PR Event Planning Guide

It is not difficult for PR professionals to carry out marketing activities, because there is a complete set of methodologies to learn behind them."

Recently, I was chatting with my friends who are in the public relations field, especially those in developing companies. They often told me, "The boss always wants to organize an event marketing," like a certain brand, which was reposted by multiple self-media and received over a million likes. I really can't do anything about it.

You say, “I’m a public relations person,” I write communications drafts, do public opinion monitoring, cover vertical media, and maintain KOLs in vertical industries, so why do I suddenly have to do “marketing”?

People say that "public relations builds a brand" and advertising maintains a brand, but I'm not good at "creative planning". The company is not recruiting people and always puts the KPI on the public relations department. Now it should be called "public relations creativity + marketing department". It's really too difficult.

Perhaps this situation is common around us, especially for companies in the A/B round of development. It has long been commonplace that PR is not like PR, and marketing also requires communication.

Whether it is event marketing or topic communication, the essence of public relations activities is marketing activities + theme creativity + presentation form + public relations communication.

Don’t worry, today we are going to talk about how to plan for “a salary of 100,000+ at any time” in the eyes of your boss. We hope to give some clear directions to those friends who are confused about PR around you.

1. “Can you help us make 100,000+?”

Whenever Zhiyuan hears this sentence, "Can you help me come up with a communication strategy of 100,000+", my basic response is: "How much is your budget?"

If he says, "We don't have the budget for now, you can do it yourself," I will usually respond, "Sorry, we can't do it."

This kind of conversation should appear in front of you frequently, yes, Zhiyuan also encounters it frequently if someone asks this question.

I'm basically too lazy to talk to him, but I have summarized that those who ask these questions are either traditional enterprises or companies that have not done brand communication.

Two different modes of transmission:

I divide public relations communication into two aspects. The first aspect is: "online public relations communication" and the second is "offline linkage communication".

Online PR

Every time I communicate with different people, I will encounter this situation. For example, I want to do a Weibo topic marketing, I want to do a brand promotion on Xiaohongshu, and I want to do short video KOL promotion on Bilibili + Douyin.

I want to organize a large-scale event marketing, and I have to say that there are too many channels now and the gameplay is also innovative.

But they always give you some new concepts and create new words. In fact, in the eyes of some brands, they don’t even know “what they are trying to do”.

Whether it is riding on hot spots, creating topics, one-picture streams, H5, short videos, or various online combinations, I call them social marketing, social public relations and communication. I define them myself, otherwise it will be easy to be confused.

I have also been taught this kind of lesson by a professional 4A-level planning expert. When I first started working in the industry as a public relations officer for a client, a contractor pointed at me and asked me if I understood public relations creative communication.

I think you can only be a medium. Don't worry, we all have been through this. Without criticism, there will be no reflection and growth.

Offline PR activities

As the name suggests, in the execution of strategies, offline-related scenarios, and even offline activities that are completed and then combined with online communication, which have a relatively large weight , are what I call "offline public relations activities."

Let me give you a clear example. For example: "Your company filmed a TVC, then held an offline press conference, broadcast it in the community, and then created a topic on Weibo."

For example, you placed a wave of advertisements on the subway, and the advertisements were in the form of "topics".

For example, NetEase and DingTalk often use text style, and some do pop-up stores, offline conferences, flash dances, find celebrity endorsements, etc. I position them as offline public relations activities, and also call them integrated marketing.

Different things for different budgets

Generally speaking, for companies that use surprise attack strategies for public relations communications, the marketing department of this company most likely does not make full-year marketing plans.

You should know that in a slightly more complete marketing department, the marketing manager will have a full-year marketing budget, and will split the budget and allocate it reasonably at the beginning of each year.

Why should you ask about the budget before doing a "PR campaign"? Because as a PR, you need to be very clear about how much budget you need to do and how big the project should be.

It may happen that 70% creativity + 30% communication will lead to a hit, or it may happen that 30% creativity + 70% communication cannot even reach 100,000+. It is important to choose the right communication channel according to the budget.

If you only have a budget of 50,000, I suggest you ask your boss not to come up with any creative ideas, but just do a lottery, Weibo, official accounts, or do DOU+ on your own short video platform, or find an amateur on Xiaohongshu to send you advertisements.

If you have a budget of 100,000, it may only be enough to make a "one-picture flow picture, work hard on the content, and publish it through your own official account", and then do a wave of vertical big V placement, and that's it.

Of course, you can also do it on Weibo or a public account, plan a forwarding topic, find a few big Vs to repost it, and just circle some fans. Don't even think about getting more.

