What with COVID, calamitous weather and the human divide between us nationwide, nature appears to be running amok and making a direct hit on safety and health. Ultimately, studies are showing, it has manifested in a lessening of trust in each other, in our institutions, and in our way of life, long taken for granted. For food industry business — as producers, retailers and responsible employers — the impact of the last year will reverberate for decades. As communicators, however, this is not a doomsday scenario. I am sure my more seasoned colleagues will agree, we’ve seen historic marketplace and cultural meteors before.

Food businesses and executives who make smart, credible and genuine moves, now, will lead their category. It’s going to require, though, a doubling down on consumer trust and embracing change. The question of who and what do you trust must be answered, and we are all responsible for demonstrating the answers with well-considered decisions and activities. I believe that means our public relations must be centered, discerning and authentic.

What has changed across the board? The speed by which critical information (and misinformation) is shared and the crucial nature of getting it right, especially when it comes to human health and safety.

So, how best to build trust and meet consumer, customer and employee expectations? If we get it right, shareholder expectations will be met accordingly.

Our experience in helping clients successfully communicate consumer messages tells us to focus on building trust from the inside out. Take a brutally honest look at your corporate reputation and brand, how consumers and your own people view your organization. It can’t be just about food or business as usual. The old saw, “doing well by doing good” is especially relevant today.

Here are some pathways our own food and beverage clients are taking:

Increase Employee Communications

Out of sheer necessity, communicate often and visibly through these COVID times. Our daily business lives have been upset – to remote or not to remote, to renew the lease on our office space or find a less sizeable option. Many companies and employees are at loose ends to find their way and some regularity in daily work life. Provide brief, regular, fact-based updates to your website, your employees and your customers. Demonstrate your partnership with regulatory and public health entities. Especially during these times, it is these public guardians that consumers will trust most (over the word of for-profit companies). Communicate with a tone of concern for your audience’s health and welfare. Tone is often more important than content; optimism and encouragement never hurts.

Connect With Your Community

Remember your local communities where many of your employees and their families live and where you often have an outsized shadow. Your town’s tax base is often, in large part, dependent on your decisions. Local businesses and civic organizations will appreciate your support and patronage wherever you can provide it. Are you able to go the extra mile by working with a local medical partner to provide your workforce with vaccines? Are you able to contribute with scholarships, sponsorships, speaking/virtual presentation opportunities with the local community college? Can you organize team volunteers to contribute to local projects and/or disaster areas? Donations of much-needed supplies?

Gut Check Your Reputation

Re-vitalize your assets and allies, especially your employees. Take an honest audit of commentary on social media, internal chat channels and employee forums. Is your tried and true approach still working? Are employee concerns going unaddressed, purposely or from lack of resources? How can you really improve, and soon? Set aggressive timelines and take action where you can. Have you recognized those employees who went the distance for the company over the past year? Are there new employee voices emerging as leaders that may help the organization evolve? 

How Credible Is Your Position or Message?

Are there local or industry experts that would be valuable to enlist for expert counsel and for referral sources when the media calls? Have you conducted studies and surveys that could be of interest to others? Are there forecasts or other research — trade or medical — that you have used to help guide your initiatives? Leverage them and keep eyes open for new partners who can support you and add credibility to your brand promise and values.

Update Your Game Plan

Do not wait until there is some semblance of “normal” to evaluate your communications strategy. Even though we are far from the “end” of this challenging period, all of us have seen organizational changes, personnel shifts, and the re-ordering of priorities. Take a fresh look at your scenario plans and crisis preparation. Does your approach incorporate the new resources your team has leaned on in urgent situations over the past year? Lessons learned? Review your most reliable and/or updated tools for pushing out content and measuring impact.  Revisit new threats to your business. Take an audit of competitors in the news. Think about what developing trends, threats to your business and community, potential disasters and hazards, and competitive concerns that could have a pernicious effect. Then, act. Develop a position for these issues and scenarios, no matter how brief, that can be updated and customized when needed (response speed in hairy situations is so critical). Determine which events or developments might trigger your need to address the situation. Messaging? Medium? Spokesperson? Use this time to regroup wisely and retire outdated practices. It all adds up to help bulwark brand trust.

