the front end your company will find itself unprepared and unwilling to face the embarrassment of an effort that fell well short of its goals.

Before implementing any call to action, I’ve learned that conducting the slightest bit of preliminary research will leave you more prepared to handle difficult situations in the process of developing your campaign. What is your client’s mission? What are their long and short term goals? What are they trying to accomplish by bringing your PR agency on-board?

This information can acquired through the simple act of listening. It’s one of the five senses that people seem to have the most trouble with. Listen to your client, identify what their needs are and put goals, strategies and tactics in place to help build a successful campaign.

Entry level employees will be expected to write press releases, conduct research and work with the media to build relationships on behalf of the clients you’re representing. The research part is easier if you have the right tools to use. Setting up Google alerts and using sites like socialmention.com and blogpulse.com are free resources that are easy to use. Cision makes it easy for professionals to find reporters that cover specific topics so pitches are relevant, local and targeted.

Social media has done the entire media industry a favor by providing  platforms that offer timely information and a way to connect with the public. It’s more important than ever to monitor blogs, twitter, facebook and other social platforms to keep the client and your agency positioned as thought leaders in the public eye.