Another way is to find a big V to make a ghost video for you on Tik Tok or Bilibili, which can brainwash you magically, and then distribute it through channels. This is also possible, but I won’t talk about the chances of it becoming popular.

If you have around 300,000 to 400,000 yuan, you can try these methods: shoot a small TVC, and then find a group of KOLs to forward it for you. Try to keep the quality of the film at around 150,000 yuan, and use the rest for dissemination.

If you want conversion, then find a big V in short videos, ask them to shoot a video for you in the form of an amateur, and then subsidize the products for an event, and you buy DOU+ for them.

You can also try Weibo, buy a promotional spot, or buy a fan headline for your own Weibo. There are many ways to do this. You can also find a few KOLs on Weibo to repost it for you.

Of course, you can also try to make a creative H5 video for your circle of friends like China Auto Rental, find some top KOLs on WeChat, and forward it through your own private traffic pool to become popular. Of course, this also depends on the chances.

If you don't want to do all these fancy things, I suggest the simplest and most convenient way is to "distribute information flow" and don't do any public relations activities.

As for the budget of 500,000, 1 million, or even more, we will not break it down here. Most of them use a combination of methods, usually offline topic placement, online public relations content dissemination, plus Douyin and Weibo dissemination, as well as cooperating with operations to carry out marketing activities.

5 million+ basically means finding celebrities to endorse, placing in variety shows, offline subway advertisements, online topic dissemination, plus various KOLs and short videos.

In summary, different budgets require different PR activities. If it is not a luxurious configuration, the general public's choice is generally centered around "content + creativity + PR communication."

2. STEP 1: "Now that we have a budget, what is the purpose?"

For temporary public relations activities, or activities that need to be planned and executed one or two months in advance. Assuming that we have received the budget from our superiors, the next step is to set goals.

The goals are divided into two aspects:

Exposure-oriented

In this regard, companies in the C round and above usually do more.

Because the brand user base and even GMV have reached a certain level, it is necessary to occupy more market and even shape the brand's mind externally. In public relations and communication activities, more weight will be given to the brand for "exposure" , which will of course also cooperate with conversion.

Conversion-oriented

Most companies basically require that every external promotion and communication must result in conversion.

Currently, there are very few wealthy companies willing to invest millions, or even hundreds of thousands, to end up forwarding a large number of messages in a self-congratulatory manner without any conversion.

Different orientations have different requirements for channels and content:

Conversion-oriented content requirements

For example, if the purpose of this public relations activity is to attract new customers and focus on conversions, then we need to think about where to attract new customers.

Where is the target's public domain traffic pool? Only in this way can we find the corresponding channels in conjunction with the "new additions" and create reasonable "content" for the channels.

Short videos are quite popular now. Usually, companies with external TOC will adopt three strategies to attract new customers. The first one is to directly put information flow into short video platforms.

The second way is to seek cooperation with KOLs, asking KOLs to put products in the live broadcast room, or even find dozens of vertical influencers, and record content promotion with this product and platform as the dimension at the same time.

Finally, the company took the prepared PR draft and GMV performance chart and looked for big Vs on WeChat to forward it.

The third method is to conduct LBS targeting delivery or interest-based delivery in WeChat Moments . These are common practices that require conversion orientation.

The budget with a weight of "80%" is used for advertising, and 20% is only used for the dissemination of public relations content (such as public relations articles, XX big V platform promotes XX items for a certain brand).

The requirements for planning are relatively low, while the requirements for media public relations channels are relatively high.

Exposure-oriented content

We are required to have a budget of 200,000 yuan just for exposure, not conversion, so what we need to study more in this dimension is "content creativity".

For example, if the 200,000 yuan is to be spent on Labor Day, then we can try to use "Labor Day" as a basis to see if we can take advantage of the holiday's publicity.

For example, you can shoot an H5 version of TVC "In the Name of Love", or "In the Name of Mother, spread a topic of gratitude on Weibo". This also depends on the budget. If the budget is larger, you can also "invest in a wave of subway advertisements."

If the budget is not enough, after shooting the TVC, in the public relations industry, the marketing KOL’s circle of friends can set the pace, use advertising gates and field libraries to create exposure, invest in official media, and let them comment on the brand, etc.

Unlike the conversion dimension:

The exposure dimension requires more "creativity", "content" + communication channels + credibility endorsement . Whether it can reach the level of 100,000+ or ​​1 million+ screen-sweeping depends on whether the content can resonate with users related to its own brand. This is the essential difference between the two.

3. STEP 2: "Activity background analysis, competitive product research"

Investigation and analysis are necessary conditions for public relations activities. There may be many ways to carry out activities and ways of communication, but if you fail to find your own precise target group, it is basically a self-congratulatory "communication" and does not have much meaning.