Social Distance isn’t for Social Media

Now is the time to lean into social media to connect with your audience where they are choosing to spend time. Keep up with potentially new audiences, look for ways to genuinely connect with your followers and build loyalty through content that matters to them. This is not the time to overproduce or overspend; there’s no need to be perfect or slick. It is about telling your story authentically and contributing to the real-life conversations and experiences that are helping us all get through these times, together. And, remember, you are talking to the end customer. There’s power in that.

Be Willing to Change

Innovation is what fuels our industry and our personal growth. The changes in our professional world – one charged with contributing to a safer milieu, preserving precious resources, evolving healthcare and society itself – will continue, as will the changes in our daily lives. A trust mindset for business and for ourselves will help evolve how we communicate, how we connect, how we function, and how we support a constantly shifting consumer marketplace and food supply. Be open to change. Communicate trustworthiness and the promise reflected by your brand. 

Michael Fineman is President of Fineman PR.

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When I started my public relations agency in the late eighties, I was determined to further define Public Relations and make it a more powerful and recognized tool in the marketing mix. There was no such thing as social media; fax machines and networked computers were what we thought of as high tech, and we used actual tablets and notebooks made of paper for notes. To say the least, we were less automated by today’s standards but still “smart,” just without smart devices.

For me, back then, defining PR for a wildly competitive marketplace meant developing a dynamic publicity machine, based on memorable, entertaining, and, perhaps, provocative story lines that showcased the values of my clients’ brands. As a brand marketing tool, my public relations methodology was, at its core, trust-building communications for the brand promise. It was to be ethical, attention-getting and crisp. At the same time, I knew there was so much more to public relations than just publicity. As we became more and more successful, clients began giving us more than one-dimensional work.

I fulfilled my vision with message-driven, national news for my clients, and so was born “Brand PR.” I coined that term to show that public relations could make a brand promise so viscerally meaningful – in language, stories, experiences and messages – that other factors (price, for example) lose relevance. In the decades to come, Fineman PR also earned national recognition for its 17-year running of the widely published “Top Ten PR Blunders of the Year” to comically demonstrate the public relations impact of an organization’s every word and action. We also developed the PANTCHEK crisis principals (don’t get caught with your pants down in a watershed moment).

Twenty years in, a new age was upon us, an age of videos, social media, clever digital graphics, significantly shorter attention spans and an exponential surge of online media outlets, citizen journalists and web-based forums.  We upped our game to build that side of the business as client needs and demands continued to evolve.

Over the years, the caliber of Fineman PR’s clients and our results on their behalf have been the source of tremendous pride that continues to this day. From representing the two distinguished Napa Valley wineries that, 20 years previously, put California’s wine industry on the map (beating their French competitors in the 1976 Paris Blind Tasting), to creating memorable Brand PR programs for countless consumer packaged goods and natural foods brands; to coordinating major client events all the way to the White House; and supporting crisis clients around the clock in their most dire moments to do the right thing by their customers, employees and communities. We handled a few colorful and sometimes bizarre high-profile issues that most people wouldn’t believe unless you were in the room with us. At the core, we are known for bringing discretion and fresh thinking to each unique public relations challenge. As anyone who has worked with me will tell you, at Fineman PR, “spin” is a forbidden four-letter word.

Last year, I met David Anderson, co-founder and co-CEO of a highly competent and visionary digital agency based in Phoenix: Off Madison Ave. Besides being like-minded about our areas of expertise and our mutually dry senses of humor, and with David’s agency based on the solid principles of behavior design and digital communications, Off Madison Ave specialized in areas that we sought growth. In turn, David and his founding partner Roger Hurni valued our substantive approach to public relations, our reputation for quality work, our crisis communications expertise, and our 30-year track record. We knew fairly quickly there was a match, the kismet I mentioned in my opening paragraph.

