posted on April 2, 2016 by

17 Reasons To Send A Press Release

Have you ever thought of using press releases to promote your business to your customers and prospects?

 

Using press releases is a form of PR or public relations.

The Chartered Institute of Public Relations says: “Public relations is about reputation – the result of what you do, what you say and what others say about you.”


It adds: “Public Relations is the discipline which looks after reputation, with the aim of earning understanding and support and influencing opinion and behaviour.


“It is the planned and sustained effort to establish and maintain goodwill and mutual understanding between an organisation and its publics.”

 

So, why should YOU send a press release?

 

Here’s 17 reasons to do so:

 

  1. Media coverage from a press release can drive valuable traffic to your website
  2. It can position your company and its products and services in the minds of your customers and potential new customers more easily than traditional advertising (or online advertising)
  3. It is much cheaper than advertising
  4. It helps to build your brand
  5. You can say things in a press release that you can’t say in an advertisement
  6. Appearing in a local newspaper, business magazine or trade publication (or even on radio or television) gives your business massive credibility amongst your customers and potential new customers
  7. It can help to position you, a member of staff, or your company as ‘the expert’ in your field and give you a competitive advantage. Likewise, it can showcase your products as the ‘best in the market’
  8. It can help generate sales enquiries and new customers
  9. It can help your business get more coverage online
  10. You can use the content of a press release for 1 or more posts on social media
  11. Brainstorming ideas for news stories can highlight successes internally within a business (and even make staff feel better)
  12. A press release can help to create goodwill between your company and your customers, potential new customers, employees, shareholders, and even suppliers
  13. It can help to protect your corporate reputation in case of negative media coverage
  14. It can help to influence buying behaviour of your customers and potential new customers
  15. It can help your company to earn understanding and support from customers, potential new customers, employees, suppliers and even shareholders
  16. It can help tell the world what your business is good at, how your products and services can help your customers and why customers and potential customers should buy from you rather than your competitors (but you have to careful how you do this!)
  17. The content of a press release in a news stories in a newspaper, magazine or online is viewed as far more credible (i.e. true) than anything you can say in an advertisement

 

 

Filed Under: Public Relations Tagged With:
posted on October 21, 2013 by

The Social Reboot

web-design-serviceAs a marketing expert, I spend my days (and some nights) working to improve the customer engagement, branding, and overall image of my clients.

This is a never-ending job as business and marketing is always evolving due to constant developments in technology, methods, and practices, and I need to do my best to keep up for the sake of my clients.

As a result, the last company I come to address the marketing issues for, is usually my own, and I never really get to practice what I preach with Red Flame Marketing.

However, that’s all about to change as, over the coming months, I’m going to overhaul my online marketing, explaining the reasons for my changes as I go, and turn all of my social media channels into pages that I’m proud to have representing my company.

Most importantly, I’m going to demonstrate how you can apply the same techniques to your business, as well as tips on lead generation, blogs and content, and social media etiquette, as we gradually explore the world of modern marketing.

So, consider this the starting pistol, and make sure you are following Red Flame Marketing on Facebook, Twitter, Google+ and LinkedIn, so you can see the full transformation and the effect it has, as well as exclusive content for users on each page.

Finally, make sure you check back here, as there will be more content on the dos and don’ts of modern marketing and monthly updates on this social media reboot. Meeting regularly to talk about marketing is a good practice to get into, so let’s make this our regular meeting place, as good marketing requires time, effort, and a certain amount of dedication to get right.

Get Our Latest, Free Marketing Tips Here.

Filed Under: Public Relations, Social Media For Business Tagged With: , , , , , , , , , ,
posted on March 14, 2012 by

Get a plan in place BEFORE the crisis happens

5 PR lessons from the Kony PR campaign

The link above is well worth a read for any organisation – public or private sector, large or small.

This is some good advice to help any organisation deal with possible negative PR or a backlash to any pro-active PR it is trying to undertake.

 

The lesson is to have a crisis communications plan in place AS well as a pro-active communications plan or in fact as part of your PR campaign.

It’s rare, however, in my experience, that companies, particularly SMEs, have both a marketing or PR campaign and a crisis communications plan.

Most don’t usually have either.

The ramifications, however, of damage to a company’s reputation can be dramatic – from turning customers away to putting off future employees, and even discouraging investors.

It can often lead to the beginning of the end for the company.

A crisis communications plan helps people to respond more calmly in what can be a highly stressful time.

It can also help people to respond more clearly and avoid them ‘losing their heads’ in a crisis and saying or doing something to exacerbate the situation.

A good crisis communications plan should also clearly delegate the likely roles to different people in an organisation.

For example, who is going to approve statements to the press?

Who is going to draft them?

Does the organisation have the mobile telephone or home telephone numbers of key personnel likely to be involved in a response to a crisis?

Can you easily set up space within your office to respond to a crisis?

Likewise, other questions like ‘what happens if the MD is sat on a beach 3,000 miles away when the factory blows up?’ need to be answered following lots of scenario planning.

Who is second in command or next best placed to front the organisation?

As part of the decision to whom a task is delegated consideration should be given to any appropriate training needs.

We could all see that Tony Hayward was not the right man to front BP in media interviews following the Gulf of Mexico leak in 2010.

For example, does the CEO or MD need some media training to handle radio or television interviews?

If the latter is lacking in confidence or does not naturally present well it may be worthwhile identifying other senior members of the organisation to front any broadcast media interviews.

There’s a lot more to developing a good crisis communications plan but it should form the bulk of any disaster recovery plan that all organisations should take the time to put in place.

Filed Under: Public Relations