Instead, it requires niching down to each media gatekeeper — a massive challenge when there are a half-dozen ways to reach someone, and journalists are moving at the speed of 24/7 news. 

That was the common thread running through two recent episodes of Cracking the Comms Code.

The first brought together three senior communications professionals to discuss strategies to reach diverse audiences instead of sticking to one broad (but inefficient and ineffective) cohort: 

•   Robert Kuykendall, Director of Accounts at Proven Media Solutions;
•   Ryan Cohn, Chief Strategy Officer & Partner at Sachs Media; and
•   KayAnn P. Schoeneman, President & Co-Owner of Curley Company.

The second flipped the perspective, bringing in three reporters to shed light on how communicators can get reporters to care about your pitch in the first place:

•   Anastassia Gliadkovskaya, Senior Reporter at Fierce Healthcare;
•   Jeremy Lott, Reporter at The Epoch Times; and
•   Scott Carlson, Reporter at The Chronicle of Higher Education.

The comms pros and the reporters came from opposite ends of the process to (more or less) agree: Good communication is about making what you say matter to the person hearing it.

Name the Audience

Ask your client or your boss, “Who’s your audience?” If he answers “Everybody!,” run for cover. 

One of the biggest mistakes executives can make is to treat an audience like a giant bucket. But a modest budget spread across five audiences — even if they’re all considered one bucket — will likely just get you five mediocre campaigns. Target your audiences carefully, and your resources will go farther.

Whole Foods doesn’t go after most buyers; the new product needs only 5,000 buyers in a country of 340 million people. Political candidates want only 50.5% of voters, and voters make up only a fraction of the constituency. 

Whatever the desired transaction, identify the audience with the clearest path to the desired outcome, and then work on hitting only that audience. 

“Media” Is Lame. “Journalist” Is Great.

Most pitches fail because they are too general. This means more than just avoiding email blasts. Get more specific about your recipient — down to the particular paper, or better yet, to the particular reporter.

Consider these four easy steps for research and targeting:

1. Figure out which outlets reach the target audience.
2. Zero in on the guy or girl at those outlets who reach the audience.
3. Background-check that journalist. What’s his beat, his niche? What’s he covered lately?
4. Identify the reporter’s style. How does she operate? Live interviews? Breaking news? Evergreen stories? What formats do her last five, ten, fifteen most recent articles take?

You don’t want to be like the uncle who asks his nephew, “How’s school going?” every time he sees him. Yes, fine, the kid is in school, but there’s more to him than that.

Journalists are the same. Before sending a pitch, look for patterns. Understand the questions he’s asking and the stories his publication considers important. Then ask whether your idea will find purchase in his head, and thus on his outlet’s pages. That’s how your pitch email gets a click and a read.

Zoom In, Zoom Out

Oftentimes a pitch email gets clicked because of an unconventional, niche subject. However, the pitch itself will work only if the niche that got the click is connected to a wider issue that person is covering.

Maybe you’re pitching a trade publication with a narrow focus, but the journalist is planning a wider-scale project down the line. Some beat and prior coverage research can reveal that, and you can tailor your pitch accordingly. Or your target outlet might have several different media, like print and podcasts, and your pitch fits only so-so into one but really well into another. 

Deftly laying out the broader context will help your target journalist map out the best use of your content for her outlet. Zeroing in on the hook or the unconventional angle or the exclusive information establishes that you have something to say.

Find the Eager Recruits

Another flaw with the “broadcasting” mindset is the rigid assumption that communication has to come directly from the organization. But why?

What if you can get people who aren’t officially part of the communications department to do some of the message distribution work? How about employees, partners, customers, franchisees? Industry experts? Other advocates? The world is our oyster!

Think about this from the reporter’s perspective. She doesn’t want a canned statement from the CEO. Give her a dozen testimonials from consumers whose lives were changed by the product, or an outside expert with a report that verifies your narrative, or a low-level employee who found his spouse at work. That’s fodder for a story – just ask the surrogates for presidential candidates.

The stories we’ve gotten into major media like Fox News Digital, USA TODAY, and The Hill are not from the $1,600 suits in the 32nd-floor boardroom. They’re people with personal takes with which audiences can connect.

In short, you don’t necessarily need to reach everyone directly if the people who command attention and respect are willing to carry the message for you. There are a lot of credible voices and trusted networks under the company’s top floor, and even outside the four walls. Use them! 

Bye-Bye to Spray-And-Pray

The journalist doesn’t care about making your client look good. He’s cashing a paycheck on his ability to tell a story his employer’s audience cares about.

Those who rely on spray-and-pray blast a message out indiscriminately, hoping someone will pick it up just by virtue of having heard it. Reporters delete that email. Communicators, on the other hand, go to ground. They pick out with precision exactly the kind of journalist — and then the actual, literal, flesh-and-blood journalist — who will make a good partner. Client benefits, outlet benefits, everyone wins.

