The challenge The European agrochemicals lobby had been facing mounting pressure in the regulatory arena and serious public scepticism about its products when Prospero was approached to develop an integrated pan-European communications strategy. The challenge was complicated by a long history of reactive, rather than proactive, communications and a general lack of confidence in the likelihood that any significant shifts could be generated in attitudes towards the agrochemicals industry. The solution We began by conducting a thorough internal communications audit to ascertain the issue-specific needs of the agrochemicals industry in 25 European countries. The audit revealed that there was significant potential for quick reputational wins on the media relations front in most of the participating countries, and we determined to make this a mainstay of the communications strategy. Qualitative testing of the industry's key messages also revealed that the vast majority being used were ineffective with the audiences they targeted. We therefore developed a completely new raft of country and context-specific messages, intended for integration into three issue-specific pan-European PR campaigns.
| The outcome We developed and deployed three linked PR campaigns on the benefits of agrochemicals, agrochemicals and food safety, and the sustainable use of agrochemicals – all intended to boost institutional and public awareness of the vital role that agrochemicals play. The campaigns included fully integrated media relations across the EU and sustained web-based promotions all rolled out in all of the national languages of the participating countries. Positive media coverage of the campaigns was widespread as was the media uptake of the most business-critical messages integrated into all three of the campaigns from the beginning. This sustained integrated campaign effort resulted in an IABC Gold Quill Award in the multicultural communications category in 2006. Read more about one of these linked campaigns (CommonGround) in the full IABC Work Plan.
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