1. Mainly analyze brand image and crowd

The activity can be analyzed from five stages: current brand image and brand stage, market population, problem points, and opportunity points, so as to clarify the focus and direction of the activity.

You can also use the SWOT analysis method. If you find it complicated, you can also ask the marketing department, user operations department, or data analysis department a few questions:

(1) What is our brand positioning and what is SLG?

(2) Who is our collective audience? What is the main purpose of this stage of activity?

(3) Which groups should this public relations activity be focused on, the media or users?

(4) Is the purpose to promote brand reputation or to achieve conversion rate?

（5）What are our goals for this year?

2. Check if your competitors have any relevant cases

Although we are in the same industry, our competitors are the most worthy role models for us to learn from.

If they are larger than you, then they may have already fallen into the trap that you are about to fall into, and they may have also used the PR techniques that you want to use.

We just need to follow their methodology and make relevant "content strategies". The only difference is the target groups and gameplay.

Complex things are not good things. For example, the public relations and marketing activities of Zhiyuan’s first member day were very easy. I will tell you my steps:

first step

First, after observing our competitors, I communicated with the operations department to formulate operational strategies for the membership day event time and the theme of the event, "March 8th Queen's Day, in the Name of Love."

The event date is March 4th – March 10th, a week.

So what can be done in terms of operations is to follow the GMV orientation, APP-side resources, slot configuration, product selection, as well as APP operation-side event planning, coupons, and full-discount event planning.

Step 2

With the growth orientation, adjustments have been made to the original flash sale products, and generous subsidies have been given to new users. If users invite new users to register and successfully place an order, they will be rewarded with 30 yuan in cash, with no upper limit.

I won’t say much about the product side. Just open the relevant landing pages and fission interactions, and do A/B testing.

The user operation within the site is carried out according to the marketing method of the APP. The only difference is that the promotion activities on the community operation side are the responsibility of the community operation leader, but they only do the activity part and bear the KPI.

Step 3

The theme, general direction, and UI vision are respectively the responsibility of the respective persons in charge, and the KPI of marketing and public relations is growth + exposure.

In this way, our theme is very clear. Next, from the public relations perspective, we got a budget of 1 million. How do I use my budget?

(1) Filmed a "communication video" with the theme of International Women's Day

(2) A wave of subway ads were launched during the event

(3) The content of subway advertising is "poster materials based on the theme, plus marketing activities"

(4) In the early stage, some vertical marketing accounts were launched

(5) Weibo created a “topic collaboration”

(6) After the incident, a wave of promotional articles were released to set the tone, and the operation pushed coupons to new users on the site.

This first complete marketing campaign ended successfully with an exposure rate of tens of millions and a few million new users. At that time, our team just copied the strategies of our competitors.

You see, actually, a complete public relations event planning is not very complicated, and it cannot be completed by one person. It is the result of cooperation in multiple dimensions such as operations, marketing, growth, public relations, and creativity.

4. STEP 3: "PR activities, what are your activities?"

Zhiyuan has met many client marketing departments. Since they have never experienced major cases, when they start doing public relations, they begin to think about "creativity". In fact, this way of thinking is problematic.

Public relations event planning, as the name suggests, revolves around events. As a PR manager or marketing manager, the first thing you should think about is, "What is my event?" If you don’t even think through the event, all your public relations efforts will be in vain.

Many brands’ activities are centered around operations. Of course, operations are based on KPIs and marketing budgets.

Generally, brands will not carry out public relations activities in the early stages, but only promotional activities, because they have ROI and their own performance appraisals.

Theme of the activity:

The theme of the event is not something that PR can decide alone. You can consult with the leader of the marketing department and the leader of operations to set the theme based on the goals . The extended topics of the theme can be formulated by the public relations department.

For example:

It’s a single-brand promotion. The purpose of this promotion is: it happens to be the 3rd anniversary of the brand’s launch, and we intend to retain old users, expand the brand’s strength, and bring some growth.

In the early stage, operations and marketing will work together to formulate a theme: "Three years of companionship, dedicated to you", so you have a theme.

Once the theme is established, there will definitely be KPIs, and then the KPIs can be split up, for example, operations account for 80% and marketing accounts for 20%, so that the market can think of ways to promote and expose it.

Let’s take another example of a platform-based brand. Every platform should have experienced large-scale events such as Double 11, Double 12, and Singles’ Day.

These activities generally start with setting KPIs, then breaking down tasks, and finally deciding on themes, action maps, and UI design. The market does communications and channel promotion based on the market budget . Of course, the marketing promotion rhythm should also have its own "battle map."

