The reason public relations finds itself in behavior business is because it’s firmly rooted in principle that people act on their own perception of facts. It strives to create, change or reinforce public opinion by reaching, persuading and moving-to-action those people whose behaviors affect organization. When behavioral changes become apparent, and meet program’s original behavior modification goal, a public relations venture can be deemed a success and, in this case, even show first signs of economic recovery.

Even in these recessionary times, when you start looking for a return on your public relations investment, it becomes clear that your goal MUST be kind of change in behaviors of key stakeholders that leads directly to achieving your operating objectives. So, it is quality planning, and degree of behavioral change it produces, that defines success or failure of a public relations program.

In good times or bad, think about some of perceptions out there that could actually hurt your organization. Perceptions that, if ignored long enough, could well result in behaviors that run counter to those you may desire.

At root of it all, is that simple truism we all know but tend to forget: people really DO act on their perception of facts and behave accordingly. But, if a manager is to have an effect on those perceptions and behaviors, he/she must deal with them promptly and effectively whether economy is down or up.

Imagine how many audiences your organization may have to depend upon at one time or another? Would your list include insurance carriers, journalists, minorities, customers, prospects, employees, legislators, community residents and others whose perceptions of your organization, if left unattended, may hurt or help?

Here’s one approach to informing those perceptions (and, thus, behaviors) out there that you may wish to consider.

List your important audiences in priority order. For example, customers, prospects, employees, local and trade media, local business and community leaders, and so forth.

As time permits, meet with members of each audience and jot down their impressions of your business, especially problem areas. Here, you’ll have opportunity to decide to what degree you will try to alter opinion and perception among each audience.

In my opinion, you must keep your eye on end-game because reason we do public relations in first place is to change behaviors of certain groups of people important to success of our organization.

Another way of saying that? What we REALLY care about is modifying behavior of those we wish to influence. Ask yourself this question: do we employ public relations for sheer pleasure of writing news releases, running special events, doing surveys or booking speeches? Some folks may actually think so, but I believe answer to that question is no. We employ public relations so that, at end of day, somebody’s behavior gets modified.

o you may wish to influence people to begin thinking more positively about your organization, thus strengthening its reputation.

o or encourage them to begin buying your soft drink brand by communicating its great taste and refreshing flavor.

o it could be as simple as communicating a company’s strengths to a target audience leading them to invest in company’s shares.

o or even providing environmental activists with facts about company’s full compliance with Federal regulations, in hope they will bring their plant-site demonstrations to an end.

But remember: until you have a solid indication that target behaviors have, in fact, changed in ways that meet your primary behavior modification goal, you DON’T know if your investment has paid off.

So, let’s look at ways to increase one’s comfort level about that public relations investment. Here are five steps, that can help you hit public relations bullseye – desired behavior modification -- on your next public relations venture.

Step 1 Accept Fact That People Act on their Perception of Facts

Many behavioral experts agree that people really do act on THEIR perception of facts, and that how they react to those facts actually does affect their behaviors. It follows that individual understanding of those facts must be contin- ually informed if those behaviors are to help achieve organization’s goal and objectives.

A simple, but effective illustration of this dynamic at work, is investor considering purchase of company shares. With facts available to him or her at moment, he/she forms a perception of company. Unsupported though they may be, should those facts cast doubt on company’s future, it’s safe to say that investor’s negative perception of company will lead to a certain behavior, namely, no shares are purchased.

Public relations counsel, alerted to negative perception about company through continuous media monitoring, opinion sampling and thoughtleader contact, moves rapidly to communicate accurate sales and financial data to investment community. In due course, this leads to perception and behavioral changes on part of many investors – namely, towards a decision to buy company’s shares.

Step 2 Create, Change or Reinforce Opinion