PR is dead... Long live PR!

Is there still a place for public relations in today's digital world?

With all the hype about digital marketing there has been a big push for companies to develop their inbound marketing strategies.

Many businesses are rightly looking at how they can change their approach to marketing and make it less 'me-me-me' and more about attracting and engaging with potential customers.

So is traditional marketing dead? Are real world marketing activities, such as PR, consigned to the history books?

In our view, not at all! We believe there is still a very real case for traditional marketing, however, we all need to stop seeing things in two distinct categories - online and offline. We need to think about how we can integrate our marketing efforts so that everything is works in tandem and achieves the best return from our marketing dollars. Integrated Marketing to coin a phrase!

So, if someone tells you PR is dead, tell them to have another look. Tell them to look at how they can use PR in an integrated manner. Not as a one off tactic but part of an overall marketing strategy which works across both online and offline.

Briefing Your PR Agency

OK, you want to raise profile for either yourself or your business and decide to jump in and hire a PR agency. Great. There are lots of options available to you, many of which we have listed below. These will all serve to get you 'out there' and raise profile, but the question remains - why? What purpose are you serving by raising your profile? Yes, I know you want to raise your profile so that potential customers will see you and consider purchasing from you, but that's not a good enough brief. Everyone uses that line. You need to ask yourself what your overall marketing objectives are and how 'raising your profile' will meet these? For example, or objective could be that you an acquisition strategy and want to increase market share, or have alternatively you could have a large market share and you want to maintain this, i.e. a retention strategy? Each of these objectives will require a different approach and ultimately the message you will be conveying through your PR activity will be different.

So, if you think raising profile is a definite must, think it through. Think about your overall marketing strategy and the objectives you want to achieve, this will really help your agency to devise the best possible PR initiatives to acheive these objectives for you. Otherwise your profile raising will be shallow, puff marketing making you feel great 'cos your pic is in the paper. At the end of the day, what purpose does this serve?

Now we know what it is we want to achieve and have our overall marketing strategy nailed down, we can make sure our PR message fits in. It would be pretty wasteful to spend a fortune on say, newspaper ads, billboards, radio campaigns and then talk about something completely different with your PR activity. This is the true essence of integrating your marketing activities as the sum of the parts is always greater than the whole. Very few of us have the budget to really saturate a market with our chosen message. We need to make sure each of our activities carry the same over-arching message. The collective effect on our audience is that they may see a TV or newspaper ad and it might not really register, however, if there is a piece of commentary in several newspapers as a result of your PR activity then it may all build up in their consciousness and start to sink in. Add in your online activities - say, some Facebook ads, blogs on your website, retargeting and social media - all designed to carry the same overall message and part of the same over-arching strategy and you will be punching well above your budget. One-offs are proven to not work but if you pull your marketing activity together in an integrated fashion your message will start to cut through the hype.

What have you got to talk about?

OK, so now I know why I need to do some PR, what do I possible have that I can talk about?

Like all marketing activity, knowing your audience and what your key messages are is one of the first steps on your way to a successful PR strategy.

Some initiatives you could think about for your PR plan include:

• Senior personnel profiling
• Customer/large contract wins
• New product lines
• Company acquisitions
• Office moves
• Senior appointments
• Collaboration with partners
• Corporate social responsibility news
• Opinion pieces
• Market commentary

These represent just a few ideas to consider when looking at your PR plan and should be laid out in a PR Planner highlighting what you plan to do each month.

Get to know the media

Whilst writing a good press release and organising a great photo shoot all helps with your PR strategy, it will be to no avail if you don't get it published. Identify the key publications your target audience reads and find out who the editor is and who the main journalists are. Getting to know them will make it that little bit easier when it comes to trying to get something placed. If you don't know them and no-one you know can introduce you, try and bump into them at an event, consider calling them (not when they are on deadline!), or maybe even use LinkedIn to send to send them a 'short and snappy' introduction. Remember they are busy people who get up in the morning with blank pages to fill - don't get in the way and bug them - do the opposite, sell yourself as a way to help them fill some of that space. The trouble is, they are probably inundated with similar requests - it's up to you to find the right level of assertiveness. Too weak and you will be ignored or too pushy and you get a bad name.

Make it count!

OK, you've worked hard and your article has been placed, now what? Is that it?

Try and build in relevant Calls to Action (CTA's) in your PR message. It will be difficult to get your actual contact details or web address into an article by a journalist although an advertorial or by-lined article may be able to include some details. What you need to do though is develop a few hooks that readers can then follow up online with. Obviously you will want your website to be easily found if your CEO or company name is typed into Google. But what about your product names or other keywords used in the article? Having a good SEO plan will really help yo make your PR tangible and integrate with your inbound marketing strategy. Without a CTA you are still shouting your message into the ether and hoping someone will do something to find you. Make it easy for them and have some form of free offer, like a report, and let them know where to get it or failing that get you. This way you have turned your traditional marketing PR activity into an inbound activity!

Summary

This is just a flavour of what PR can do for your business but first and foremost we need to remember that traditional marketing activities are still as relevant in today's digital world - we just need to make sure we have robust plans in place and that we change our approach ever so slightly. No more issuing a press release with a sexy photo bragging about how great we are. That's too easy and what everyone else is doing. Try and be different and stand out. We need to find another way of trying to attract and interact with our target audience so that they take action and start to engage with us. Only then can we start to comprehend the possibility of generating quality leads that have a real chance of conversion into £$€.

Are you building an inbound marketing strategy for your business and using traditional marketing initiatives to drive interest online? We'd love to hear about what is working for you...