PR has transitioned to a more strategic role as an enabler for us and gives us credibility to all our work..

The role of PR has become very vital for every other category and is seen as an important marketing tool to build credibility. While there is very few big market research companies in India but today these companies are also smartly leveraging the power of PR to stay top of mind with their current and potential customers. The primary task of PR for research companies who are primarily in the B2B business is to reinforce their image with their key stakeholders with some interesting white papers and thought leadership views. It also helps them in building their visibility and talk about their key capabilities and providing insights around people behaviour, culture and some future outlook and trends of the various industries.

To understand ?how PR is helping research companies and how they leverage it, I spoke to Madhurima Bhatia, Media Engagement & Partnerships, Ipsos India & APEC (Asia Pacific Excluding China). In a freewheeling chat she spoke in depth as to how their company is managing and leveraging PR to build their image and credibility. From an earlier perception of cost to company, PR has now transitioned to a more strategic role as an enabler according to Bhatia.

1.Ipsos is a multinational research company with a large network. Tell me what is the role of PR for your company and how do you leverage it?

Ipsos is a global company with offices in 90 markets across the world. We have a global footprint and employ around 19,000 people around the world. Ipsos is a French MNC and we are registered on the Paris stock exchange. In India we are a full-service market research company and among the top 3 players by revenues. We are a custom market research agency, which truly means all our work is customized to the needs of the clients, mostly in the consumer-packaged goods (CPG) sector, though we are also a significant player in the social sector and do a lot of work with the govt in evaluation of the implementation of government programs. We are B2B player, so the task of PR is quite similar to how we would do for any sector. To inform, build visibility for our key capabilities, provide insights around people, markets and sectors and reinforce our image among key stakeholders via compelling thought leadership. PR gives credibility to all our work and we take it very seriously.

2.?What kind of expectations you have from PR when you define your objectives and what is the core message that you want to be delivered for Ipsos as a brand?

Public Relations gives credibility to all our work and for a global company of our stature we have a definitive PR Strategy. Our call to action is to amplify our content for our different verticals which we call service lines – like brand health tracking (BHT), market strategy and understanding (MSU), public affairs (PBA), innovation, Ipsos UU (qualitative research), Channel Performance (CHP), Mobility and Clinics, Healthcare etc – and to build saliency for our leaders who lead these verticals; to provide the most compelling global content around our multi country studies where India is a constant and to provide highly engaging thought leadership by our leaders. And PR is our most essential and effective vehicle for disseminating our news and content. We expect mainline media to be more receptive to our high quality, insightful global studies which provide interesting trends on India, but they do not get enough traction. Our content if you see is limited to mostly industry and business media, but the topics are more interesting for the common man. We want news agencies to not just focus on breaking news but also the content with rigor and insights.

3. When you create a PR campaign, who do you keep in mind as your TG? What kind of framework you follow to deliver your message to your TG?

Being a B2B brand, our core TG remains our clients; and then media, our employees, vendors and even the common man. Because to clients it matters most to read about our new thinking, launch of cutting-edge tools and consumer studies on diverse topics. And for the rest it is about establishing credibility. When our field staff goes for interviewing the common man, then mentioning Ipsos gives them a more receptive response from the respondents. Our modus operandi for reaching our TG is to provide consistent information across touch points. We leverage earned media (TV, print, digital) and owned media (SM platforms like LinkedIn, Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, and YouTube) for amplifying our content and increasing our Share of Voice (SoV). PR also works as a good pull strategy for generating interest and queries from clients for our capabilities and work.?And of course we generate a lot of thought leadership pieces around engaging topics which our clients enjoy reading. PR is our first window to the world on everything new and current and then it goes on our website. We also measure the effectiveness of our PR on a monthly basis especially through the number of media mentions generated. Of course, another way would be to measure it via ad rates and column cms. But for us these days we also do not focus on the quantum of media mentions but more on quality and effectiveness in engagement with our key stakeholder of clients.?

4.How is PR managed for Ipsos in other countries? Do you exchange your thoughts with your overseas partners and apply some of the learnings in India?

Across our 90 markets, we have dedicated resources for marketing and communications. Our PR Campaigns run at the local level, regional (Asia Pacific) and global level. We launch everything across all our markets simultaneously. Whether it is a new product launch, a new global hiring, global multi country studies, marketing campaigns. And we have a regular monthly Teams meeting of communications experts at the global level, regional level and also with the CEO at the local level. There is sharing and stealing with pride among all our peers. That is the advantage of working with a global brand. There are templates. While there is a lot of local customization that PR must do, but the templates and global assets ease the work for us, and we work as One Ipsos. Interestingly, even our global CEO Ben Page guides us regularly in building the big picture and our regional CEO Hamish Munro in setting the tone on priorities. In India, every PR message and communication that goes out is vetted by our CEO, Amit Adarkar.

So, we have our Teams Groups by APAC and Global. Everything new is shared here for amplification by markets.?

5.How much of digital you leverage in your PR activity? And what kind of role digital plays for all your PR campaigns?

Digital is an intrinsic part of our PR Strategy. While Earned Media is our primary vehicle of news dissemination, Owned Media is for amplifying our share of voice and both work in tandem. Then of course we also keep our website updated to provide the most compelling and engaging content. We curate content for digital media, SM using different formats. And we have a campaign calendar that we run across all our markets simultaneously to maximize impact. So, campaigns run at the local level, at the APAC level and at the global level depending on whether the launch is local, regional, or global. And we are wired to work that way and of course we also measure the effectiveness of our PR campaigns in terms of ROI.

From an earlier perception of cost to company, PR has transitioned to a more strategic role as an enabler for us.

?

?