The Media and Public Relations Plan - Essay Example

STOP 4 – Public Relations Plan Introduction Stop 4 is a franchise that will allow its franchisees the opportunity to sell snacks and other goods in asmall developed area at the British Rail stations. These stations currently provide no such service. Therefore, Stop 4 will be one of a kind to provide such goods to people within the stations. This paper will present the media and public relations plan that Stop 4 should follow in order to meet its marketing goals and objectives, from the launch. Before the plan is delivered, the goals and objectives, and the target audience are highlighted for better evaluation of the programme. Goals and Objectives The public relations plan will be designed to meet long-term marketing goals. These including attracting as many as 300 potential investors and franchisees in the first 2 years, having sales of approximately $5000- $6000 per week per franchise, drawing as many as a 100 more train stations in the next two years, having a market share of more than 50 percent for the first five years. For the marketing department, establishing a positive and a strong image of Stop 4 in the minds of its investors and customers is a major goal that would lead to meeting all other goals such as high sales or a wide customer base. Therefore, objectives of the public relations plan would be to first of all help with launching this service in the market, building goodwill with potential investors, franchisees and the customers by offering them good service, generating a wide customer base, creating a good brand image and recall in the minds of investors and customers, establishing Stop 4’s leadership, innovativeness and expertise amongst potential competition, investors and customers, and informing people about the company and its values. Target Audience The target audience for Stop 4 is all the commuters that use the trains to come and go. These include a big chunk of the population from the middle income group. Moreover, the locals – people who live around these stations – would also be a target market for Stop 4 franchises. Plan of Attack In order to lure potential investors and ultimately customers, a strong media plan would be critical for creating a strong brand image. The first thing to do would be to give a press release in the newspaper about its launch to get coverage in local event calendars. This will include the location, hours and opening details. This launch will have to be on the 4th day of a month, perhaps June, so that it coincides with the name. This would inform its publics about the introduction of a new service. This would go on for three weeks. If budget allows, a release in a business magazine about the launch would also be placed. Moreover, advertisements about its launch will also be placed on two major social networking sites; Facebook and LinkedIn. When its relevant public is possibly well aware of the launch, it will arrive at it at the scheduled date. The second thing to do would be to reach out to a business magazine to feature a story about the kind of service Stop 4 is providing. This article would emphasize on its expertise and innovativeness. To make this happen, letters to different editors would have to be sent so that at least one of them features Stop 4 in the latest issue with the Dormans prototype as a highlight. These would have to be detailed and would focus on the good and new things Stop 4 has to offer. Any potential investors and franchisees are most likely to read such articles. It is also important to gather a sufficient number of end customers at the launch so that investors can see for themselves the market response for Stop 4. In order to make customers aware, Stop 4 will have to be advertised in a spot they would all notice. The perfect spot then is the train itself. The train operating companies would be contacted for this and would be paid accordingly for allowing Stop 4 to advertise. This would also play a big role in creating a strong brand image of Stop 4 in the minds of customers. Also, as a teaser, direction stickers labeled ‘Stop 4’ at the stations will be pasted to the floor in bright colors. This would lead people to a wall that would be graffiti-ed with the launch date for Stop 4’s launch with a line such as ‘Come Snack with 4 on the 4th”. It will also give other opening details and location. This would instate a sense of curiosity in the people and get them to attend the launch. Finally, on the launch day an activation program that would give out free snacks would be carried out. It would give out four free snacks to each customer. They would be allowed to choose four snacks of their choice from a set of trays. After they have taken out four into a box, they would be given a flag that says ‘Stop 4’ along with a free coffee mug branded with Stop 4. Many of these activities are likely to attract customers. It is this customer response that would then ultimately attract the investors and franchises and allow the Rail Network to see the need for such a service at the stations. This will eventually get Stop 4 a bigger contract and more franchisees, if all goes well before the launch and on the launch itself. The schedule of events is presented below. Schedule May, Week 2 – Press Release in newspaper announcing the date and location May, Week 3 – Press Release in newspaper and magazine announcing launch – Advertisement on and in the trains May, Week 4 – Featured article in a business magazine Directional Stickers June, Week 1 – Directional Stickers – Lanuch Measures In order to see the results of the campaign, measures would have to be put into place to evaluate the success of the programme. First ensure to gauge performance would be the number of people who showed up. This would be measured by the number of itmes sold out, divided by 4. Second measure to assess performance would be the number of investor phone calls/emails received in the following four months. References Lake, L. (2010). “Six Steps to Developing Your Public Relations and Media Plan” About [Internet]. Available from: http://marketing.about.com/cs/publicrelations/a/prplan6steps.htm [Accessed May 1, 2010]. Read More