Let’s start with this question: What is PR, a.k.a., Public Relations?
I like to tell my clients the following phrase that I learned as an 8-year-old being raised by a PR Executive: “Advertising is something you pay for, PR is something you pray for.”
There’s a difference, a big difference, between PR and advertising. While PR and advertising executives both have the same goals for their clients – that is, promoting them – PR people and advertising people go about promoting their clients differently. The ROI is vastly different, not only because of the end result but also because of the vastly different dollar amounts attached to those strategies.
PR executives secure “free” or “earned” media for their clients – an article in a newspaper, for example.
Advertising executives secure “paid” media for their clients – an ad in a newspaper.
Paying for a message versus being acknowledged for your message is very different. And more important, it’s a difference that the viewer/reader – that is, your target market – recognizes.
Bottom line: PR is about getting the media and the community to “endorse” you or your product, to wax poetic about you and what you do, to talk about your platform, to validate your messaging while advertising is about paying to be able to say those things to the public about yourself.
Again, people can see the difference.
You are a consumer. Don’t you see the difference when you read an article of value about a business versus seeing an advertisement (paid for messaging) about a business?
But I’m not here to knock advertising. There’s a place for advertising for some businesses. Since PR is in my blood, and it’s what I do for a living, the advertising talk is now over. From here on out, we’re focusing solely on PR.
A good PR person can take a company’s message, platform and mission, find story angles that will attract the interest of the media and the community/public, write that/those angles into a pitch or a press release, and deliver the client what we call a media landing (examples of PR landings-link to portfolio).
PR is key to every business; it doesn’t matter if you are large or small. There’s a misconstrued impression that PR is a big business strategy and that’s because all too often SMB’s don’t think they have the budget for PR. But, in the age of social media, PR is even more cost-effective — more priceless – than it ever was. Check out my piece in the Huffington Post about why PR and social media are BFFL’s, (Best Friends For Life), In the Age of Social Media, Why PR Should Matter to Businesses, Both Small and Large.
If your goals include…
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getting people to know about you (increase awareness)
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getting people to value you (or your service)
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increasing sales
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promoting word of mouth
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continuing to grow
…then PR is the ticket.
What kind of PR do you want? It’s one of the questions we ask when discussing goals with our clients (link-read our blog about how important it is to define your goals). We not only ask about business goals – short-and long-term — but also PR goals. Are your goals as a business to get everyone in the United States (the world?) to know about you? In other words, do you have/want a national business presence? Will it help your business grow if people in Iowa know about you, or only if people within a radius of 5 miles know about you?
Scenario #1: Business-Doctor
Goal (short- and long-term):
- Increase patient base to local, Rockville, Maryland practice.
- Increase referrals from Montgomery County, Maryland businesses/doctors offices.
- Sell business in 20 years to a local doctor.
Public Relations approach: Since being on the Today Show — while exciting — would have a poor ROI for this particular doctor’s goals. Again, cool to be on the Today Show, but what’s the point if 99% of the 6-million watching likely don’t live within a 5-miles radius of the doctor’s office.
Scenario #2: Business-Retail
Goals (short- and long-term):
- Increase sales in the local Bethesda, Maryland store
- Open franchise locations throughout the country.
Public Relations approach: Because the retailer has a goal of open retail stores throughout the country, being on the Today Show is a fantastic return on investment. 6-million people will hear about the business that could be opening in their town in the next few years.
A PR executive’s job is to get their client’s story to the correct journalist with information that would be interesting or enticing to the consumer (i.e. media outlet’s target market), favorable to the client, content driven and filled with the client’s messaging, and eye-catching. What’s eye catching? Anything that fits into the following categories makes a journalist pant over a story:
- Something that amazes them and makes them say “wow.”
- Something that “turns them on.” Sex piques interest.
- Make it about money – making money, losing money, saving money
- Make their stomach churn – it still holds that, “if it bleeds, it leads.”
- Make it emotional – emotion sells.
- Tell a really good story
- Make it local to the community
- Educate them about something they don’t know.
But remember how I started – “PR is something you pray for.” Public Relations has never been about a quick fix. It’s about momentum. It’s about building an interest and popularity. A business isn’t going to get a ton of customers because one article was written. Instead, it’s about time and relationships and, in the 21st Century, it’s about social media.
Milk it! These days, PR isn’t only about the event. It’s also about what you do after you get the coverage. Shout out about it! Create a PR strategy to share info, and get your target market engaged. Make your PR viral and resurrect it. A year after your article was in the paper, talk about it again. For example, we have a concept called, “Throw back Thursday.” Every Thursday we shout out about media coverage we have landed for our clients in the past. It helps our clients and it reminds the potential client that we are good at what we do.
And finally, don’t forget the SEO. Make sure you are consistently using the same keywords when linking from your own media. Ask your friends and fans to do the same. Those articles will have a profound impact on your SEO.