Off Madison Ave’s acquisition of Fineman PR became official November 1^st. Even amid the challenges and changes of 2020, our teams have melded (via Zoom) with high energy, creative sparks and excellent rapport. The two teams are surprisingly similar in temperament, complementary in our skills and strengths, and each appreciative of the capabilities we all bring to the party. I look forward to the next chapter of smart, creative growth and continued excellence. Many thanks to David, Off Madison Ave co-founder Roger Hurni and to my own team as we embark on this new adventure. I am, as always, grateful to my many friends in the business and valued clients who have been part of our journey and look forward to reconnecting as a member of the Off Madison Ave team.

The post It Happened in 2020, and it was Good appeared first on Fineman PR.

Fineman PR hard at work, Union Square/FiDi San Francisco.

Check out our 2015 State of the Agency Slideshow.

Fineman PR bucks the trend of the agency turnover epidemic with an exceptional employee retention record. The collaborative culture, career development opportunities, continuing education, and work-life balance foster talent and maintain the singular esprit de corps at Fineman PR. Karmina Zafiro, with the agency for 11 years, was promoted to vice president. Lorna Bush, our senior vice president, began her work at Fineman PR 14 years ago. Our awesome anchor, Vice President Heidi White, is now in her 19^th year with the agency. At the end of the year, V.P. Travis Taylor was promoted to Executive V.P. Serene Buckley, now a five year agency veteran, was promoted to Senior Director of Content Strategy and Development. Toby Baird, who heads our wine practice, and Juan Lezama, senior director of our multicultural communications practice (Mosaico), celebrated their six-year anniversaries with the agency. A tremendous source of pride for all of us is that our team is ethnically diverse and includes Asian, Latino and African American professionals, and nearly half of our 17-member staff are bilingual.

We continued efforts to stand out in our own community and gained new clients in non-profit, live event and government categories. We now count as clients San Francisco Marathon, Habitat Horticulture, HealthRight 360, Dale Scott & Company (California’s leading K-14 financial advisor), Progressive Insurance San Francisco Boat Show, San Francisco Police Department, Girl Scouts of Northern California, Central Contra Costa Sanitary District and Mission Neighborhood Health Center.

Event management this year included initiatives at the Foster Farms Bowl at Levi’s Stadium and work for HNTB, the lead designer of Levi’s Stadium related to the venue’s status as host of Super Bowl 50. We continued our work for the San Francisco Marathon which became a sanctioned qualifier race for the 2016 Olympic Team Trials and provided support for the San Francisco Boat Show.

Our wine practice is thriving, now representing Napa-based Quintessa and Renteria Family Wines, and Santa Barbara-based Zaca Mesa. Quintessa, owned by the renowned Huneeus Family, is one of the very best Cabernet Sauvignon producers in California. Zaca Mesa, founded 40-plus years ago by real estate dynamo John Cushman (of Cushman & Wakefield), is the pioneering Syrah producer in a region that now boasts some of the best Syrah wines in the world. We are launching the new, super premium quality Renteria Family Wines for a family who came to California from Mexico and became renowned as among the best vineyard managers in the modern era of Northern California winemaking, with oversight of some of the most highly regarded vineyard estates in Napa and Sonoma.

New work for our multicultural communications team, Mosaico (www.mosaico-pr.com) included assignments for Pro Ecuador (Mosaico’s first international client) and the Mazatlan Forum in Mexico. Early in the year, Mosaico helped a low income housing developer in Southern California fill its new development, leveraging broadcast news opportunities and strategically placed outdoor and broadcast advertising.

On the crisis communications side this year, we worked with clients involved in criminal investigations, changes in ownership, employee misconduct and sexual abuse, false and misleading product allegations, litigation, product recalls and crisis preparedness planning. Many clients on the issues and crisis side sought out our on-camera media training services which have also expanded over the past year. For client Foster Farms, we managed community issues related to the drought and the company’s water conservation initiatives; Avian Influenza threats; and false charges brought by vegan, animal rights activists.

