This April, SMPR had the opportunity to support Children’s Week at the Capitol. This annual event is near and dear to our firm for many reasons. For starters, President and Partner Heidi Otway used to cover Children’s Day early in her career as a news reporter. For the mothers and aunts at our firm, it’s a reminder that thousands of individuals work tirelessly to ensure Florida is the best place for our children, nieces and nephews. Lastly, it’s a week surrounded by wonderful clients and partners as our firm works closely on many initiatives supporting children, teens and families. 

This year, however, was extra special as Children’s Week Florida™ celebrated 30 years. An event that began back in 1995 as a single day has grown into a week of activities with thousands of people from across the state. 

Although joining in the festivities would be more than enough, our firm was lucky enough to support their public and media relations initiative. 

Helping Children’s Week tell its story. 

As we all know, everything trickles down from leadership. While we all had our own perceptions and experiences with Children’s Week, we couldn’t tell its story without hearing directly from Erin Smeltzer, chief executive officer of the Children’s Forum and organizing partner of Children’s Week. 

Erin told us her story: her joys with Children’s Week, her experiences with partners and kiddos, her favorite part of each event. Together, we helped create what Children’s Week had become – a place where the world gets a little smaller. 

Message development was next. Collaborating with Erin and her internal communications team, we crafted a message that was clear, concise and effective. 

After that, it was easy. 

We connected with partners to ensure our message was clear; we called local news to help us elevate the upcoming event, tell their story and come out to witness some of the great initiatives happening each day; we worked with Children’s Week’s photographers to collect and distribute content quickly to media who couldn’t be on-site; and we collaborated with legislators, partners and the Children’s Week team to further the message through additional stories, web and social media platforms.  

Telling Children’s Week’s story reminded us why we do what we do: helping meaningful missions reach the audiences that matter most. We were honored to uphold a real legacy of care and connection that’s been 30 years in the making.

Whose story should we tell next? 

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