Whitepaper
Choosing the right PR agency can be a deciding factor in a company's success. But how do you know when you can sign on the dotted line with confidence? We’re sharing 5 questions you should ask every PR agency before you sign.
Let’s be honest: it would be great if you could plan PR results at the start of the quarter and reliably hit them by the end. It would be ideal to have a long-term, strategic partner rather than just an execution-only agency—someone who provides regular input and strategic advice to help you reach your goals.
Essentially, an outsourced press department. But how can you figure out during the sales process how much substance lies behind the flashy packaging?
From our own experience, we know there are a few critical questions you should ask every agency—but that we rarely get asked ourselves.
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Choosing the right PR agency can be a deciding factor in your company's success. But how do you know when you can sign on the dotted line with confidence? We’re sharing 5 questions you should ask every PR agency before you sign.
Let’s be honest, it would be great if you could plan PR results at the start of the quarter and reliably hit them by the end.
It would be ideal to have a long-term, strategic partner rather than just an execution-only agency—someone who provides regular input and strategic advice to help you reach your goals.
Essentially, an outsourced press department. But how can you figure out during the sales process how much substance lies behind the flashy packaging? From our own experience, we know there are a few critical questions you should ask every agency—but that we rarely get asked ourselves.
01.
Ideally, you should meet your future point of contact during the second meeting with the agency. Like any other service, PR lives and dies by the people executing it. Use the second call to engage in some strategic sparring with your future consultant.
As a rule, PR agencies will present initial plans and ideas. Ask critical questions and compare the approaches of different agencies. Which one best understood your product and your objectives? And be honest with yourself: what does your gut tell you? A little chemistry never hurts. ;)
TIP
Many companies prioritize having the most senior consultants working for them, which often comes with higher costs.
For strategic consulting, you should rely on the experience of senior consultants. If your goal is broader outreach, junior consultants are a great choice, as seniors often prefer not to get their hands dirty with pitching. Ideally, you have a mix of both.
02.
No agency can cover every industry. Ideally, the agency has a track record with companies in your sector. Experience in your field allows them to get up to speed faster, and in the best-case scenario, there are synergy effects with other clients. However, if a PR agency doesn't have much experience in your industry yet, it doesn't automatically mean they aren't a good fit. They might impress you with their strategy during the sales call and go on to exceed all expectations.
"No agency can cover every industry."
The likelihood of an agency specializing in lifestyle PR placing an e-mobility startup in business media is simply not that high.
Do they work with companies in your industry? Ask for names and examples of articles the agency has secured for them.
If you want to play it safe, ask for references and speak with other clients of the agency. If they are evasive or hesitant, stay away.
03.
Ultimately, freedom of the press applies, and unless we are talking about advertorials (paid content), journalists still decide whether articles get published. We have spent years optimizing our PR process and know our conversion rate quite well. In simple terms: how many media outlets do I need to pitch to get one clipping*?
Providing the greatest possible value for clients sometimes means investing significantly more time to hit our targets. In the worst-case scenario, this can be a loss-making endeavor. However, the client should never notice this.
In 2017, getpress was one of the first PR agencies to bill based on value rather than hourly rates.
Many still work on an hourly basis today, but more and more agencies are switching to outcome-based models. The two most common outcome promises are based on reach and clippings.
*In industry jargon, clippings refer to PR content such as press articles, television segments, podcast appearances, radio spots, etc.
Imagine an agency guarantees you 80 million in reach per quarter. Sounds great at first, but what exactly does reach mean? Unique users? And where do they get their data from?
We know from our own experience that it is nearly impossible to determine the actual reach of articles, let alone predict it, as no media house makes this data accessible.
The only metric that every major media outlet shares publicly is the number of unique users. For Handelsblatt, for example, this was 7.36 million in March 2023.
TIP
At getpress, we use this formula to approximate actual reach:
[Unique users per month] × 0.15 × [click-through probability]
The 0.15 is based on an SEO analysis in which we compared the daily user numbers of various online media outlets with their monthly figures.
Whether a user actually clicks on your article depends primarily on its position on the website. If your article is featured in the hero section, the probability is highest. Nevertheless, we take a conservative approach and apply a value between 0 and 0.2.
Depending on your company's PR goals, it can certainly make sense to look at reach. However, you should always follow up on
a) how the reach value was calculated and
b) which media outlets the reach refers to.
There are many online media outlets that demonstrably have high reach but also thousands of pages. Consequently, not every article gets the 7.36 million unique visits of Handelsblatt .
It gets even more specific with clipping goals. Here, too, you should ensure that articles don't just appear randomly in all sorts of media, but rather in the media that are relevant to your objectives.
By the way, some agencies also sell their placements in self-published "magazines" as a clipping success – easy for them, but not effective for you.
This brings us to the next topic: When is a "result" truly a PR success?
04.
Let's assume you have proposals from two PR agencies. One offers 24 placements and the other 48 (projected over a year) – at the same price. This means either the second agency is simply incredibly efficient and can deliver double the value, or they have different definitions of the term 'clipping'.
Reality check: Clipping can mean anything.
From a company profile to a small mention in the margins of an article. Therefore, ask: What exactly does 'clipping' mean to you?
Because, clearly, 48 'clippings' are easily reached if it's just about small mentions.
But even 48 articles that focus solely on you won't achieve much in the end if the media outlets don't contribute to your PR goals. That is why a good PR agency should create a target media list with you during onboarding. Articles that do not appear in relevant or related media should not be counted as clippings.
05.
A good agency doesn't just execute tasks; it proactively offers ideas and strategies that support your goals. This means taking a holistic approach to PR, identifying opportunities, and engaging in a collaborative exchange with you.
Ask for concrete examples of this. Good strategic consulting also means knowing when to provide context for a client's ideas or even advising against certain measures.
In the summer of 2023, the political debate centered on the reliance on China for solar energy.
It would have been pointless to jump on that bandwagon to position our client, Enpal.
The solution: Creating a new perspective.
Knowing that Robert Habeck was traveling to India that summer and that a member of the Enpal team would be part of the delegation, we developed a pitch focused on India's role and offered our client as an interview partner.
The result: Articles in Welt, Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, Süddeutsche Zeitung, Focus, Stern, Stuttgarter Zeitung and ntv.
Asking the right questions before signing with an agency is the key to a successful partnership. By ensuring your potential public relations agency understands your needs and provides the right answers, you lay the foundation for an effective and long-term collaboration.
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