Watch the most recent episodes of Cracking the Comms Code below:

“We’ve known Susan for over a year, and we’re excited to have her on the team,” said Dustin Siggins, founder of Proven Media Solutions. “She will play a key role as we expand further into serving the B2B space, especially in complex industries like healthcare and tech.”

Powell began her career as a teacher before serving multiple CEOs as an executive assistant. She moved into corporate marketing with two government contractor firms and a global transportation and logistics company, developing innovative strategies and processes each step along the way. 

“I’ve been an in-house leader for years, working with agencies – and now I’ll get to do it from the other side of the table,” said Powell. “After so long on the marketing side, I’m eager to see what I can bring to PR.”

Powell is Proven Media Solutions’ third client manager hire in the last 13 months as the company continues to scale its operations and service clients ranging from healthcare and insurance to public affairs and transportation.

Proven Media Solutions is a public relations and public affairs firm that specializes in putting people in the press.

The organizations that handle crises best have already done the work. They’ve built relationships across departments, empowered employees to communicate confidently, developed trust with stakeholders, and created processes that help people execute under pressure.

And best of all, they’ve trusted their communications team to play a key strategic role in all of it.

That’s the central lesson from a recent episode of Cracking the Comms Code, featuring members of one of America’s leading crisis communications programs in the country.

• Dr. Yan Jin, Professor of Public Relations at the University of Georgia’s Grady College of Journalism and Mass Communication;
• Jason Anthoine, Senior Vice President and Managing Director at Arketi Inside;
• Jennifer Bowcock, Senior Vice President of Communications & Creative at RealPage, Inc.; and
• Chloe Clavert Hicks, Senior Social Media Content Strategist and graduate student at the University of Georgia.

The discussion centered on UGA’s Crisis Communications Think Tank, where students, professors, and corporate leaders solve real-world communications challenges. What emerged was the blueprint for an organization built to beat a crisis before it starts.

Not Every Fire Requires the Fire Department

One of the first lessons discussed was what should become standard practice in every communications department: define the term crisis before you think about particular crises.

A flood of angry comments on social media may feel overwhelming, but if the organization continues operating normally, serves its customers, and maintains stakeholder confidence, it may simply be having a bad day. A true crisis is more than the spasms of the social media outrage cycle.

Organizations can focus on only so much, and true crises deserve the lion’s share of their attention. Leaders who mobilize crisis teams every time criticism appears eventually train employees to overreact, exhaust resources, and lose perspective when genuine emergencies arise.

Panelists argued for a “continuous readiness” mindset. Crisis management isn’t an emergency procedure tucked away in a binder until disaster strikes. It requires communications, legal, finance, operations, and executive leadership to continually identify risks, challenge assumptions, and prepare for situations before they become headlines.

The Team Hears the News First

When it comes to warding off a crisis, organizations are too ready to overlook their most important audience: their own employees.

Workers answer questions from customers. Friends ask them what happened. Family members send them news articles. Even if they never speak to the media, employees become unofficial spokespersons the moment uncertainty begins.

That’s why internal communications can’t be treated as an afterthought. A polished press release accomplishes little if employees receive conflicting information—or worse, learn about company news from social media before hearing it from leadership.

To cut the wire on a company-collapsing game of “whisper down the lane,” leadership should bring multiple perspectives into the room early in the war-gaming process. Communications professionals, lawyers, finance leaders, product teams, and social media managers all view the same situation differently. Those differences in perspective safeguard against blind spots.

One such overlooked perspective brings in social media teams. These guys and gals aren’t simply publishing content; they’re gathering real-time intelligence. Every comment, direct message, and customer complaint offers valuable information about how audiences understand — or misunderstand — an organization’s response.

Companies that treat social media teams as strategic advisers instead of content distributors gain an enormous advantage during fast-moving situations.

Trust Isn’t Built During a Crisis

Long before the crisis hits, every company has an account with the “trust bank.” Every honest conversation with employees, every transparent customer interaction, every fulfilled promise, and every thoughtful decision becomes another deposit in the trust bank. When the time comes to make a withdrawal — and it will — leadership should make sure the account is well padded.

Executives often feel compelled to respond immediately when disaster hits. But sometimes strategic silence is the better choice. Rushing incomplete or inaccurate information can inflict more damage than taking time to understand the situation.

That’s not an excuse to cower under the mahogany desk. On the contrary, knowing when not to speak requires preparation every bit as much as knowing what to say.

The same principle applies to artificial intelligence. AI can quickly summarize thousands of comments, identify emerging trends, and help communications teams work faster. But today’s tools still struggle to interpret sarcasm, humor, and emotional nuance. Leadership absolutely must keep a “human in the loop,” because AI can’t handle the job on its own. Instead, combine AI’s speed with human judgment.

None of these systems can fix a disaster at the moment it’s unfolding. Every one of them needs to be in place, earning credibility for the company, well ahead of time.

The Best Crisis Plan Starts Long Before the Headlines

Crises are part of running an organization. The CEO may not show up at a Coldplay concert, but it’s up to you as the comms person to make sure you’re ready when the plague of locusts shows up out of nowhere. If it’s not one thing, it’s another, so companies need to make preparation and flexibility a part of their daily routine.

