By: Erin Boyd
A big part of our public relations campaign consists of conducting our own primary research for our client Connections For Life. Our class has finally gotten IRB approval, so Belle Public Relations is now able to distribute our surveys to our key audiences. We have decided to target three churches, Christ the King Catholic Church, St. Alban’s Episcopal Church and Healing Place Church, to conduct our research. Last week, Alexis Nicaud and I went to Christ the King on Louisiana State University’s campus to hand out our surveys. Every Thursday at noon, the church gives out free lunch to students. Our group agreed that this would be the ideal time to hand out surveys because it would give us more responses and a better representation of how the LSU community feels about Connections For Life.
When Alexis and I arrived at Christ the King, we were overwhelmed by how many students had turned out for lunch. We decided that the best way to get started would be to walk up to different tables of people eating lunch and politely ask them to take the survey for our class. We briefly explained what Connections For Life is and what it does for the Baton Rouge community. As an added incentive to take the survey, we also brought cookies for those who completed it. We were able to hand out all of our surveys and the majority of the surveys were returned by the end of our time there. It was a successful first outing for Belle Public Relations and we look forward to interacting with parishioners are at St. Alban’s and Healing Place.
Photo found at: http://thecatholiccommentator.org/pages/?p=18052
When it comes to research, the importance of personally handing out surveys cannot be diminished because it gives the community an opportunity to voice their opinions about your client. According to an article by Snap Surveys, there are four main reasons to conduct research with surveys:
- Uncover answers
- Evoke discussion
- Base decisions on objective information
- Compare results
At the end of the semester after “Fashion For A Cause,” Belle Public Relations will administer the survey again to the same three churches. Our hope is that through the event, awareness of Connections For Life will have risen throughout the community and will be reflected in the survey results.
Photo found at: http://paveoncampus.org/about-pave/pave-survey
PR Campaigns is a service-learning class and going out into the community is at the core of the curriculum. By working with the public, we gain a greater knowledge of the community and reinforce what is taught in class with real world experience.
Erin Boyd is a senior studying public relations at LSU Manship School of Mass Communication. Connect with Erin on LinkedIn.
Belle Public Relations 