So it seems that football didn’t come home for England in 2018, but that’s not to say that we didn’t experience the best England team for generations!
Harry Kane (the goodest of boys) captained a team that has produced exemplary team work and earned the respect of the nation. But business, like football, relies on excellent management, excellent communication and excellent teamwork. Football, therefore, provides the perfect analogy for implementing an integrated B2B PR campaign.
If you look at your business like a football team the major similarity lies in the unique roles that each member plays in order to achieve success. This is especially the case in the World Cup, where players from opposing teams Tottenham Hotspur, Liverpool FC, Manchester United and Leicester City join to compete as the national team in the World Cup.
There may always be that star player, a department that the team and the fans rely on to deliver results – but they simply can’t play the game by themselves. In both business and football it is crucial to utilise every asset to perform.
Imagine finance as the goalie with the legal department close by in defence. They can’t hope to win the game without the sales and logistics departments pushing for the attack and actually scoring some goals.
As a B2B PR agency we would love to pretend that PR can deliver everything a business could possibly want, but that’s not the case. In reality, marketers and PR teams wouldn’t be able to get the ball out of the proverbial midfield without a little help from the rest of the team, but we bridge the gap, feeding gameplay to those targeted players.
This is exactly why an integrated PR campaign absolutely requires communication, collaboration and seamless integration with a well-constructed marketing plan. Our roles are similar, and we share an end goal, but one cannot expect to perform to the best advantage without the other.
If premier league football clubs pay millions for one player’s tackling technique, and an extra ten million for another player’s famed long kicks, then surely it goes without saying that each skill that brings a PR plan together must be different and complimentary also. Sector research, writing, pitching and planning requires team work both within and between departments.
Furthermore, having team players throughout an organisation infinitely helps in representing a brand accurately to garner the best results – for the sake of this analogy, sending the ball in the right direction. You can imagine the shambles if right midfield and the centre forwards only wanted to pass straight to attack…
So for your next integrated B2B PR campaign, bear in mind England’s 2018 squad to ensure alliance between PR and marketing players, working together in the wider (business) team to protect finance and legal from danger and enable sales and logistics to achieve (company) goals.