This means fostering a broader culture of readiness. It starts with acknowledging the trust bank’s existence and taking deep breaths to distinguish between a true five-alarm fire and a flash mob of loudmouths on X. From there, the rough-and-ready company makes regular trust deposits with customers, stakeholders, and employees; keeps everyone on payroll up to date; and consolidates the whole team, human and robot, into an elite crisis-crushing unit.

The strongest crisis response isn’t a perfectly crafted press statement written two minutes to midnight. It’s an organization that spent years preparing so that, when the pressure sets in, everyone already knows what to do.

That theme surfaced repeatedly across two recent episodes of Cracking the Comms Code. Communications leaders from healthcare, technology, agencies, internal communications, and media relations  —  including Jasper Hamill, Lindsay Lapchuk, Alan Shoebridge, Keith Berman, Jennifer George, and Meredith Klein  —  explored what AI is really doing to comms, not what everyone fears it’s going to do.

Put simply, AI is dividing the people who create content from the people who create business value. The winners will be the communicators who do both — but are known primarily for the second.

Content vs. Counsel

The first panel focused on the content side of the AI era. Shoebridge argued that there’s now a strong inverse relationship between content (abundant) and strategic counsel (scarce). The “A” in “AI” doesn’t stand for “adviser” – the robot won’t tell you (or at least won’t do a good job telling you) what should be communicated, when, to whom, and why it matters to the business.

That’s where Shoebridge said the best communicators will stand out. They’ll move beyond trying to outrace AI systems and move to where humans do their best work – talking to other humans, understanding problems, and creating solutions.

Part of counsel is knowing the content strategy, including what narratives hit home the best. It’s easy to use AI tools for content creation, so the next frontier is learning (quickly) to use them well.

Hamill argued that the premium now sits on exceptional stories, memorable headlines, and interviews that uncover insights experts didn’t realize they had.

How do you get the AI to do all that? It starts with asking better questions.

Instead of broad prompts, experienced communicators ask for specific moments, decisions, or turning points. That gets them the gem in a piece of content to develop into a story that hits home.

And, finally, yes, you do have to know what AI search is up to. Lapchuk explained that customers, investors, job candidates, and journalists increasingly begin their research with AI tools. Every organization already has an AI reputation, whether it is managing one or not.

The strongest communications teams are working alongside SEO, sales, and product marketing to understand the questions buyers actually ask and to ensure AI systems have accurate information about their companies. Earned media, executive thought leadership, customer stories, and owned content all contribute to the information AI uses to generate answers.

Companies can’t control every AI response. They’ll have to work twice as hard, then, to influence the information that drives those responses – starting with counsel, then finding outstanding narratives, and then making sure those narratives spread properly. 

The Right Counsel Earns Trust – and Budget

The next panel barely mentioned AI, but elevated the “counsel” conversation to its highest strategic levels.

George urged communicators to tie their work to acquisitions, restructurings, market expansion, and other major business decisions instead of communications outputs. She said asking the finance squad for help did wonders for her business education and, later, her career as a comms executive. 

Klein encouraged professionals to think like business leaders who specialize in communications rather than communicators trying to learn business. That’s the only way to ensure that the C-Suite listens to you, on everything from forward-looking predictions to urging them to ditch the tie and go with an authentic approach to executive messaging. 

But trust doesn’t always come with all of the necessary tools. The Wall Street Journal article about CCOs storming the C-Suite had a number of shortcomings, including what George called an “unfunded mandate” where a single high-paid person is doing the work of five. Sure, the title and cash are nice…if you don’t burn out.

So start quantifying your work. Measure your workloads, calculate the cost of poor communication (you can be creative about this), and demonstrate how effective internal communications improve productivity and reduce risk. When you have data to leverage, you can act like the finance department and make a business case for your work, and the resources it deserves.

And, finally, Berman argued that if you want to be trustworthy, speak candidly. He’s been in external and internal comms, and since employees are a company’s most powerful asset, speaking candidly (and intelligently, armed with the data) is the only way to ensure that you are seen as equal to the longstanding members of the C-Suite. 

Enjoy each panel discussion in full below.

The real goal is becoming someone the C-suite instinctively calls before the biggest decisions are made. That happens only when communicators stop thinking like messaging specialists and start thinking like business leaders.

That was the recurring lesson across two recent episodes of Cracking the Comms Code. In one discussion, I was joined by

•       Ellen O’Brien, founder of Hudsons Media;
•       Conrad Bellehumeur, a veteran chief communications officer now working in fusion energy; and
•       Sarah Graham, cybersecurity lead at Kickstand.

In the other,

•       Lainie Keller, a longtime pharmaceutical communications executive;
•       Alex Dudley, VP of Communications at Cognizant; and
•       Erin Weinstein, Managing Director at SKDK,

explored what it takes to position executives for success.

Six accomplished communicators  —  in healthcare, cybersecurity, technology, government, public affairs, and energy  —  came to more or less the same conclusion: Speaking C-suite isn’t a “nice-to-have” anymore. It’s a core competency.

