How is PR distributed? Most people generally see it as sending it for media coverage for it to be seen by many people. Below, are some actions that companies or an individual to take with media relations without sending out a single press release.
Event
Organizing events is a great way to build media relationships with media contacts. Having them be able to see, touch, smell, and hear about your brand will help them remember you.
Organizing an event for media contacts is a great way to build media relationships. By being able to see, touch, smell, and hear your brand, it will be in the minds of journalists. This increases the chances to be remembered because of the creativity and experience that is associated with your product.
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When there are good times, there have to be bad times. Most brands at some point or another will experience a few bumps along the way. Whether this is serious; such as your CEO making an offensive comment, or minor such as misspelling, you will need a protocol and personnel to help you navigate through this.
Having a plan as well as a strong media relationship is critical during this time. This allows you to respond quickly and get the public to your side so that your brand reputation survives. This as well as a company spokesperson or personal, trained staff, clear protocol, and quality briefing resources to keep your reputation intact.
Your employees are your foundation. Strong brands seek understanding and acceptance from not only the public but also those who are involved. This means that you have to develop your internal PR as much as you did with your relationship with the media. This can start with internal communication such as newsletters, events, and training.
Companies with employers who love their work environment are most likely to get coverage are their brand story and reputation are more credible. Internal communications also directly affect your external communication, especially during crisis times. Without communication, your staff can become worried, concedes, and will make assumptions about the situation.
It’s also important to be transparent with your staff as it can act as a safeguard in their position as your key ambassadors. So be sure to keep them in the loop. The company’s reputation is something that is built over time and having regular check-in with your employees allows them to be in the loop with the brand’s narrative most importantly they’re happy.
Strong media relationships require a lot of influence. Having thoughtful leadership helps you build your influence by showcasing your expertise, unique ideas, and original approach to the work you do. Humans by nature are tribal. To foster an understanding with your peers, the public, and the media, you will demonstrate deep knowledge of what your business is in as well as the core value and needs.
Through thoughtful leadership, you can build your reputation. This reputation is kay amongst your peers as it places you at the heart of the industry. To build this thought leadership, you need to identify experts in your company and listen to their ideas.
There are many ways to showcase these ideas. This includes op-eds or bylines to speaking at conferences and events, company websites like blogs, online newsrooms, or any social media platforms.
Here are a couple of examples where CEO uses their public personas to help their brand stand out:
Sara Blakely, CEO, and founder of SPANX uses her approachable Linkedin posts to communicate her brand purpose.
Marc Benioff, CEO of Salesforce wrote a timely Op-ed to reimagine the way we do business.
With nearly 5 billion people online every day, your company’s online reputation is crucial. Building an online presence can help an organization become a household name. So managing your SEO is crucial to becoming more findable as well as avoiding bad press.
Without intervention, one bad story or comet can jeopardize the search engine results page (SERP) and the social media timeline will be part of your brand’s history. To avoid this, work with your company’s SEO expert to build a domain authority so that you have more control over what people find when they look for you. Consider also paid ad placements to boost your SEO.
There are other digital strategies to build your online presence and reputation. Make sure you have consistent messaging across your platforms. So work with the marketing department to social proof when you’re posting. For example, if you’re posting product/service reviews, make sure they’re consistently good. If they are not, reach out to consumers to find out why.
People are more likely to trust opinions from people like them rather than a faceless brand. For reputation management, use an online newsroom where you can create a narrative for your media coverage. This also boosts your inbound PR.
PR and marketing have a symbiotic relationship. And digital activities are increasingly taking over communications. As these expand, they will intersect with each other. PR focuses on an area that is more long-term investments such as relationship building and reputation management, while marketing will get you quicker results and sales.
Having or not having a consistent brand narrative can make or break a company. You must work together with marketing and sales to make sure your company is aligned with your brand and product messaging. You need a strong company purpose and vision to use as a foundation for your messaging. Working closely with the internal timers allows you to build brand reputation and sales together.
Currently, business is going through a change. The “winner take all” mentality that dominated brands before is now being replaced by one that considers the common good. A business that doesn’t take action on its carbon footprint or its contribution to global inequality won’t survive in the long run.
So make sure that a portion of your company resources is going towards addressing these and other issues that society faces. A report by Edelman on COVID-19 is a great example of the shift in brand expectation. In this report, 71% of people agree that they will ost trust in brands forever if the brand is pulling profit over people.
Without demonstrating social responsibility, you can become obsolete. So make sure your brand is active and constantly showing your understanding of your responsivity with actions that will keep your reputation intact.
Nevertheless, building up your media relationship will keep you busy. But also take the time for a more holistic approach where you’re able to see the horizon and not neglect your stakeholders. You will find it easier to succeed in your business.
