Now more than ever, businesses of all sizes are investing time and energy into diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) programs and denouncing racism, and many are paving the way for deeper acceptance and change.

Businesses who embrace diversity and inclusion as part of their corporate culture will often create smart business strategies, boost their financial performance, outperform less diverse peers on profitability, and make their employees feel valued and included.

Two-thirds of job seekers consider workplace diversity an important factor when considering employment opportunities. And consumers are paying attention to diversity in communications, too.

Consumers have an increasing control over a brands’ bottom line and most Americans (61%) find diversity in advertising important.

All the way back from the “I’d like to buy the world a Coke,” commercial to today, you can clearly see stand-out examples of diversity expressed in advertising. Savvy marketers are also demonstrating brand diversity in social campaigns.

But what about public relations and your media relations program?

Once you’ve established an inclusive culture that values diversity and equity, public relations can also play a critical role in communicating your culture and beliefs.

The opportunity to further share your diverse perspective lies within your media relations program.

Spokespeople
Look beyond the corner office and expand message and media training to employees who have an authentic voice and are also representative of your company culture.

Diversity of race, gender, age, physicality, ability, gender identity (LGBTQIA), experiences and life differences all hold merit.

Whenever the opportunity arises, pass the mic to someone else on the team who can carry the company message. And if that isn’t a company policy with any flexibility, then be sure to gather a diverse group around the table when writing press kit materials so that they are representative of a deeper, more inclusive voice, because diversity makes us smarter.

Messaging
Words matter. When PepsiCo’s CEO Indra Nooyi suggested women, “don’t like to crunch too loudly in public. And, they don’t lick their fingers generously and they don’t like to pour the little broken pieces and the flavor into their mouth,” she came under fire and received deep criticism for her “Lady Doritos” comments.

Her words were deeply offensive to women and were viewed as a sexist microaggression.

At all times, you should recognize what makes your business and its employees unique, interesting, different, valued, and helpful, and celebrated, and use this as the foundational messages for sharing your expertise in press releases and media interviews.

You can strengthen your ability to stay on message by writing a key message platform with inclusive language, that is devoid of any microaggressions or language that could be misinterpreted.

If your company or product serves a unique audience as part of your customer base, then lean into sharing why they are important to you. When doing so, consider using People First Language (PFL) if referring to people with a disability or diagnosis.

Your press release typically begins the conversation with the media and is your on-the-record statement that will live on for years to come both on your website’s newsroom, and anywhere it is picked up outside of your organization.

Leadership and a strong stance can ensure the foundational DEI aspects of your key messages, and heart of your news, stay intact whenever your press release undergoes edits and rewrites throughout desks and departments in your organization.

Language
If any significant part of your customer base or target audience speaks a language other than English, then look within your organization for a spokesperson that also speaks that language and invite them to your media training sessions.

If they are a competent spokesperson, then you can offer them up as a media interview source, or use them in a b-roll package aimed at non-English language media.

Translating press kit materials into another language and adding them to your online newsroom, and using them in outreach to applicable media, are two more ways to widen your inclusivity to diversify the conversation — expanding it to reach more people.

Visuals
When you are concepting your press kit materials, step back and use the widest criteria possible for diversity and inclusion. Does the image you’ve chosen to go on the wire or the web with your press release represent your target audiences: current and potential customers?

If not, then is there a fantastic user-generated image representative of someone’s diversity on one of your social channels that you could secure media rights to and use as part of the image package you send to bloggers, writers or editors?

If you can’t find what you need in-house, and user-generated content isn’t quite giving you what you really want, then turn to stock photography. Affect the Verb has a free stock photography series celebrating Black, Indigenous, people of color (BIPOC). (Be sure to give them credit for image use.)

And, when gathering media assets, the accessibility and understanding of your images and videos matter. The most recent ADA Website Accessibility guidelines under Title II of the ADA direct you to make sure all of your images are posted with and without text equivalents; any downloads are available in both text-based and PDF formats; and, audio descriptions and captions are available on all videos, among other guidelines.

Communicate Inclusively
As companies elevate their DEI programs, they should take the opportunity to also evolve and expand their communication opportunities.

Media relations, social media, advertising and marketing campaigns all work together to enhance their DEI communication goals. By looking inward before communicating outward for your next product launch or company announcement, you can create an earned media campaign that is reflective of your diverse, inclusive culture.