Build Trust Before It’s Needed

Every panelist, regardless of industry, kept returning to one idea: Trust comes before influence.

O’Brien noted that communicators are often brought in simply to execute instead of being given time to build relationships with leaders. But it’s those relationships — developed long before a crisis hits — that transform a communications professional into a trusted adviser.

Bellehumeur said the same pattern has followed him through government, transportation, defense, and energy. Trust under pressure might work in a pinch, but it’s not what you want fro leaders over your career long-term. Instead, you want the people who matter to remember that you’ve consistently helped them solve business problems before those problems bled over into messaging.

Weinstein offered the flip side from the agency perspective. Clients often hire outside advisers for one reason: to hear what nobody inside the organization is willing to say. Honest counsel, even where it goes against the company grain, is what builds executive confidence.

If executives hear from you only when they need a press release, you’re a vendor. If they call you before making a business decision, then you’re an adviser.

Trust is Built on Learning the Business

Expertise is a no-brainer in every career, including communications. That’s how you get in the door. But it’s not enough anymore to keep you in the room.

Bellehumeur shared his “five keys” for becoming an executive adviser:

•       understand strategy
•       know the operating environment
•       build relationships across departments
•       speak the language of numbers
•       volunteer beyond your communications responsibilities

Alex Dudley took that even further: Be a business person first who specializes in communications — not a communicator who happens to work for a business. Saying you’re “bad at math” is disqualifying. The best communicators read the 10-Ks and earnings releases, understand the balance sheet, and know where revenue comes from. 

Lainie Keller added that business fluency also helps communicators know when not to respond. Sometimes — maybe often! — acting gets attention, customers, and revenue. But the communicator elevates himself into an adviser when he also knows how and when to remain silent for the business’s long-term health.

Learning the business is how we helped a client develop quality KPIs. They first came to us with a lot of useless measures like pitch volume. By the end of the conversation, we turned it around to them to answer questions like:

•       Did the USA Today op-ed help the sales team?
•       Was the Financial Times interview repurposed by business development?
•       How much content time did earned media save because placements could be repurposed on the blog and in newsletters?

Questions Earn More Influence Than Answers

The best advisors usually arrive with questions. Call it “ask, don’t tell.”

Sarah Graham applies the same mindset in cybersecurity. As buyers shift from CISOs toward developers and CTOs — and increasingly use AI tools to research vendors — she constantly asks where audiences actually spend time and how communications should evolve. This is especially important when trying to help technically sound CEOs who are small today but want to scale, because it helps keep everyone focused on success. 

Dudley emphasized another question communicators often skip in a crisis: Who is actually affected? Before speaking, determine whether the primary audience is employees, customers, investors, or regulators. Maybe it’s someone else entirely.

Keller suggested organizing audiences into three buckets:

•       core stakeholders who must align
•       critical stakeholders who require active management
•       contextual audiences worth monitoring

You can’t be lazy about this. The right answer is going to be different in every situation.

Internal Communications Is Business Strategy

Another remarkable point of agreement across both panels was the importance of internal communications. Employees have become ambassadors, skeptics, influencers, and fact-checkers. That’s all wrapped up in the job now.

Keller argued that organizations should tell employees first whenever possible, while assuming that anything communicated internally could become public within minutes — in other words, as O’Brien observed, today’s internal conversation can quickly become tomorrow’s headline.

Dudley described employees as the organization’s authenticity test. They know whether leadership’s words match leadership’s actions.

Bellehumeur stressed that employees trust direct supervisors far more than CEOs several levels removed, making manager communication one of the most important tools in any communications strategy. We’re talking about a lot more than just keeping HR happy here.

C-Suite: Think, Speak, Lead

Across both conversations, the message was consistent: Communicators who earn lasting influence are doing more than simply writing better messages. The next level is that they understand the business. They ask smarter questions. They build trust before it’s needed. They connect communications to growth, risk, operations, finance, and strategy. And they’re willing to tell leaders difficult truths when everyone else is simply nodding along.

Speaking C-suite has to go beyond learning executive buzzwords or faking it ’til you make it. You have to do the work, which starts with learning to think like an executive before you ever speak like one. That will get you in the right headspace to understand that your goal is not to ask politely for a seat at the table. The people already sitting there will get up and come to you, because they can’t afford not to.

Watch each panel below.

That shift has led many clients to forego one of the oldest tools of PR – the op-ed. After all, why would you create content that someone else might change (without permission), fight to get space, and then possibly have to get through a paywall to make it matter?

This was the topic for a recent Cracking the Comms Code show. And what three op-ed editors said is that their audiences, from local to industry to nationally political, still see tremendous value from what many people mistakenly think of as a dinosaur tactics. 

Here’s what they said – as well as how editors evaluate submissions, what makes pitches succeed or fail, and the important role editorial judgment plays even in an age of unlimited self-publishing.

Third-Party Validation Matters – Especially to New Audiences

One of the clearest takeaways from the discussion was that publication in an established outlet still carries weight with readers in ways self-publishing often does not.