Set activity goals:

The goal of this activity is different from the operation goal in that it is "a part separated from the overall goal."

For example, a platform has set a target of 300,000 overall growth, of which 200,000 is the target for old and new members to come from the site operations department, and 100,000 is the target for the marketing department.

Then this 100,000 increase is the core KPI of the market brand. If we look at it in more detail, for example, the total budget for this activity of the marketing department is 500,000, then the 500,000 must be split flexibly.

For example, 300,000 yuan is used for information flow, and 200,000 yuan is used for public relations and communication to assist exposure.

Of course, Zhiyuan is just making a hypothetical amount. If you really have a configuration of 200,000, then you can think about shooting a TVC, putting some ads on big accounts, and creating a topic on Weibo, but funds are indeed tight.

Step 4: “Now is the time to think of something creative”

Once you have the goal, time, budget and KPI of the event, you can then imagine creativity. Creativity is the core of the core and the lifeblood of communication.

Just like the Lao Xiang Chicken that dominated the screen during the Chinese New Year in 2020, a creative idea worth tens of thousands of dollars produced "tens of millions of exposure effects."

If it is growing with marketing, do you think the number of registrations will be low? Of course, their KPI dimension may be based on "brand exposure".

If you ask Zhiyuan whether there is any good strategy for creativity, I can only give you some theoretical suggestions, because the position of creativity can be described in one word: "crucial".

Combined with the current market trends, excellent creativity basically has the following characteristics, for reference only:

1. Differentiation

To put it simply, it means "we are different". For example, during the Spring Festival one year, JD.com extended its IP with "JD.com Dog JOY, fishing, sending blessings".

In 2020, Tmall released an MV produced with the "Sweet Honey" tone through its short video platform, which was also forwarded by many users.

For example, Tmall Youpin used the rhythm of "I never expected that" and Wang Dachui's dubbing to make a Chinese New Year blind date MV a few days ago. These have significant differences.

Therefore, when expressing creativity, we can avoid making homogeneous things. Incorporating some unique innovations can bring a lot of freshness to users . Secondly, cleverly using IP can narrow the distance between us and users.

However, from an overall perspective, it is necessary to be consistent with the brand aesthetic and theme, and not blindly pursue novelty and uniqueness and lose the brand's pattern and height.

2. Start with the content

Based on the budget, we decide whether to make TVC, H5 dynamics, short videos, or one-image streams. These are called content carriers and ways of online communication and presentation.

The so-called content refers to the external form, content, specific links, etc. expressed in the activity, including picture UI style, text, audio, video, etc. These are the most important means to create atmosphere and artistic conception.

Rich content that is integrated with the brand style and presented in a sequential manner can stimulate users from a sensory and spiritual level, motivating users to forward content and be willing to participate.

If combined with the final marketing activities, users can be more involved in it. In addition to visual recognition, it can also resonate with their inner emotions.

3. Catch the trend

Brands are willing to catch whatever is hot, such as the brainwash songs from a few years ago, Gangnam Style, and the recent hot short video platform hit, "I'm still the same boy, without changing at all", all of which can be used to make a fuss.

The public pays close attention to these hot topics and pays more attention to the entertainment and interactivity of the activities.

If the brand can use this aspect to be creative and add some topic elements that can be discussed interactively, then the exposure will be higher.

Of course, it should be noted that popular hot elements will soon fall into "homogeneity", so the use of popular elements must be appropriate and creative.

In fact, many brands’ public relations activities can become fashion or popular trends. Most of the time, they can use public opinion monitoring software to predict what will be the hottest thing at the next node, and then quickly follow suit.

4. Cross-class: Integration of multiple elements

The "national trend" that was popular last year is a typical example. Of course, Zhiyuan does not recommend trying these single brands, because they all require linkage and playing with other brands, and the effect will be relatively better.

Another way is that if you want to express your recognition of a brand or promote products through creativity, it is best to present conflicts or climaxes in the "content".

The posters, UI visuals, TVC style, various atmosphere details, etc. of online communication activities can all become highlights.

This can profoundly convey the theme of the event and the core of the brand, and also allow users to participate and leave deep memories, thus remembering the brand.

VI. STEP 5: “Presentation, materials, media, timeline”

Zhiyuan still said the same thing: the amount of money depends on the size of the task.

Being creative in public relations activities is an uncertain thing in itself. There is no good or bad, only the effect may be greater or smaller. If your boss cannot bear the risk of creativity, here are four words for him: "Don't do it."

Assuming we have completed the goal, theme, and creativity, now we can think about the form of presentation.

