So you’ve hired a communications firm to steward your stories and connect you to your audience. Now what? Just like any relationship, the working relationship between you (the client) and your agency requires intentionality and maintenance to flourish.
Built on trust and transparency, a fruitful partnership boasts:
- Shared Vision
The client/agency team must share a roadmap. The agency team should develop a plan following discussions about your organization’s big picture vision. At the outset, roles and responsibilities should be outlined and agreed upon, and the client/agency team should establish clear metrics for success. Questions like, “how do you expect communications to move the needle toward these goals?” and “what does success look like?” will guide strategy development and keep both parties aligned.
- Open Communication
To act as an effective extension of your team, your communications firm must be brought into the fold. At Elmore, we ask clients to educate us on their organization’s successes and challenges. Clients are expected to share influential factors which may affect communications strategies and outcomes or the organization at large. Influential factors may include potential internal or external roadblocks, budget parameters, adversarial groups, and historical or relational contexts. During times of organizational change, clients should include the agency as early and often as possible to leverage its expertise and advice.
Both ways, dialogue should be kept open and honest. With feedback, strategies can be refined and tactics adjusted to accelerate impact.
- Practical Accessibility
At the beginning of the partnership, a clear internal decision-making process and hierarchy should be established. Identifying the go-to client contact for approvals will expedite response times for urgent interview requests and time-sensitive materials. Providing timely access to relevant information and resources equips the agency team to communicate with context and on deadline. Dedicating time to connect on a regular basis via recurring meetings ensures both parties remain on track toward the shared vision.
For more than 30 years, these standards have guided Elmore’s practice to earn meaningful results for our clients. We hope to do the same for you! Reach out if you are ready to expand your communication team with an outside agency’s expertise.