As David Mills, former deputy opinion editor at the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, explained, readers understand intuitively that an op-ed published by a newsroom has passed through an editorial process. Someone evaluated the argument, assessed the quality, and decided that the writer had something worthwhile to say.

Audiences today live in a world flooded with content. Anyone can post opinions online or launch a newsletter. The new addition to this landscape is AI generating endless commentary. But earned publication still signals credibility because it reflects outside judgment rather than self-selection.

For emerging executives, niche experts, or organizations trying to establish authority quickly, that editorial validation remains enormously valuable.

Washington Technology senior reporter Ross Wilkers also emphasized that self-published content often circulates only within existing networks. Op-eds, on the other hand, allow communicators to move beyond their core audiences and enter broader industry conversations.

There is a “quality” difference here (reach), and also a “quality” difference (legitimacy). A LinkedIn post may reinforce existing relationships — fine. But an op-ed in a respected publication can introduce an executive or organization to entirely new audiences.

That mirrors broader industry trends. Research from Cision found that storytelling and media relations remain among the most valuable PR skills despite the growth of AI and digital publishing channels.

Editors Want Useful Arguments, Not Corporate Messaging

The panelists repeatedly returned to one issue that frustrates editors across every vertical: advertisements disguised as a submission.

Communicators often have clients or bosses who approach op-eds with a marketing mindset. The people at the top want to announce a launch, highlight a product, elevate a spokesperson, or promote an initiative. Editors, however, are evaluating a different question: will readers care?

David explained that overtly promotional submissions are often rejected immediately because they prioritize a client’s goals over what the editor and his publication need to deliver to their audience. Readers will go to the grocery store circular if they want somebody to sell them something. 

Carl Cannon, White House Bureau Chief for Real Clear Politics, said the same thing happens in political opinion essays. Those who have an overtly partisan agenda are often saying the same old things, but dressing them up as something new. 

The editorial page is for something else entirely.

The strongest submissions frame organizational expertise around broader issues affecting readers. A technology company — or the agency representing it — should not write an op-ed saying its platform is innovative. Rather, it should explain a cybersecurity challenge reshaping the industry, describe implementation lessons learned, or explore emerging risks organizations are failing to address.

In other words, the best op-eds educate, and inspire interest, first. Then, if there’s time, space, and audience buy-in to promote, they promote.

Fairness and Intellectual Credibility Matter More Than Outrage

The editors also highlighted an issue increasingly relevant in the social media era: the difference between attention and persuasion.

Online platforms often reward emotional intensity, ideological certainty, and outrage-driven commentary. Editorial pages generally do not.

Carl argued that editors are drawn to writers who engage opposing viewpoints honestly rather than caricaturing them. One of his central standards is simple: an op-ed should treat the opposing argument with as much respect and rigor as if it were the writer’s own position.

From an audience perspective — and thus from the editor’s perspective, too — intellectual confidence beats exaggeration and personal attacks every time. The latter might be easier to dash onto a page and send out the door. But editors do not have time to salvage pieces that begin with ad hominem language and emotionally charged rhetoric. They’ll move on.

Ross noted that strong op-eds often resemble strategic briefing documents. They anticipate skepticism and respond to likely objections. Communications professionals can take note: thought leadership has to be more than simply asserting expertise. Showing that we did our homework is what makes an editor look twice.

The Best Pitches Begin With Understanding the Publication

Another recurring frustration among the editors involves poorly targeted outreach.

Carl noted that many pitches reveal immediately that the communicator does not actually understand the publication he’s contacting. Editors, overwhelmed with submissions especially in our age of mass-produced content, can’t spare time or energy for amateurish research.

Examples abound for communications professionals looking to start editor relationships on the right foot. Regional newspapers prioritize local relevance. Trade publications focus on helping professionals navigate operational challenges. Political outlets emphasize policy and public debate. A pitch that ignores those distinctions is unlikely to succeed, regardless of writing quality.

Finally, there is relationship management — going beyond good outlet research and good (human-centered) writing, and remembering that the editor himself is a human being, too. For example, editors are overwhelmed with email, which makes follow-ups necessary, because pitches genuinely get missed. But then there is a line between persistence and pushiness, and sometimes it’s a thin one.

Professional communicators succeed when they recognize editors as partners serving audiences, not gatekeepers standing in the way of promotion.

Artificial Intelligence Is Increasing the Value of Human Perspective

No discussion about the world of editorial would be complete with addressing the elephant in the room: artificial intelligence.

The editors acknowledged that AI tools are already reshaping publishing workflows. Newsrooms are experimenting cautiously with automation, drafting assistance, and workflow efficiencies. At the same time, editors remain deeply skeptical of overreliance on AI-generated content.

That skepticism reflects a broader industry concern. As AI-generated material floods inboxes and content platforms, editors are increasingly looking for qualities that feel distinctly human: lived experience, authentic perspective, original framing, nuanced judgment.

