Product and campaign launches in regulated industries

Product and campaign launches are rarely simple. In regulated industries, communications teams are increasingly responsible not just for promoting launches, but helping determine whether they are viable in the first place.

PR and communications professionals need to work within strict regulatory frameworks, keep up with policy changes, and ensure messaging remains compliant across every market. A misstep can lead to reputational damage, regulatory action, or loss of public trust.

Telum Media spoke with senior in-house and agency PR and communications professionals working across the finance sector to understand how teams can balance stakeholder ambition with regulatory responsibility, navigate grey areas, and manage risk when launching products across multiple markets.

Bring communications in before plans are set
For Prisita Menon, PayPal’s Head of Communications, Asia, communications teams are most effective when they are involved before a go-to-market strategy is finalised.

"As strategic advisors, in-house communications teams play a critical role at the intersection of commercial ambition and regulatory responsibility. Ideally, we should be involved early in shaping go-to-market strategies, helping to anticipate risks and define messaging approaches before plans are fully formed.”

That early involvement is not always guaranteed, however. Prisita warns that tight timelines and misconceptions about when communications should be engaged can limit early input.

"Commercial priorities often move at speed, driven by market dynamics and business goals. This can make it challenging for cross-functional teams such as legal, compliance, marketing, and communications to stay aligned," she said.

For communications professionals, the challenge is often less about reacting to risk and more about identifying potential friction points before a launch strategy is fully developed. That means understanding stakeholder objectives and mapping them against regulatory requirements, industry standards, and customer expectations.

Joyce Lee, APAC Account Director at Montieth SPRG in Hong Kong, adds an agency perspective. For her, the work starts with understanding what the client wants to achieve and what audiences in each market need. But most importantly, underneath both sits what regulators allow - which is what she describes as the foundation everything else is built on.

"Agencies that get this right are in the room from day one, before the strategy is locked," she said.

Scott Schuberg, Managing Director of Cognito in Australia, said communications advice can also shape decisions before a launch is fully formed.

"...as much as communications can be considered the end point of operations, it is common that strategic communications advice can drive operational requirements - the tail does wag the dog, on occasion."

Get the right people in the room early
Prisita advised that in-house communications teams should not operate in silos. Instead, they should facilitate scenario planning with key decision-makers to surface trade-offs early and reduce friction.

"Cross-functional input is essential when navigating regulatory grey areas. Communications teams should actively consult stakeholders to form well-rounded recommendations," she said.

That coordination becomes particularly important in markets where licensing, permissions, or regulatory expectations differ from a brand's home market.

Scott said compliance should help guide how communications are managed when entering new markets.

"Although it can really pour cold water on what might be an otherwise-eminently-saleable campaign to the media, a firm compliance function should advise the process for managing comms in new markets, in conjunction with the reasonable requirement to profile a company's story."

Prisita said teams should consider which marketing guardrails apply when entering a non-licensed market, as well as the regulatory implications or reputational risks of not adhering to them. She added that, for in-house comms teams, external expertise can be helpful.

Public affairs consultancies can provide in-depth analysis of local regulations and offer an independent viewpoint. If external partners are not feasible, in-house government relations teams should be consulted early, as their insights often underpin communications strategy.

Build messages around what regulators allow
In regulated industries, a strong message is not enough - it needs to be permissible.

"In regulated sectors like financial services, what can be promoted is very clearly defined, and not everything a client wants to say is legally allowed to be promoted directly to their customers," Joyce said.

Audience, channel, and jurisdiction all matter. A message suitable for one investor segment or market may not be appropriate for another. She added that rules are not always consistent or evenly enforced across markets, so communicators need to understand where grey areas may exist.

Using crypto-linked sports betting promotions as an example, Joyce said: "It is banned in China and South Korea, but not categorically off-limits across the rest of APAC. In many markets it sits in a grey zone while regulators are still actively reviewing the rules.”

For communications teams, this means each channel needs clear guardrails. Earned media, paid media, EDMs, websites, and promotional material may all carry different risks, even when they support the same launch.

Scott explains that specialist financial services agencies need to balance campaign delivery with a higher responsibility to protect reputation. He said that responsibility extends beyond earned media.

