Time to launch your PR campaign? Make sure you’ve asked yourself the right questions to prepare yourself for success. Create a media relations checklist. Better yet, read this article and review the 15 most important public relations questions you can ask. Each business is different, so you need to supply your own answers, but the following questions offer you a framework around which you can build your campaign.

Before starting this process the first question you need to answer is: what is your primary reason for launching your PR campaign? You don’t want to take step one until you’ve carefully answered that one. Once you’re ready, answer each of these questions with thought, care and honesty. The journey starts below:

1) What are your main stories and pitches?
2) What are your primary target markets?
3) What is your secondary target market?
4) What media outlets reach those markets?
5) How can your stories and pitches be modified to meet the needs of various media outlets?
6) What are your primary anecdotal stories that can be used as pitches?
7) How can your personal story be used as a media pitch?
8) What are the business or entrepreneurial stories that can be pitched?
9) What are some quick phone pitches that you can make?
10) Are there events or anything you can stage that will interest the media in covering your story?
11) What are some strong visual stories you can pitch for TV segments?
12) Does your pitch have a hook?
13) Is there a media call to action?
14) Is there a consumer angle? For example, is your product safer, time-saving, less expensive, more convenient, better quality, etc.?
15) Is there a different, unusual or one-of-a-kind angle?

Approach these questions from your perspective first. Then review them again from a journalist’s perspective. This is a great exercise; as you review them with your journalist’s hat on, keep asking yourself why you’d want to cover this story. What would interest your viewers or readers? Keep reviewing your questions and refining your answers. Once you’ve written out your responses, you’re set to launch; use this as your roadmap.

Copyright © Anthony Mora 2011

Author's Bio: 

Anthony Mora Communications, Inc. is a Los Angeles-based public relations company that has placed clients in: Time, Newsweek, 60 Minutes, CNN, USA Today, Oprah,The New York Times, Vogue, and other media. Anthony has been featured in: USA Today, Newsweek, The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, The BBC, CNN, Fox News, and other media outlets. For more informative articles on PR how-to, like us on Facebook @ Los Angeles PR Firm AMC, Inc.