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Looking for a PR company? Not sure of the benefits of PR?
If you’ve heard about the power of PR, but you’re not sure about the benefits it can bring, here’s our simple guide to why PR can transform the fortunes of a business.
The media is the most powerful developer of reputations
Coverage in the media will shape the way your customers perceive you. The media has no competitor in this respect.
Whether you’re a brand new company, or launching a new product, or you’re an established player trying to challenge the monopoly of market leaders, media endorsement can make or break your business.
Whether you receive TV coverage or column inches in a trade paper, the neutral, independent sanction of the press is far more powerful than the most emphatic word of mouth recommendation.
If you want people to believe in you, make sure first that the press believes in you.
An editorial is the ultimate advert
It’s true that advertising allows you to shape your own message and gives you complete control over the way your brand is positioned. It’s also true that when it comes down to editorial you’re in the hands of the media.
But that’s why PR companies exist. They can make certain that your company and its messages are communicated to the media in the most effective way, ensuring not only that the journalist covers you, but also that the coverage reflects you in the best possible light.
That’s why PR companies seek to place specific messages about their clients in the media, and track for the take-up of those messages in subsequent coverage.
When it comes to comparing powerful advertising and a successful PR campaign, there’s only one winner. Top-quality editorial endorsement is the greatest stimulant a business can ever experience. Ask any successful business what the X-factor in marketing is, and they’ll tell you: “X = PR”.
PR is the most cost-effective marketing vehicle
PR is a far more cost-effective tool than advertising, database development and e-marketing through brokered lists. Yet PR support is available to you at a fraction of the spend of traditional above-the-line communications. One positive endorsement in a high circulation – or highly targeted – media title often produces a spike in traffic to your website or call centre. If you’re a trade operation, positive coverage can stimulate direct enquiries, and will make your business targets more responsive to your sales and marketing campaigns.
PR is vital to online search (SEO)
PR is now one of the most effective weapons in SEO (Search Engine Optimisation) or “natural search”, on search engines, and is proving to be one of the most effective weapons in helping companies command the highest possible rankings.
Take up of your press announcements by wires and websites creates online coverage which in turn quickly gets picked up by the search engines. The outcome? Your company will be ‘discovered’ by people using search engines in ways you’d never previously imagined, because of the sheer weight of search terms that produce a result which points to your site.
For this reason, online PR is now becoming a key element within PR companies’ strategies.
PR can improve your presence online
PR is spanning wider than it has before with the development of digital media and new technologies. Media outreach can cover one sector of the press, for example traditional print media, or it can straddle the wealth of information resources from online news sites and digital TV through to podcasting and forums.
Managing a company’s reputation is no longer just a focus on the national or trade press, it can also involve infiltrating forums and blogs to ensure that accurate and relevant information reaches the readers. Often online journalists receive details from a third party or scramble across the web to do research. By reaching out to these networks PR can make certain that a business is represented in the best possible light.
PR doesn’t just get customers interested in you!
Press coverage doesn’t just stoke sales, it develops market-wide interest in your brand. Typically, coverage can lead to requests for marketing partnerships, such as affiliate relationships, endorsements and sponsorships.
PR develops speaker and expert opportunities
Newspapers, conference organisers and other media and marketing channel are constantly on the lookout for experts, either for speaker platforms or to join panels, think tanks or other types of event. Press coverage helps position your experts as industry gurus, and press coverage is much more likely to lead to them being invited to participate in events.
PR is essential to recruitment and to staff motivation
Press coverage communicates to your staff that your company is going places. Keeping staff informed about your latest media profiling is vital both to motivation, and to ensuring that staff act as roving ambassadors for your company.
Just as importantly, press coverage often stimulates interest from prospective employees. Companies often witness an increase in hits on the recruitment section of their website – and the arrival of new CVs - immediately after coverage appears.