"I know from personal experience that in Australia, the Australian Securities and Investments Commission (ASIC) and the Australian Prudential Regulation Authority (APRA) case officers are reading what brands say - not just in earned and paid media campaigns, but below-the-line EDMs, websites and promotional material as well."

This makes consistency across the full communications ecosystem essential. A cautious media statement can be undermined by stronger claims on a website, email campaign, promotional asset, or sponsored content.

Scott identified paid editorial-style activity as one grey area for regulated brands to be aware of.

"If I were to pick an example of a grey area, it would be trade publications that, in exchange for a fee, repackage prescriptive corporate communications as earned editorial, without relevant sponsored or advertorial disclaimers. Given the rise of GEO, this has become an attractive commercial opportunity for some publishers, and my advice would be not to use this tactic for clients in heavily regulated industries."

Treat each market as its own communications environment
For multi-market launches, respondents pointed to the risk of assuming a central message will work across different jurisdictions.

"The biggest risk is assuming one message fits all markets, and only realising it doesn't after the launch," Joyce said.

Joyce cited AI as one example. In the US, she said the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) is actively targeting firms making unsubstantiated claims about AI-driven portfolio management. In APAC, regulators are engaging with AI innovation within defined guardrails, including Hong Kong’s GenAI Sandbox++ and Singapore's Project MindForge.

"Managing that risk comes down to diligence, transparency, and judgement. Build the communications strategy market by market. Tier the messaging by audience and jurisdiction before anything goes out," Joyce said.

Prisita said the same risk applies across regulatory, cultural, and customer contexts.

"Misalignment at the local level, whether in terms of regulatory compliance, cultural nuance, or customer expectations, can quickly lead to reputational risk, regulatory scrutiny, or loss of consumer trust."

Local adaptation should be built into launch planning from the start. Prisita said in-market teams can bring critical insight into local sensitivities, regulatory frameworks, and audience behaviours.

Closed-group pilot campaigns can also reduce risk before a full rollout.

She explained: "These allow teams to validate messaging effectiveness, identify potential cultural or linguistic misinterpretations, and refine positioning before full-scale rollout."

Once the campaign is live, monitoring becomes just as important as preparation.

"Social listening and media tracking across markets enable communications teams to quickly identify emerging sentiment, particularly negative or misinformed narratives. This allows for timely intervention and escalation, preventing isolated issues from evolving into broader reputational challenges," Prisita said.

Know when to pause or change the approach
In regulated industries, strong communications advice sometimes means slowing a launch down, narrowing the scope, or changing the channel strategy.

According to Joyce, issues are much easier to address during planning than after launch. If risks are clear, communicators should advise clients or internal stakeholders to engage regulators early. If something goes wrong, they should address it proactively.

Agencies should also be prepared to tell clients when they are not ready.

"Sometimes the most valuable thing an agency can do is tell a client to hold off until they are comprehensively prepared, in all respects, or to push back on positioning that could expose them to regulatory risk," Joyce said.

"That's the difference between being truly strategic as a trusted advisor and a firm that just executes."

Scott said this is particularly relevant in fintech, where fast-scaling companies may face pressure to enter new markets, meet investor expectations, and deliver ambitious go-to-market plans.

"Rather than looking at media campaigns as a means for a small operation to generate interest and inbound leads, they should really separate marketing communications from corporate communications."

That distinction matters as a campaign designed to build market credibility may need a different approach from one designed to generate leads. If local governance or regulatory resources are still developing, a corporate narrative about market entry may be more appropriate than product-led promotion.

"The bottom line is that it is paramount to please regulators in new markets and establish communications that are appropriate to a brand’s level of local governance. This doesn't mean you need an enormous team - we've seen small teams execute very effective go-to-market campaigns in new markets, using expert consultants in public affairs, fractional CMOs etc."

For PR and communications teams, the goal is to help organisations launch with more precision, fewer surprises, and stronger protection for reputation, trust, and regulatory relationships. In regulated industries, the strongest communications advice shapes what is said, who it reaches, where it appears, and whether the business is ready to stand behind it.