1. This work was presented to an actual client. Client’s names and information have
been removed or altered to present this as a free sample.
Sample Brief Public Relations Strategy for Supermarket.
Drafted by Valentine K Butale

2. Social Public Relations Campaign
Current Situation: Public sentiment on the quality of Supermarket products and/or
service is on the negative and it is being escalated in public social network groups like
Name and Shame Botswana (Facebook).
Supermarket has inadequate customer feedback mechanisms in place to trace the sources
and reasons as to why there is negative opinions on product and/or service quality. This
may be the reason as to why customers resort to social network groups to express their
dissatisfaction.
Proposed Solution: A social Public Relations campaign integrated into Supermarket’
existing marketing strategy would assist in meeting the public at their point of
dissatisfaction. The major objective would be to shift the perception of the public on the
quality of products and services offered by Supermarket. Below are two strategies to roll
out a PR campaign:
 Social Network Public Relations: Virtually free PR can be rolled out through
Supermarket’ various social pages. Social media is where public dissatisfaction is
published and shared thus it would be best to combat it on that same platform. This
can be done by:
 Publicising Quality Measures: Supermarket may look into publicising the
measures they regularly take to ensure quality in their products. An example of
this is the way Go Fresh Botswana uses their facebook page to emphasize their
fruit and vegetable production process and its health benefits. If the public have
an idea of the extent of the measures taken to produce quality products and
service they will have a better appreciation of their Supermarket experience.
 Promoting the good aspects more: The public knows Supermarket as a great
employer of Batswana of various capabilities and backgrounds. Supermarket is
also perceived as being an affordable ‘proudly Botswana’ alternative to big
South African grocery stores. Such public perceptions can be leveraged.
Supermarket can use testimonies from their staff stating how working at
Supermarket has improved their lives. These stories will resonate a positive
feeling about Supermarket which in time may diminish the negative opinions.

3. Target Digital Mobile Advertising: Targeted Advertising is a practice where adverts that
are relevant to the person viewing them are placed on the media or platforms he/she
usually uses. Unlike traditional mass media advertising which displays a promotional
message to everyone regardless if it moves them to purchase or not, target advertising
only displays your adverts to those who will appreciate them and have a higher chance of
purchasing. It is cheaper but more efficient and very effective.
Lately it has been introduced to the mobile market with companies sending direct adverts
in the form of push messages to an audience that has already shown interest.Currently
this service only has one provider in Botswana being Incepta Digital.
Incepta Digital offers targeted mobile advertising in partnership with Orange Botswana
via the Orange Makoya service still in development. Users will be able to opt into the
service for free, choose what advert categories they would like to receive (example:
grocery, electronics, etc.) and then receive specials and other adverts in the form of an
SMS. The ease of access for the end user makes it a potentially lucrative advertising
investment.
Clients who want to advertise also have the option to use Dialogue Messages developed
on USSD (mobile banking is an example of this). Unlike Push Messages Dialogue
Messages allow for the end user to communicate back by choosing the labelled options
and clicking the send button. These could be good for feedback. Incepta Digital have also
stated that they have services where advertisers have the ability to check if their return on
investment is adequate, that is, that the adverts induce enough action to purchase in end
users.
Targeted Mobile Advertising does cost money but it is quite cheaper than traditional mass
advertising. Incepta charges a few Thebe per message at a package price of a certain
thousand messages. Many packages are available for both push messages and Dialogue
messages. As long as the character count does not exceed the 160 SMS characters limit,
the content can be anything the advertising client wants it to be. So uses for targeted
mobile advertising may include:
 Promotion of Specials,
 Notifying the public on company related issues (e.g change in shop closing times
etc.),
 Crises management (which could have been very effective on the public addressing
that Supermarket would have to re-call some bottled water).
 Feedback from buyers
 Notification on events and competitions.