After a challenging food safety crisis, during which we worked resolutely, Foster Farms’ laser focus and singularity of purpose transformed it into a food safety leader. The entire company pulled together with dedication and commitment to resolve the challenge and enhance the systems and processes of every part of its business. That teamwork and vigor is now paying dividends in workforce productivity, new prepared foods and value-add offerings, antibiotic-free and organic products, and wider brand recognition and distribution.

Our initiatives for the company even reached the White House from where recognition came for Foster Farms’ antibiotic stewardship, with feature billing on the White House’s own press materials and with a visit from Agriculture Secretary Vilsack.

We also helped the company make national news for its role in raising “TOTUS” (the National Thanksgiving Turkey) for the White House’s annual Presidential Pardon. We partnered with United Airlines to bring the turkey to Washington D.C via a plane dubbed “Turkey One” and also developed content for the inaugural presidentialturkey.com website and presidential turkey social media handles (including a Spotify playlist). A three-week stream of highly targeted events and engaging content earned more than 2,800 news placements across multiple geographic markets and a trending #TurkeyPardon2015 hashtag on social media.

Our agency was also involved in building and promoting several cause marketing initiatives that, in partnership with West Coast food banks, provided more than 250,000 meals to needy families throughout California, Oregon and Washington. We continued with Foster Farms’ Food 4 Thought incentive-based program that has supported more than 4,500 Central Valley elementary school students with more than 1.3 million pounds of food since its inception in 2009.

2016 is off to a good start with several additions to our client roster. For more on that, see our last agency news update. With our diverse client base, top notch team and growing capabilities and service offerings, I couldn’t be more proud of the agency we have built over the past 28 years. The outlook is bright for 2016.

Download a visual slice of our work here: Fineman PR: 2015 State of the Agency (PDF)

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Operating at the intersection of design, architecture and horticulture, San Francisco-based Habitat Horticulture creates living walls for commercial and residential projects. The company has installed artistic, vertical gardens at commissions throughout the Bay Area, including urban/public spaces and for a rolodex of Silicon Valley businesses. Habitat Horticulture seeks to enhance national awareness of its brand and services, especially leveraging news of its recent masterpiece – a 4,400-square-foot living wall that will grace the newly expanded, LEED-certified San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, which opens to the public in May 2016.

Materra | Cunat Family Vineyards has opened a new large winery and tasting room in Napa Valley’s Oak Knoll District. The family-owned estate seeks to increase exposure of its wines and the visitor experience offered by its daily, appointment-only tours and tastings.

Antioch University Santa Barbara, a private, liberal arts institution, has turned to Fineman PR to help create awareness of its new Master of Fine Arts in Writing & Contemporary Media program. Fineman PR will work to strengthen the university’s brand reputation and leverage its proximity to Southern California’s creative and entrepreneurial entertainment industry to drive enrollment.

“We are continuing to grow as a result both of entering into new business categories and of expanding within industries we have long served,” said Michael Fineman, agency president.

About Fineman PR

Fineman PR is an award-winning, full service public relations agency specializing in Brand PR, crisis communications and multicultural communications. The agency has worked in a variety of industries that include food and wine, construction, consumer package goods, health care and education. Fineman PR is a member of IPREX, a global network of communications agencies. The agency reaches diverse audiences with its multicultural division, Mosaico. For more information, visit www.finemanpr.com.

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The key is to break through the noise and stand out by doing something noteworthy.

Here, Travis Taylor, executive vice president of Fineman PR, discusses his uncommon path to a career in PR, the need for continuous improvement and the gratification of being a mentor.

Read the Cision story here.

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Stepping foot into an empty Levi’s Stadium is like that moment when you arrive at the top of a roller-coaster before the impending drop: exhilarating.

Our client, HNTB Corporation, set out to design the next generation football stadium, and that is exactly what they did. Nestled in the heart of Silicon Valley, Levi’s Stadium reflects many of the attributes that we associate with the Bay Area: technological innovation, sustainable living, and a rich, diverse food and wine culture. The sleek, state-of-the-art design makes you feel like you are part of something grand;  its green and high-tech design achievements make it one of the most celebrated sports venues ever.