Zhiyuan probably mentioned the fifth part above. I have summarized the scenarios for creative implementation for your selection:

Online landing scene selection

Commonly used one-picture flow, creative posters, TVC.

Offline landing scene selection

You can do pop-up stores, subways, buses, press conferences, rock climbing walls, rainbow runs, back to school, escape rooms.

Historical re-enactment, Chinese-style themes, the eccentric themes that Mr. Jack Ma has worked on (LADY GAGA), space scenes, beach parties, and urban graffiti.

Grassland ethnic style, Creation Festival, cruise theme, airplane scene, cruise ship scene, bus scene, beer festival, Harry Potter.

Rock and jazz, beauty salon, Disney theme, farm experience, classic reproduction, disco, old photos of the youth of the previous generation, pirate scenes, red carpet walk, etc.

In addition, there are video creativity, outdoor creativity, VR creativity, etc. Compared with online experience, offline experience is relatively important, and of course it also has a great impact on users' sensory impact.

However , the online cost is small and the risk is lower . If you build a landing scene offline instantly and the final effect is not good, it will have a great impact on the brand, so choose carefully according to your budget.

Material preparation is divided into two aspects, online and offline:

Offline

If you must hold a theme event offline, or a press conference-type scenario, then the "performers", hosts, flow charts, guest invitations, layout, hotels, stage design, lighting, and large screens will all be quite complicated. Zhiyuan will only share a brief summary here.

Nowadays, there are more community advertising and subway, high-speed rail and airplane advertising.

For this type, there are usually car stickers, LOGOs, SLOGANs, marketing theme introductions, and sometimes even celebrity endorsement photos.

on-line

Posters of various sizes and scenes, creative copywriting, carousels, boot header images, H5 dynamic images, dynamic videos , etc.

Generally speaking, two sets of communication materials are produced: the main KV (mainly explaining the theme/slogan of the communication) and the series KV (product feature series, different copywriting series, etc.).

Choice of media channels

In fact, now is an era where everyone is their own media and everyone is a communicator. The most important thing is whether your creativity is attractive enough to users and arouse their participation and forwarding.

Of course, the first channel is generally the "official Weibo", "WeChat public account", and short video account to release it.

Then find some big Vs to forward it vertically, and generally leave it to the Party B's execution team to do.

It takes a lot of effort and is relatively expensive to search for information by yourself, but it is easy to hand it over to a third party and can guarantee a certain effect. It is also very important to quote some KOLs appropriately.

The top Internet review sites, such as Ebrun, 36Kr, Interface, The Paper, etc., can all engage in commercial cooperation. Others are official sites, such as Phoenix.com and Caijing.com.

The media’s channels are not only reflected in forwarding, but also in commenting, leading the trend, etc. Usually the rhythm of communication can be divided into: event brewing, event public opinion guidance, topic escalation, etc., while the content of the landing is public relations drafts of different dimensions.

It is mainly divided into "word-of-mouth", "exposure" and "closing" . Remember to choose different channels according to the communication budget.

Timeline creation

First make the overall framework, determine the major theme and direction, and then calculate the time for each detail. Zhiyuan gives a simple example:

For example, for the 7-day marketing communication activity from March 4th to March 10th, the first step is to get a product schedule from the operation department, which is the basic version of APP marketing.

Then, based on the established theme and the form of communication, I communicate with Party B about the production cycle and add the cycle to the timeline. I usually divide it into "front", "middle" and "back".

Timeline

(Source: Knowledge Planet "Nice to meet you")

The first part includes the production of TVC materials, communication with the other party, channel selection, operation docking, event planning, etc.

The mid-term is divided into two parts. The first part is the basic delivery time, event brewing execution, activity topic execution, etc.

The second part is the "guidance period", which is the exposure point . At this time, some press releases will be made and public opinion monitoring and background data will be monitored.

If it is not enough, add more distribution channels. If it is still okay, adjust the strategy based on operational conversion.

In the later stage, we will "close the cover" and do another dissemination , and package the TVC or case into a press release with sharp comments for reference by KOLs, media and other friends.

If the channel resources are OK, you can apply for TVC to the site library, new film studio, etc. as a case, and an annual selection is also a good choice.

Final summary

Planning a public relations event is not difficult. To put it simply, it is marketing activities + theme creativity + presentation form + public relations communication . Mastering this methodology will make it easy to carry out public relations activities.

In communication, every step is the most important. If there is only a marketing activity without the support of the creative part, it is essentially no different from publishing a press release.

If there is only public relations exposure but no marketing activities, then it is just building the brand's reputation.

Author: Wang Zhiyuan

Source: Wang Zhiyuan