Ironically, the rise of AI may strengthen the strategic value of thoughtful op-eds. Low-quality AI-generated thought leadership may increase output volume. But more output is only as good as the willingness of editors to accept it. More often, editors are getting tired of generic content, and also getting better at sniffing it out.

The firms that stand out will have invested in authentic expertise, sharper storytelling, and unique perspectives. These commodities will rise in value as AI slop tsunami keeps on rolling in, and the value of an editor’s judgment will rise with them. Comms professionals who give up on this still-valuable system in favor of greener AI pastures may find that the grass over there doesn’t taste so good.

See the entire panel conversation below.

But here’s the thing: these one-time wins mean nothing if you can’t show up to a meeting on time, don’t communicate difficult news cycles, or have a habit of sending clients surprise invoices. That’s because the best PR campaigns are built on more than just the headline. The more important foundation is the backstage work that nobody sees, but shows up in how you show up.

Two recent episodes of Cracking the Comms Code laid out what’s most important for agencies and consultants to bring to the table. The first was from the client perspective and featured 

• Dan Ring, SEON’s Head of Communications,
• Susan Powell, Marketing Director for Interstate Moving Relocation and Logistics, and
• Amanda Coffee, who ran global comms for PayPal and other corporate giants.

The other brought experienced agency executives and consultants to the conversation:

• Jen Becker, founder of JB Comms Consulting and wearer of many comms hats,
• Julie Murphy, president of Sage Communications, and
• Rod Hughes, president of Kimball Hughes Public Relations.

They all agreed: it turns out that the “boring back end” of a business often determines whether clients stay, grow, or walk away.

The Hidden Half of Client Service

Most agencies focus heavily on the front-end of communications work. This means media strategy, messaging, thought leadership, pitching, and interview prep. But a reliable operation makes as much of an impression on clients, and they’re looking for that every day of your contract.

•   Did the proposal arrive when promised?
•   Did the invoice match the agreed amount?
•   Did team members show up to meetings on time looking worth the money?
•   Did onboarding feel smooth?

Administrative details? Sure. And that can translate to “boring.” But “boring” leads to “predictable,” and “predictable” leads to “reliable” – and that leads to the exciting stuff like uncovering a great narrative, landing the surprise piece of media coverage, and getting paid. 

These agency, consultant, and in-house experts described how operational consistency directly impacts client confidence. A missed payment record, a confusing invoice, or a delayed response can quickly create friction even when the actual communications work is strong.

For smaller agencies especially, professionalism can become a competitive advantage. Many less-known boutique firms can compete successfully against larger agencies precisely because they provide a smoother, more attentive client experience.

Clients Don’t Care about Your Internal Chaos

One of the strongest themes from the discussion was simple: Clients generally do not care what internal systems or challenges an agency is dealing with. They care about outcomes and the ease of working together to reach them.

Clients want smoothness, and they expect it, too. Anything less calls into question an agency’s or consultant’s competence, which too often is a client’s first step toward the door.

This becomes even more important in family-owned businesses or smaller organizations making their first investment in PR. It’s enough of a challenge to justify the budget to leadership. Throw in a few operation mistakes, and that uphill battle becomes Everest without a Sherpa.

There’s enough organizational chaos out there, but that should stay behind the curtain. Without clarify, there’s friction – and not the good kind. An agency that communicates clearly and has its administrative ducks in a row will stand out, and build trust. This is part of client service, and a bigger part than most communicators acknowledge.

What to Do with All that Tech

Modern agencies now rely on a growing ecosystem of tools for contracts, accounting, project management, collaboration, CRM systems, communication platforms, invoicing, and AI-powered workflows. That’s fine, provided all this tech supports good processes.

As Amanda described, many small businesses face the temptation to sign up for endless free trials without fully considering long-term operational implications. Once financial records, invoices, and client data are embedded into a platform, switching systems becomes painful.

The smarter approach is to ask these questions when a tool looks tempting:

• Does this solve a real operational problem?
• Will this scale as we grow?
• Does it integrate with my other systems?
• Does it integrate with client systems?
• Will it make life easier for the team or just create more complexity?

This is especially important as corporations look to have many specialty agency partners. If you love Slack and can’t handle Teams, you might be out of luck. Dan works with firms in North America, Europe, and Asia-Pacific. The sooner an agency in Arizona or Alabama can standardize systems and collaboration tools across time zones and offices, the better.

Transparency Versus the Bait-and-Switch

Especially with all the unscrupulous (or even amoral) AI out there now, clients are doubling down on transparency as a top priority. Honesty has always been the best policy, but now it’s taking center stage.

Take upselling as a prominent example. If an agency believes that additional services could help achieve business goals, clients generally want to hear about it — as long as the recommendation is thoughtful and clearly tied to outcomes.

Upselling becomes problematic only when it feels disconnected from strategy or business priorities. But when agencies explain

• the opportunity,
• how it supports the client’s mission,
• its potential measurable value, and
• the additional cost,

clients are often receptive.

Here’s another example of where transparency is key: the pitch process.

