“You can do your own PR; you don’t need to hire a publicist.”
I’ve heard this many times, and I don’t necessarily disagree that some business owners can pitch their own products or services effectively. But I always wonder if the person saying it understands there is a difference between PR (Public Relations) and publicity. The terms are often used interchangeably and shouldn’t be.
Seth Godin explained it well in a blog post last March: “Publicity is helpful, but it’s not PR. PR is the strategic crafting of your story. It’s the focused examination of your interactions and tactics and products and pricing that, when combined, determine what and how people talk about you,” he wrote. In a nutshell: getting a hit in InStyle or Real Simple is fabulous – it’s great publicity, but media relations is just one step in a strategic PR program designed to build both your brand and your bottom line.
Crafting your story is critical for building your brand. An authentic brand story makes you memorable; it allows you to differentiate yourself from your competition and helps bring your brand to life. It’s a very important first step in the development of your Public Relations and Marketing plan. To start, it provides a context for pitch angles and helps your pitch stand out from the hundreds of others sitting in an editor’s inbox. (By the way, a well-respected publicist can also help a pitch stand out because of the relationships she has developed with editors.) A good story also gives your sales team something to talk about; provides content for marketing materials and an outline for your social media efforts (blog topics, Twitter posts, online communities to join, etc.) Overall, a good story communicated consistently throughout all your PR and marketing efforts is essential.
Once your story is crafted and told, it is important to guard that story. This is the focused examination Seth Godin refers to. If you don’t ensure that your product delivers the benefits promised; that your staff provides the level of customer service guaranteed; that your products live up to your claims (i.e. are truly BPA-free/Green/100% Organic, etc,) word of mouth, especially powerful in the age of social media, will quickly begin telling a new story.
This is where the “bottom line” comes in. Guard your story (deliver what you’ve promised) and leverage what people are saying about you. Great publicity can only deliver so much, but when media hits are incorporated into a larger PR and Marketing program, the impact of these hits has the potential to deliver sustained sales and build brand awareness.
Fortunately, entrepreneurs have a lot of opportunities to leverage media hits these days:
• Sales reps leverage the credibility media coverage offers to open new accounts and get current accounts excited about your brand;
• Media coverage is shared immediately via email, Twitter, Facebook, etc. with current and prospective customers/clients to keep your brand top of mind;
• Hits are posted on your website press page and included in your SEO key words and phrases;
• Reprints are strategically positioned at tradeshows to capture buyers’ attention and draw them into your booth;
• Reprints are provided to retailers for POP displays;
• Coverage is compiled to give your brand credibility and tell your business story to new audience; and
• When one sale becomes two or three or even more because the client has a great experience or loves your product and tells her friends.
If you’re ready to start telling your story, please join me February 2 for the P2P Workshop, Building Your Brand and Your Bottom Line: How to develop and execute strategic PR programming. I hope to see you there!
Karie Reynolds is the co-founder of Grand Avenue Public Relations, a boutique firm specializing in lifestyle public relations and marketing for women’s lifestyle brands with an emphasis on mom & baby, home and fashion. In January 2009, the Grand Avenue Baby Showroom opened in the heart of Los Angeles’ Kids business to help companies translate media and celebrity exposure into sales by integrating PR and Sales to achieve maximum results.
