Goals

Effective public relations is strategic; it has a purpose. Each public relations action should be designed and intended to achieve something for the organization or person developing it. Goals are an important part of developing your public relations strategy and evolve from your formative or background research. A goal is a general statement of what you hope to achieve with your public relations action(s)—the outcomes expected from the public relations effort. A goal is tied to the problem statement that was developed from your formative research. You cannot create a goal until you under-stand the public relations situation. The goal is designed to eliminate the public relations problem and indicates what needs to be changed. Goals are sometimes called directional statements because they provide the overall direction for the public relations actions. Goals are general statements of where you want the public relations action to go.

A few examples will help to clarify the discussion of goals. Consider these two goals: (a) “to increase awareness of the GM Cobalt” and (b) “to improve community perceptions of Merck.” The Cobalt is the new automobile model for GM. The problem is that people may not know about it and, therefore, may not consider it an option when buying a new car. The general solution (direction) is to create awareness of the Cobalt. Merck personnel may have found that local communities where they operate do not believe they are good corporate citi-zens. The general solution (direction) is to improve community perceptions of Merck. The goals are vague; we do not have a clear idea of the exact out-come that is desired. Objectives provide the specific outcomes for the public relations actions.

Objectives are specific and measurable, whereas a goal is vague and probably not measurable (see Objectives). To translate our two goals into objectives requires much more detail. Here are two potential objectives that could be drawn from our original goals: (a) “to make 75 percent of potential compact car buyers aware of Cobalt as a purchasing option” and (b) “to increase perceptions of Merck as a strong corporate citizen from 20 to 40 percent in the communities where Merck has facilities.” In each case, the objectives provide more detail. The Cobalt objective specifies the target percentage of awareness (75 percent) and the specific target public (potential compare car buyers). The Merck objective seeks a specific increase in perceptions of “strong corporate citizen” (from 20 to 40 percent) among a specific target public (people in communi-ties where Merck has facilities).

Goals are dangerous when they become confused with objectives. If a goal is used instead of an objective, proper evaluative research is impossible. A goal is simply too vague and offers no true measure of success or failure. The public relations practitioner will be unable to clearly determine if his or her strategy was successful. Let us return to the sample goal “to improve community perceptions of Merck.” What is your measure of success or failure? Do you succeed if just one member of the commu-nity expresses a more positive perception of Merck? You cannot determine the most effective way to assess your efforts if you only have goals.

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