Agencies benefit from adopting this rule, or at least something like it, when presenting themselves for a client’s evaluation: Every team member who will actually work on the account must participate in the pitch process. The alternative is all too common: a bait and switch where the agency presents senior executives during pitches, only to replace them with junior staff once the contract is signed.

Clients understand that agency teams evolve over time, but changing the team immediately after winning business is a trust-killer. Clients should be important, not just feel important for the first five minutes of the relationship. So sell the team you actually plan to staff.

Success Starts with Operational Excellence

If you want a good reputation in the industry, start internally. Delivering a smooth experience will wow clients more effectively than fireworks from an inconsiderate or unresponsive team.

“Flashy” is fine, but “dependable” is better. (Better still if the client can get both.) Agencies with reliable systems, clear communication, transparent billing, and collaborative processes often retain clients longer, even in highly competitive markets.

PR professionals have a lot of good stuff to sell. If they lose sight of operational excellence as part of the package, they’re going to have trouble closing on anything else.

Both panel conversations are below.

The client perspective

Agency and consultant best practices

In a trilogy of Cracking the Comms Code episodes, we convened industry experts and thought leaders to explore how PR professionals can level up their skillsets to drive the greatest possible impact. Here’s what they told us.

Elevating your PR skillset

Our panelists agreed that although sector knowledge can be a genuine advantage in specialized fields, core skills matter more than narrow experience. PR professionals with strong fundamentals — writing, storytelling, media relations, audience awareness — will always be in demand across industries. What matters is whether you’ve handled similar challenges, not whether you’ve worked for an identical company.

Bringing the right mindset is just as important. That means showing up curious, coachable, and prepared to ask the right questions so you can learn quickly. Understanding how your client’s business works is critical. PR professionals need to know what leadership cares about, how the company makes money, the challenges it faces, and how communications can move the needle.

When speaking with decision-makers, avoid slipping into jargon. Translate your value into business language. Tactics like placements and outputs are only part of the story — what matters is how they connect to a broader strategic goal. The role of a strong PR advisor is to guide leadership and speak credibly to the C-suite. Dig deeper into this conversation with Amanda Coyle of Resilere Partners, Ted Merz of Principals Media, and Executive Communication Strategist Trish Nicolas.

Getting it right from the start

Too many PR campaigns fail before they’ve even begun. Teams build in isolation, protect the “big reveal,” and then wonder why nothing lands. The smarter approach is simple: Test early. Float ideas with a small group of trusted reporters, gather real feedback, and refine before committing.

Relationships matter here. They won’t save a weak story, but they do provide signal — faster replies, honest reactions, and a clearer sense of what will resonate.

Execution then becomes about removing friction. Make the reporter’s job easy. Offer your spokesperson, but also offer multiple angles. Package assets in a way that works for the particular reporter you’re courting. Coverage is far more likely when you’ve laid the groundwork.

It’s also important to think beyond attribution. Getting your client named could be “a good start” instead of the victory. Shaping the broader narrative — and being included as a credible voice within it — often matters more.

None of this works without a clear understanding of the client’s business. PR decisions should reflect commercial reality, internal politics, and leadership priorities. Talk to senior stakeholders early, and make sure your ducks are in a row before you make a push. Many “PR problems” are, in reality, internal clarity problems.

When engaging media, keep it sharp. Pitches should be brutally concise. You don’t need to be comprehensive to garner interest, and you don’t need company boilerplate. If the first line doesn’t land, nothing else matters.

Finally, operate in the world as it is today. There are fewer journalists, with more noise and tighter competition. AI is accelerating output, but the quality isn’t keeping up. That makes targeting, relationships, and judgment more valuable. Chris Piedmont of Slide Nine, Adam Brooks of Candor, and Chase of METATHEORY break-down some of their tips and tricks for PR practitioners here.

From activity to outcomes

The shift PR agencies need to make is straightforward: stop obsessing over doing things, and instead obsess over accomplishing things.

That sounds simple, but it’s harder in practice. It means validating ideas early, aligning internally, executing cleanly, and focusing on influence over volume. Clients won’t be impressed if you tell them nothing but how busy you are. They care about what changed.

The starting point is clarity. Define success upfront in plain terms — revenue, reputation, influence — and work backward. Explain your impact in business language, or else you won’t make the case.

From there, strip out the noise. Drop jargon and long reports. A clear one-pager linking actions to outcomes will outperform any bloated deck. And remember whom you’re really serving: not just your day-to-day contact, but the C-suite above them. If your contact can’t easily explain your value internally, the chopping block is just down the road.

Execution works only when it connects to the wider business. PR amplifies marketing, sales, and positioning. Or at least it should. When it doesn’t, results will always fall short. In this panel discussion Lynda Carlisle of CS-Effect, Melissa Havel of Turnitin, and Ashley Dennison of CommsConsultants.com share their expertise on driving real client outcomes.

Truth-telling and meaningful metrics 

It’s also critical to be honest about what PR can and can’t do. You can’t guarantee coverage — and pretending you can erodes trust. What you can guarantee is consistency, direction, and a steady build of presence over time. That shift from chasing hits to building momentum is where many teams founder.

