7 Reasons Why… PR

The news is everywhere – phones, televisions, radio, we even have virtual assistants such as Google and Alexa to read it to us so that we don’t have to. In our latest blog, our team of PR gurus have put together their top 7 reasons why you should adopt a PR strategy for your business.

Increases Brand Awareness

Public relations, (or PR as it’s more commonly known), is a great method to directly target your audience. The more coverage that your business gets in the press, the more people likely to see your brand. 

That’s why strategically, selecting and building a media list of publications that you want to appear in is essential. For example, for a B2B business, a segment of their target market may only make up 15% of a local lifestyle magazine. So, a trade magazine or local business magazine is more likely to attract the attention of, and build awareness within this specific target market.

Strategically Manage Important Messages

Whether it’s news of growth, new team additions or your business’ birthday, PR gets these messages out to the media and hopefully, your target market. 

PR is all about being timely. You wouldn’t appreciate a tabloid printing a story that dates back 2 months that you’ve already read, would you? It’s important to communicate your brands news in the right way, at the right time. 

We also know that from time to time, there’s less positive news that has to be shared, too. In this situation, keeping your message clear and consistent is crucial. A PR professional will help ensure that the correct facts, figures and concise information is shared, limiting the risk of misconstrued stories or misinterpretations appearing in the headlines.

Grow Brand Visibility

As well as brand awareness, visibility is also important to consumers of both B2B and B2C brands. People like to know more about your business and what goes on behind the scenes. If this is carefully managed it can lead to an increase in trust. 

For example, sharing a piece about changes, growth or new team members gives your audience a window into your world. You’re allowing them to see snippets of what’s going on, and people love to read these stories.

Enhance Brand Reputation

Awareness and visibility are directly related to both brand trust and reputation. You’ll often notice when you flick through newspapers and magazines that there are adverts. These are paid for, whereas editorial content, (articles), that PR campaigns are focused on getting, are free of charge. This type of content is perceived as more credible by consumers as they know that what they are reading has been picked up by an editor or reporter and included because of it relates to them, (the reader). Ultimately, this builds a reputation for the brand. 

That’s not to say though that paid PR and advertisement strategies should be discounted. Quite often, a good mix of both methods creates a good return for businesses. 

The title of the publication that your business gets featured in can also enhance your reputation. For example, a B2B business getting featured in a well-respected business magazine or trade publication can uplift consumer perceptions.

Drive Web Traffic

It’s extremely common to notice an uplift in website traffic following the implementation of a PR strategy. After reading about you, people often head online to learn more. Also, if your news gets featured in an online publication, they’ll often include a link back to your website in the piece. 

It’s important to note here that PR is not just a press release and getting featured in a newspaper. How many of us visited the Greggs website and store after they launched their vegan sausage roll in the style of an Apple product launch? That’s the power of PR!

Educate Your Target Market

An editorial feature in a newspaper can give you a platform to tell consumers more about your product or service. Managed correctly, PR can become a fantastic way to professionally educate your target audience about the pros of purchasing your product or service. Additionally, as PR also includes events such as product launches and media calls, you can use this method to reiterate your message in different ways, creating a consistent communications campaign.

Consistently Engage Your Audience

If you take a look at our social media pages, you’ll often see that we share when we’ve been in the news. Utilising PR gives you content that can be used across multiple platforms including social media and email marketing. If you have a press release written, this can also be adapted to blog format, giving you content for your website. 

There are so many reasons why PR strategies should be a part of your marketing plan, we struggled to narrow it down to 7! 

Here at Netbiz Group we believe there’s more to PR than just press releases, with this in mind we love to utilise various methods of communications with the aim of making your business stand out from the crowd. 

For us, it’s all about working with you to identify what’s going on in your business and finding the best way to shine the spotlight on your stories. Get in touch today to chat to our friendly team of experts. 

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