In the words of Tim Cahill, senior vice president and chief design officer at HNTB, “Being in the heart of Silicon Valley it just became a natural that this had to be the most advanced stadium in the country … People expected not just cutting edge, but bleeding edge technology.”

See the full story on Associated Press

Having a field day at Levi’s Stadium. The $1.2 billion stadium embodies the technology-driven, sustainability-minded culture of surrounding Silicon Valley, and its high-tech, open-space design facilitates a unique, interactive fan experience.

levis-stadium-finemanpr

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Since joining Fineman PR in 2012, Taylor has employed his extensive experience in corporate communications, media relations and training, crisis communications, community relations and public affairs to strengthen the agency’s operations and strategy, manage personnel and attract new clients. He has led a number of high-profile accounts, including several higher education institutions, government agencies, statewide and national nonprofits, and a myriad of corporate clients. In his new position, Taylor will be taking on a larger role in strategic planning and operations, staff development and client acquisition.

“With the growth of our agency, it is critical to plan ahead and strengthen our senior leadership team to help keep the firm moving forward,” said Michael Fineman, agency president. “Travis is a public relations dynamo who has proven to be a natural leader. He embodies all the qualities this agency represents. He has the vision, instincts and energy – hardly surprising in an enthusiastic rugby player – that are required to build on our success. I look forward to seeing the influence of his leadership in years to come.”

Before joining Fineman PR, Taylor served as vice president of Communications Pacific, Hawaii’s premier public relations firm and, like Fineman PR, a partner in IPREX, a global network of leading, independently owned communications agencies. That followed three years as senior communications advisor to Hawaii’s lieutenant governor.

Taylor serves on the marketing committee of Habitat for Humanity Greater San Francisco and the public policy committee of the San Francisco Chamber of Commerce. In 2015, he received a Certificate of Honor for his involvement with Leadership San Francisco.

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Even experienced communicators can get rattled when the phones are ringing off the hook – from the media, regulators and other government authorities, customers, the general public, employees and the board. Not to mention the fires breaking out on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram. Response time has shrunk from 48 hours to 48 minutes to what feels like 48 seconds.

Memorize PANTCHEK to get your priorities in order so you won’t flail and fail in public. Here’s an easy visual story to help you get started.

• Public welfare is the first priority
• Assemble the facts. Once they are verified, Announce All bad news at once
• No blame, No speculation, No repetition of negative charges or questions
• Tell your side of the story or Take responsibility
• Care and Concern for those affected – express it sincerely and right at the outset
• High-level organization spokesperson – let the public see the crisis has top-level attention
• Ensure that it will not happen again with a solid plan that will generate confidence
• Keep a separate plan for moving daily business ahead

View our crisis checklist here.

Michael Fineman is president of Fineman PR, a San Francisco public relations firm that specializes in crisis communications, brand PR and multicultural communications. Contact him here. 

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But this new media shift did not come out of a vacuum. Emerging professionals need a strong foundation in the fundamentals of PR. Clients expect it and need this journalistic lens for their messages 1) to have multilateral impact and 2) to remain effective in conveying their brands in an ever-changing media landscape.

Fineman PR practices a unique and highly focused approach to public relations that I dubbed “Brand PR,” which informs the framework of everything we do. Indulging in some agency history for a moment: In the early years of Fineman PR, there was a widely trending idea among marketers about everything Brand: brand advertising, brand identity, brand marketing, package branding and so on. However, there was a category void; no one at that time was talking about how public relations could effectively help a brand stand apart.  I coined the term Brand PR and introduced it to the communications industry in order to, well, brand this intuitive approach which bridged market/consumer research and brand positioning to effective media relations.  It was an exciting time; I went around the country – visiting potential clients, speaking at various forums, and publishing a newsletter to present my interpretation of how public relations could be an effective marketing option to win consumer trust and brand loyalty.

Today, Brand PR is a common professional communications concept and one that Fineman PR still specializes in. Throughout the years, I have been asked many times…what is Brand PR?

