PR is powerful!

Posted on in Small Business Tips, SME Marketing

Why investing in PR is a great investment in your business…

You have a small business – you and your staff are really busy – running the business, contacting clients, keeping up with the books. PR is not on your radar – surely it’s not something a small business needs?

But every company, regardless of its size, lives or dies on its reputation. And you can only have a reputation if the right people know about you – that’s PR.

Likewise, if something goes wrong, your reputation can be at risk, especially in this day and age when everything happens so quickly over social media; it only takes a few shares on Twitter or Instagram to have a huge effect on your company. An expert in PR will know how to handle things.

There are many ways to get your information out there, once you’ve identified who you need to tell about your business, products or services. Social media, local press, national press, TV and radio – knowing how to approach them and get your information considered is a very useful skill.

Creating and managing a relationship with the people who work for these outlets is also vital.

What you should know about PR

Creating and maintaining relationships does not happen instantly – it will take time to see results in your business. Plus you need to have a good idea about your target audience – who are they, what are they interested in and how you can reach them.

Be realistic – you can’t expect every story to make the front page – it may not be as interesting to everyone else as it is to you! Furthermore, there are no guarantees that a press release will be published.

Making PR part of your business plan makes it far more effective – you will know what your goals are, and you can use PR to make them happen – whether it’s selling more product or getting your business name out there to a wider audience.

Do it yourself

If you have time, you can manage some of the PR yourself – you can send press releases, messages on social media and so on. See our handy guide below to writing the perfect press release.

A fully integrated marketing and PR plan is best designed by an expert – likewise if you have a PR crisis, a communications plan is something that a professional with the right experience should handle for you.

Writing the perfect press release

  1. Keep it snappy – most publications these days are short on staff and people don’t have time to read two pages of blurb to get to the story. You need to grab them with a snappy heading and good first paragraph that tells them what the story is.
  2. Send decent, high-res images with the press release – or offer a link to the images. If a journalist has to call you and then wait for images to arrive, you may have missed your chance.
  3. Make quotes interesting – a generic quote from the company owner about how delighted they are with the latest product and how it’s the best ever of its kind, is not going to get used. Think in soundbites.
  4. Always remember to include contact details for someone who is willing to field any questions.

If you would like to have a chat about your marketing requirements, please call Alison Page on tel: 07963 002065 or email: hello@alisonpagemarketing.co.uk. You can of course browse our website to see what our existing clients have to say about our work.