So you’ve made the big decision that your brand is in need of PR representation, but where to from here? While in-house and Do you need a boutique PR agency? (Part 1) may be able to offer a range of specialised benefits for beauty brands, so too do larger companies bring with them a list of credentials in helping take a brand to the next level. beautydirectory tracks down the PR directors and brands who use the services of these bigger PR companies to discover what advantages signing up with a large agency can deliver.
Large PR agency versus in-house
It’s common practice in the beauty industry for a brand to begin their PR activity in-house, but while outsourcing comes at a cost, the benefits often outweigh the associated expenditure. The advantage of working in an agency and the value it can bring to a brand is the experience and knowledge of working across multiple brands and industries,” says Maxted Thomas PR general manager Michelle Richings.
Hayley Cole is an account director at Stellar Concepts, and suggests that once a brand moves to agency representation, the resources are far-reaching. An in-house PR team usually consists of anywhere between two and five employees, but an agency of 13 brings with it a wide network and vast skills, experiences and insights,” she says.
Utilising the experience of many practitioners is something Hausmann managing director Judi Hausmann strongly agrees is a powerful attribute: We are a team of 48 across three specialised companies - we have a huge amount of expertise in what we call ‘The Haus’. Our senior team combined has over 100 years of PR experience and wisdom, so we are a very safe pair of hands!”
While experience means PR companies are able to build great relationships with key contacts such as media, celebrities, key influences and suppliers for events, it also brings with it a set of specialist skills. We have PR practitioners with specialist skills across different audiences, sectors and channels, which mean our clients get a team of specialists hand-picked for their needs. It’s a powerful proposition,” reveals Hausmann.
In consumer PR, Richings explains this is an advantage for brands because, there are generally lots of consumer insights and key learnings that an agency can harness and bring to the table after years of working across various brands and campaigns. Sometimes having knowledge outside the categories that a specific brand operates in is highly valuable as it is a great way of demonstrating how another brand has done things differently to achieve greats PR results.”
Why get an agency?
Cole says that a lot of their clients have chosen to sign up with Stellar because of their wide industry sector experience in addition to their specialist industry knowledge. Beauty is an area that our team know and love, but a point of difference we offer is our network into other categories like food and beverage, hospitality, festivals and events, fashion and broader consumer lifestyle brands as well as our work with sponsorship, brand strategy and marketing.”
Brands tend to sign with a PR agency in order to benefit from their expertise and because of time restrictions. We understood the need to outsource our PR requirements to enable us to have access to a diverse range of services that can adapt and deliver on all aspects of a PR campaign, to drive and achieve our desired brand results across our portfolio,” says Dr. LeWinn's business unit director - Skincare Eveline Albarracin. Margifox Distributors marketing and brand co-cordinator Meg Durrington says chose to outsource their PR so they would have more time to focus on other areas of the business and marketing.”
brand manager Dennis Tiang reveals the brand has always enlisted the services of a PR agency in order to educate customers and editors about the brand. Molton Brown does not engage in above-the-line or co-op advertising and therefore is heavily reliant on PR to support the marketing communications strategy to grow brand equity.”
Choosing an agency
There’s no hard and fast rules when it comes to choosing which size agency to go for; it’s about looking for the right agency to represent your individual needs. Opting for a large agency has its own set of rewards. It comes down to scale. We can take on big jobs and tight deadlines that a smaller agency just couldn’t accommodate,” says Hausmann. For example, we organised Virgin’s 10th anniversary celebrations in a hangar at Tullamarine airport starring a tap-dancing Richard Branson and a performance by Delta Goodrem in just three weeks.” She also revealed that larger PR agencies tend to have the propriety tools and models for strategy and planning, ideas creation and measurement.
Richings points out that it’s not always just about big versus small, but more about having the right person for the job. Sometimes larger PR agencies get to work more strategically with a brand than smaller niche PR agencies, this is because they generally have the manpower to work across most areas of a brand. However, having said that it really depends on the experience and skills within individuals in a team as two PR practitioners might work more effectively than four to five practitioners. This is why good recruitment is really important to ensure that your agency has varied experience within the agency and strong talent.”
In the beauty industry it’s common practice for smaller brands to sign with niche PR companies, with the larger brands opting to go with bigger agencies. Generally established national or global brands are attracted to larger PR agencies more so than start up businesses based on limitations with PR budgets,” says Richings. This idea is supported by Hausmann. Our agencies are geared up to do work of some scale, so that normally means we are working for large blue chip multinationals as well as some of Australia’s largest companies. As a general rule, I believe smaller clients are better off with smaller agencies as they will be prioritised in a way that a larger agency is simply not equipped to do.”
There are many reasons why a brand decides to go with a large PR company.
Albarracin reveals that Dr. LeWinn’s chose to sign up with Stellar after it came highly recommended by colleagues and demonstrated experience working with clients operating within the same target market. Our organisation has preferred to work with a full-service PR agency that has the ability to cover different facets of a campaign such as traditional PR, media relations, event management, online and social media PR. This allows for consistency of brand messaging delivered across all components of a campaign,” says Albarracin. Molton Brown recently signed with Maxted Thomas PR because they had a good understanding of their objectives, according to Tiang.
Work/client divisions
With multiple staff to choose from, PR agencies have options when they appoint staff to a particular brand. Work is matched to people’s expertise so that clients are paying for the right people to do the right work,” says Hausmann. If someone is passionate about a particular PR sector we recognise that when planning account teams.” It works a little differently at Stellar. We like to mix our teams across various industry sectors so skill set and media knowledge is more widely developed,” says Cole.
While the number of staff on any one account varies, it’s typical for at least one account director to also overlook the brand. The scope of work will determine how many staff members service an account, but Stellar will always ensure an account director is leading an account regardless of its size with the support of an account manager and account executive and the client always has access to agency heads when required,” notes Cole.
Bringing to the table experience, specialist skills, wide industry sector knowledge and the ability to tackle big scale jobs on tight deadlines – it’s easy to see the appeal of signing with a larger PR agency. Visit beautydirectory’s PR directory to find a comprehensive list of PR practitioners in your states, and a description of the work they do and clients they service. This is a great starting point for brands looking to find PR representation in the beauty industry.
If you’re a PR agency and would like to update your listing, please contact Yelena.
In Part 1, bd looks at the benefits of working with a Do you need a boutique PR agency? (Part 1).
Maxted Thomas PR represents Benefit, Burt's Bees, , , , , , and Sebastian Professional.
Stellar Concepts Australia represents Dr. LeWinn's, The Fragrance Foundation, and ghd.
Hausmann Communication represents , , , and Wella Professionals.