Krysten Copeland, Founder of KC & Co Communications, discusses the importance of having open and inclusive conversations when planning the messaging for a campaign. She also discusses valuable tools such as polling through social media to ensure a client’s target audience is being reached. Krysten also shares her advice for getting stories on local and national TV news.

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TRANSCRIPT:

DOUG: The message here is messaging. And let’s start, Krysten. How do you figure out what’s one tip you can offer to help you figure out what’s the right messaging to have impact?

KRYSTEN: I would say listening and interviewing your stakeholders, there’s a variety of ways to do it. You can do it through social listening. You can do it through focus groups if you have the budget to do so. But I generally tend to do the focus groups on social media and see what is actually resonating with my audience. So, there’s a ton of ways to do it, but that’s just one.

DOUG: What are some of the other tactics you use? Obviously, that makes a lot of sense what you’re speaking about.

KRYSTEN: To figure out what message is best going to resonate with your stakeholders. Sometimes you just have to go out with it. I urge people before they actually go out with their messaging to make sure they have a diverse group of people in the room making the decisions to make sure that the messaging will actually be inclusive and not accidentally offensive to other people or other ethnicities or so on and so forth. Um, so that’s just one way. Also, you know, with a background in politics, we often did lots of polling around our messaging and the different ways we were saying things. That’s an invaluable resource to make sure that your stakeholders and target audiences are really qued into what messaging you all want to put out there.

DOUG: Sometimes you might feel that a client needs to change their messaging that can be difficult to convey or persuade as well. But obviously, since you’re a messaging expert, what are some of your approaches when you’re realizing what they’re doing isn’t resonating and how do you go about getting them to change? What are some of the ways you approach that?

KRYSTEN: You know, with all of my clients, we have really honest, open conversations. Um, you know, I work really closely with a number of organizations and brands and politicians and have so over the past decade. So, when it comes to a message that isn’t resonating, I’m thinking of one particular instance. We went back to the drawing board. We wrote out the messages that were currently being put out into the ether, if you will, and then wrote exactly what we would want our messaging to kind of shift into and why there always needs to be a good reason why we’re going to shift our messaging. And so, if it isn’t resonating, for example, and we’re seeing that our open rates on emails are going down, or when we are looking on social, we see that people aren’t really responding to, you know, the different things that we’re putting out there. That’s a clear indication that the messaging needs to be changed. So yeah, it’s just a matter of having an honest conversation and going back to the drawing board, talking to the internal stakeholders to figure out what messaging ships need to take place and then, you know, starting all over again with putting the message out there and testing it to see if it’s efficient.

DOUG: You work, as you said, in the political and public affairs space throughout all of communications, It’s really getting tougher for your message to break through. What’s your take on the landscape and the political and public affairs space when it comes to messaging and how do you try and break through?

KRYSTEN: It’s definitely a very crowded landscape, especially with social media, but then also with just traditional media. So, we want to make sure and my job is to make sure that the messaging and talking points that we want our clients to uphold are cutting through the noise. So, it’s a matter of making sure that you have a unique, diverse perspective. Um, it’s a matter of making sure that you again, are talking to your stakeholders and figuring out what kind of conversations are happening and how you can best fit into them. And then it’s also about making sure that you are constantly, like I said, going back and testing and seeing what resonates. Um, and it’s often good to see, you know, different messaging tactics in any kind of media outreach you’re doing. So, seeing what talking points kind of get the crowd going. What are people, you know, talking about on social media after you have an interview? What talking points are kind of being exhausted there. So that’s a really good way to kind of, number one, cut through the noise, but then to make sure that your messaging is still working.

DOUG: You’re obviously very focused on the media in the work that you do. And we actually did a survey that showed that local TV news was considered way more trustworthy than, say, social media and also national news. And that crossed party lines. It was actually one area where there was agreement among Democrats and Republicans. How can you work with and utilize local TV news to influence people.

KRYSTEN: In terms of getting on local news? Yeah, no, it’s definitely really important to make sure that you have a good relationship with the producers. Um, it’s also really important to, you know, make sure that you are regularly submitting statements and having conversations with the local producers, because local news really does impact a wide swath of people. So, I think there are definitely a resource that any public relations person should be utilizing and end up building relationships with.

DOUG: An important aspect of messaging, especially in the political area and actually all over is slogans that are chosen. Do you have any thoughts on that?

KRYSTEN: Yeah, I actually do so. As we know, Biden recently, President Biden recently announced his re-election campaign. Uh, and he has a slogan that I think is really great. It says, together we can finish the job. So, finish the job. The fact that unemployment is at a record low, the fact that, you know, he helped us move past some of the other things we were dealing with in the in the years prior due to the prior administration, um, it really effectively messages the fact that, you know, they are the people to bring America to the next frontier. So, I think that was it was a great messaging move on the Biden campaign’s part and I’m looking forward to seeing what other messages they decide to put to the floor during the campaign.

DOUG: And I think the together part of that messaging is also important because that was sort of his platform last time, that it’s possible to end the divisiveness. That doesn’t seem to necessarily be following through, but at least as a message to not only his Democratic supporters, but independents and maybe Republicans who aren’t big fans of Trump at this point. You know, that’s a message that might have appeal to a wider audience as well.

KRYSTEN: Absolutely agree. Yeah, it definitely will appeal to a wider audience. Together means all of us. And I think that he’s definitely made it a point throughout his campaign and then throughout his presidency to make it to make sure that he a president for all Americans. And I think we’ll continue to see that, uh, brought to the fore in the messaging and throughout his continued leadership.

DOUG: Also important, maybe a lesson is to be open when you’re not sure. I think some of the early statements that were set with certainty but turned out to be wrong really undermine confidence and allowed for it to become a political issue to some degree. Um, you touched on local news. How about national news? Can the work that PR people are doing influence what they’re covering and how do we go about that, especially in this time when budgets are being cut? Journalists have limited flexibility. We’re talking earlier about if you hold a press conference, good luck getting people to show up in person or to travel to an event because of budgets. Any thoughts on how PR can be more effective in affecting what’s the national dialogue?

KRYSTEN: Yeah, no, and I think it all goes back to and I said this before, social listening, seeing what conversations are happening and the best way to insert yourself into them and then figuring out what messaging will best resonate with the audiences that you’re trying to reach. So, it’s pretty stuff and repeat when you when you kind of look at it and think when you think about a more nationally focused outlets such as like the MSNBC’s or the CNN’s of the world, when your stakeholders or your representatives are going on those networks, that they have a very clear message and that you are also making sure that you’re doing the work on the back end to evaluate what messaging will best resonate with the audience. I think, you know, it’s our responsibility as PR people to have messaging that is effective and that resonates and that actually changes the conversation or the very least the Overton Window for the different topics that we are discussing.

DOUG: I think that’s a thought that could be close to leaving. Any final thoughts you’d like to add to it as we wrap up the conversation?

KRYSTEN: Messaging is everything. Um, it’s our responsibility as PR people to have effective messaging that resonates with our target audiences. It’s important for us to have our fingers on the pulse to make sure that any kinds of conversations we’re having, we’re chiming in. It’s important to have diverse perspectives in the room. Um, when you’re having these conversations, I see all the time, you know, brands messing up because they thought something was okay. But they just didn’t have the diverse perspectives to tell them that it wasn’t. So, I think if you follow those three things, you’ll be in a good place when it comes to developing messaging, that resonates.

DOUG: That’s great. Thanks so much for joining us for this conversation. We appreciate and congratulations on your success.

KRYSTEN: Thank you so much, Doug. It was a pleasure.