The same applies to targeting. Reach is easy to inflate and largely meaningless. Relevance is more elusive, and far more valuable. A small, engaged audience that reacts is worth more than a large one that barely knows you. Step away from the vanity metrics and measure what actually matters: message pull-through, meaningful engagement, and inbound signals.

At a higher level, the role itself needs to evolve. Strong practitioners act as partners. They push back, refine ideas, and stay close to the market. They provide activity, certainly, but the real value lies in their judgment.

That becomes even more important as AI accelerates output. Everyone is tied now in the race to see who can produce the most, but there’s still competition for who can think the best. Used properly, AI helps you move faster, not think less. Average content is now abundant. Insight is not.

In the end, everything comes down to one question: Did this PR campaign change anything that matters? Unless the answer is yes, clients have every right to be unhappy.

Watch each panel below.

Communications leaders know this because they’ve watched in horror as their carefully crafted LinkedIn posts are mocked in the comments or inadvertently sparked a social media pile-on after sharing what seemed like an innocuous, brand-safe message.

(Just ask McDonald’s CEO Chris Kempczinksi, whose simple effort to chow down on his company’s food didn’t sit well with a lot of observers.)

With trust so hard to win and massively easy to lose, creative communicators aren’t just looking for spokespeople on the board, in the company’s Slack channel or through an Indeed job posting. Instead, they are finding the right people whose voice will resonate with ordinary people: physicians who spend their days saving lives, parents whose sick kids are made sicker by bad policy decisions, entrepreneurs who have built – or rebuilt – their businesses brick by brick. 

These individuals can tell stories that customers understand and believe. But they aren’t easy to find, and their message isn’t as simple as a Yelp review or a corny ad. 

Elevating third-party voices is a powerful way to build trust while reducing the risk of turning C-suite executives into lightning rods. Here’s how to do it.

1. Pressure-test the narrative

Before seeking outside voices, make sure the story itself can withstand scrutiny. That means clarifying objectives, challenging internal assumptions, and, at times, telling clients or leadership that their preferred message will not land.

Start with alignment: What is the goal? Who needs to be persuaded? What evidence supports the case?

When we helped place everyday Americans in national and top state outlets in 2025, campaigns did not begin with pitch emails. They began with difficult conversations, rigorous research, and refining a narrative that an independent person could stand behind without compromising their integrity. 

If the story only works when delivered by a paid executive, it is not strong enough.

2. Find voices with real standing

The most effective outside voices are not mouthpieces with clean-cut success stories. They are people whose lived experience aligns naturally with the issue and who hold credibility with the intended audience.

That might mean individuals directly affected by policy, business leaders with firsthand market experience, or someone with a relatable human story. A plainly told account from someone without a grand title often carries more weight than commentary from someone with the letter “C” in their job description, because audiences assume they are less self-interested.

Sourcing these voices requires a disciplined search process. Identify individuals whose backgrounds genuinely support the narrative, conduct thorough interviews, and confirm alignment before drafting anything. The aim is credibility rooted in reality, not over-orchestration.

3. Build for multiple audiences

Once you have the right voice, approach the process like a journalist, not a marketer. Conduct an in-depth interview with the person to ensure they are on board with:

• The organization behind the curtain.
• The narrative you’re pushing.
• Their story’s alignment with the narrative.
• Putting themselves into the public eye.

Record the conversation, then transcribe it. Identify the emotional core and supporting evidence, before shaping the media content to work for four audiences: your organization, its stakeholders, the author, and the media gatekeepers (op-ed editors, reporters, producers, etc.) who will decide whether to feature this voice.

This is where many efforts fall short. Content may please the client, but ignore what editors actually run. Or it may lean heavily on data while flattening the author’s voice. Strong placements require disciplined editing, revision, and fact-checking. The same rigor applies whether targeting a national newspaper or a trade outlet. And remember that, often, regional publications deliver meaningful impact with lower reputational risk.

4. Train for discipline, not performance

A credible third-party voice is powerful, but unmanaged authenticity creates the risk that someone will fly off the handle, take advantage of their 15 minutes of fame, or have a tangential point of view that undermines the entire narrative. 

This is why media preparation is so important. Clarify the core message. Define off-limit topics. Rehearse responses to difficult questions. Align on key facts. In a crisis, independent validators can counter misinformation more persuasively than paid representatives – but only if they are properly prepared.

Preparation ensures that authenticity strengthens your position rather than undermining it.

5. Build relationships before you need them

Third-party credibility should be treated as infrastructure, not a one-off tactic. Develop relationships with experts, community leaders, and customers well before controversy emerges. 

After campaigns conclude, review what worked, be honest about what didn’t, and refine your approach.

In today’s information environment, narratives move quickly. Organizations that perform best can mobilize trusted voices without hesitation. That only happens when the groundwork is already in place.

This article was originally published as part of a sponsored partnership between Proven Media Solutions and Meredith & The Media.