Brand PR takes category ownership of a message and value and provides authenticity, editorially and experientially. Its practice captures the brand’s distinctiveness and appeal, encapsulating the need it fills and what’s memorable; Brand PR defines the WOW.

At its core, Brand PR is the projection of a solid image – the basis on which we can apply new tools and techniques to have success.  It is about parlaying an organization’s primary messages with a compelling story, emphasizing attributes that engage consumers and creating an “experience” with the brand. It is based on a set of values – what the brand’s “trustmark” adds to the product. Brand PR helps to make the brand promise so viscerally meaningful – in language, stories and messages – that other factors (price, for example) lose relevance.

While the core of our signature approach remains the same, the nuances have changed to adapt and evolved to meet the needs of today’s marketers.

With tactics aimed at integrating the brand into conversations about consumer trends and issues, our work is aimed at  making the product a part of the rhetoric for any discussion of the need the brand fills. Of course, the storytelling and contributing tactics must be compelling, provocative, entertaining or, generally, communicated with visible activities and thought leadership.

Why else would anyone pay attention?

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Here are five tips for gaining a foothold with this fast-growing population:

1.       Incorporate Hispanic values into campaigns

Whether Latinos are Puerto Rican, Mexican or Argentinian, certain similarities distinguish them from other ethnicities, including strong family ties, overwhelming sociability and unified communities. When considering how to reach Hispanics, brands need to keep this culture in mind and create marketing plans with Hispanic resonance. Simply translating generic materials will yield only a lukewarm outcome. To get impactful results, brands should base their campaigns on cultural insights.

2.       Earn credibility by partnering with a trusted influencer or institution

Last month Macy’s launched a new clothing line with Thalia Sodi, a well-known Mexican singer and telenovela actress. By partnering with a Latin American household name, Macy’s gained leverage that is likely to translate into increased sales. Macy’s projects that 20 percent of the traffic in its stores will be Latino within a few years, up from the current 16 percent. When asked why this Latina audience is so important, Macy’s chief marketing officer, Martine Reardon, responded simply, “They over-index in buying apparel, food, jewelry, cosmetics and fragrances.” Since Hispanics are one of the country’s heaviest-spending target markets, communicating with them effectively can play a vital role in a successful marketing plan.

3.       Generate awareness at a local level and get results

Last year, Mosaico, Fineman PR’s multicultural division, developed a comprehensive media relations and community outreach campaign for the Mission Economic Development Agency, an organization that serves low- and moderate-income residents of San Francisco’s Mission District, a historically Latino area. The goal of the campaign was to generate awareness of MEDA’s economic security initiatives and boost participation in its programs. By implementing strategic media outreach and conducting an effective media ad-buy campaign, Mosaico saturated local media with MEDA’s initiatives. The result: leaders of the organization saw an increase in the community’s awareness of MEDA and growth in the number of participants at its events. Latinos are very community-focused, so by designing PR and advertising messaging that resonates with their needs, brands can establish themselves as the answers to what community members are seeking.

4.       Engage Digitally

The median age of American Hispanics is 28, compared to 32 for African Americans and 42 for Caucasians. Even more noteworthy is the median age of the American-born Hispanics – just 18 years. As of 2012, 78 percent of Latinos surveyed by the Pew Hispanic Research Center said they go online, and 68 percent reported they visit a social networking site. In an effort to engage with this audience, Kellogg’s launched DiasGrandiosos.com, a website that offers recipes and lifestyle articles designed to reach and engage with the American Hispanic consumer. The site is a great example of how brands can create shareable, culturally relevant content that leads back to a branded website.

5.       Invest now and gain a competitive advantage in the future

By implementing marketing initiatives that target the Hispanic audience now, brands will be one step ahead of their competition in the future. As the audience continues to grow, marketers would be wise to reach out to it now and see what works before it becomes an even larger segment of the population. Companies that are currently reaching out to Hispanics should evaluate their campaigns to ensure that they are engaging with them in a culturally relevant, productive way.

For more information on how you can most effectively reach Hispanic consumers, please visit www.mosaicopublicrelations.com.

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