By Mark Macias
Founder of MACIAS PR | Former NBC Executive Producer
Walk into almost any industry and you’ll see the same problem. Companies describe themselves with similar words and repeat similar talking points. From the outside, they blur together. That’s why I believe emotion, ideas and individuality are some of the most important ingredients in public relations. These three elements influence how people experience a story, and ultimately whether they remember the company or person behind it.
Andy Warhol demonstrated this principle in a completely different medium. A can of soup is one of the most ordinary objects imaginable. Millions of people walk past Campbell’s soup cans in grocery stores without giving them a second thought. Warhol didn’t invent the soup can or change what was inside it. He changed the context and, in doing so, made people look at something familiar in an entirely different way.
Great public relations can accomplish something similar. The raw material might be a company, an executive, proprietary data, a customer experience or an idea. Creativity doesn’t require changing the facts. It requires recognizing the unexpected, emotional or individual element within those facts that can make another person see them differently.
Why Is Creativity Important in Public Relations?
I spent years developing and approving stories as an Executive Producer with NBC and CBS in New York. That newsroom experience taught me that information alone rarely makes a memorable story. We were constantly surrounded by information. What separated one story from another was frequently the creative interpretation of that information.
This remains true today at MACIAS PR. A company might possess valuable data, an executive might have decades of expertise, or a startup might have developed impressive technology. Those are raw materials. The creative work begins when you determine what those ingredients actually mean to another person.
Think about the image accompanying this article. Nearly everyone at the conference table looks similar. They’re accomplished, professional and presumably intelligent, but visually they begin to blend together. Then there is one person in the middle whose personality is immediately apparent. He hasn’t diminished anyone else at the table. He has simply given us a reason to notice him.
PR faces the same challenge. Being credible gets you into the room. Being interesting gives people a reason to remember you after you leave.
Emotion Gives People a Reason to Care
Facts can establish credibility, but emotion frequently determines whether information stays with us. We remember stories that surprise us, make us curious, inspire us, worry us, make us laugh or challenge something we previously believed.
That doesn’t mean every PR campaign needs a heartbreaking personal story or some manufactured emotional hook. Emotion in storytelling can be much subtler. Curiosity is an emotion. Surprise is an emotion. Frustration, hope, fear, ambition and even disbelief can all create the tension that pulls someone deeper into a story.
Imagine two companies describing the same labor-market problem. One tells a reporter that employers are experiencing a shortage of workers. The other introduces the reporter to a factory owner who has orders sitting unfinished because he can’t find enough people locally to operate the production line. Perhaps workers are now being recruited from hundreds of miles away just to keep the factory running.
The underlying business issue hasn’t changed. But the second version allows us to experience the problem rather than merely process information about it. We can picture the idle machinery, the unfinished orders and the pressure facing the employer. The story now gives us something to feel.
That’s an important distinction in earned media. A reporter isn’t merely deciding whether your information is accurate. The reporter is also deciding whether readers, viewers or listeners will find it interesting enough to keep paying attention.
Ideas Make Familiar Information Feel New
One of the hardest things to do creatively is make someone reconsider something they believe they already understand. That’s where ideas become so important to PR. A strong idea can take familiar information and reveal an implication people haven’t considered. It can connect two developments that previously seemed unrelated, challenge conventional wisdom or show that an isolated event is actually evidence of a much larger change.
This is why I don’t believe great media strategy begins with asking, “What does the company want to announce?” A better creative process looks at what is happening inside and around the business and searches for the larger idea. Where is conventional wisdom wrong? What is happening here that could eventually affect many more people?
Those questions are not about manufacturing news. They’re about interpretation. Creativity helps uncover the idea hiding inside them.
Individuality Separates a Brand From the Competitive Shelf
Individuality matters because almost every company is sitting on a metaphorical shelf next to competitors selling something similar.
Look at the language businesses use to describe themselves. They’re innovative; disruptive and customer-focused. They have cutting-edge technology, experienced leadership and best-in-class solutions. When everyone uses the same language, those words stop differentiating anyone. It’s the communications equivalent of walking down a supermarket aisle where every package has the same design.
Individuality breaks that pattern. A distinctive point of view, an unconventional founder, an unexpected company culture or a willingness to challenge industry assumptions can give journalists and audiences something they can associate specifically with your brand.
The same principle applies to executives. Reporters have access to thousands of CEOs, economists, physicians, investors, technologists and other experts. Credentials establish whether someone is qualified to speak. They don’t necessarily explain why a journalist should call that person instead of the hundreds of other qualified experts available.
The executives who become memorable sources usually bring something more. They have a recognizable perspective and explain complicated subjects in interesting ways. These leaders might even be willing to say something thoughtful that isn’t already being repeated by the rest of their industry.
Individuality doesn’t mean being outrageous merely to attract attention. Different for the sake of different can become a gimmick. The goal is to uncover what is authentically distinctive and make sure it isn’t polished away by corporate messaging.
Why So Much Corporate PR Becomes Forgettable
There is a natural tendency inside organizations to remove anything that feels unusual. A distinctive phrase gets replaced with safer language. A provocative observation gets softened. Personality disappears during rounds of approvals. By the time everyone is comfortable with the message, sometimes there isn’t much left for an outsider to remember.
That’s one of the paradoxes of corporate communications. The desire to make a message acceptable to everyone inside the company can make it interesting to almost no one outside the company.
I saw the consequences of this from the newsroom side. Reporters receive an enormous amount of corporate information, and much of it follows the same formula. A company’s newest development is described as exciting, groundbreaking or innovative, followed by carefully approved quotes explaining how pleased executives are about it.
The problem isn’t necessarily that any of those statements are wrong. The problem is that they frequently don’t produce a feeling, introduce a new idea or reveal anything distinctive about the people involved. They disappear onto the same crowded shelf as everyone else.
Storytelling Is What Connects Emotion, Ideas and Individuality
This is where storytelling becomes critical to media coverage. A good story provides the structure that allows facts, emotion, ideas and people to work together.
The story might begin with an unexpected character rather than the company’s history. It might revolve around a conflict that illustrates a larger business problem. Proprietary data might provide the evidence, while an individual’s experience gives the numbers a human dimension. A counterintuitive observation from the CEO might become the idea that makes the journalist reconsider the subject.
None of this requires embellishing what happened. In fact, the strongest storytelling usually comes from looking more carefully at what is already there.
That’s one reason my background in journalism continues to influence how I approach PR. During my years at NBC and CBS, I wasn’t looking for companies to promote. I was looking for stories that would make viewers pay attention. Today, the perspective is reversed, but the fundamental question hasn’t changed: What is here that another human being will find interesting?
Great PR Doesn’t Change the Facts. It Changes the Way We See Them.
At MACIAS PR, I don’t believe the objective should be to make a company appear different simply for attention. The stronger approach is to discover what is already authentically different and find the story that allows other people to see it.
Information may tell people what your company does but emotion gives them a reason to care. Ideas give them a reason to think. Individuality gives them a reason to remember.
And when all three come together, you have the beginning of a great story.
About MACIAS PR
Mark Macias is the founder of MACIAS PR, an earned-media public relations agency specializing in media coverage, media relations and thought-leadership campaigns for healthcare, technology, AI and financial companies. Before founding MACIAS PR in 2009, Mark was an Executive Producer with NBC and CBS in New York, where he evaluated and approved story ideas. His newsroom experience now shapes the media strategies MACIAS PR uses to identify newsworthy angles and secure earned media coverage for clients.
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