The Public Relations Blog

When preparing for a speaking engagement, you may tend to focus only on deciding the topic or preparing the speech. While those are challenging elements of speaking engagements, too often there’s not enough attention on other parts of preparation, such as what to wear to a speaking engagement. The way you dress and present yourself gives the audience their first impression about you and your company and continues to solidify their belief in you. Here are eight tips to help you decide what to wear for your upcoming speaking engagements. 

Writing and submitting a bylined article can offer many benefits for you and your company – it doesn’t have to be a daunting task. When you’re an expert in your field and within your company, there are other people and even other companies that will benefit from your expert knowledge, which is the first step in recognizing that you should create and write a bylined article for submission. Here are the top nine things you need to know before submitting articles for publication. 

Your company should look closer at this hidden gem opportunity.

Earning media coverage in outlets your target audience consumes is one goal you might be familiar with in your public relations efforts. One area of media coverage companies often overlook is their own industry publication and association outlets. Many companies don’t think these are worth their time because their clients aren’t consuming articles from those outlets. However, you should seek out and utilize industry and association publications because they’re a hidden gem that can boost your company more than you may realize. Here are three reasons why.

As the economy changes, so does consumer spending, which in turn impacts most every company. Decreases in your customers’ spending can negatively impact your company’s bottom line and decrease the things your company can spend money on. In some ways, it can become a vicious circle.

When your income decreases, your company usually cuts the “extras” first. While you may need to decrease unnecessary expenses, you should look at how cutting expenses and services may impact your company overall.

For some companies, especially those without a strong communication department or team, drafting of news releases is sometimes one of the more difficult things to write. While pitching may be a work of art, writing a news release is like a science project. There are many elements and best practices to writing a news release, so here are our top eight best practices for writing a news release:

Let's cover the big issue of external factors (that we can’t control no matter what) in public relations and what we can do about it!

When working as a vendor for a company, you need to always be on your “A” game. Sometimes when you aren’t at your highest performance, mistakes happen. Mistakes can also happen when you are on top of your game as well. It makes you feel worse when accidents happen that shouldn’t have happened. When a mistake happens – one you can control – you are often left with egg on your face.

Journalists are gearing up for a stronger year in the post-COVID-19 era

With the world returning to normalcy, journalists are coming to terms with the realities of a post-pandemic industry. After the pandemic compelled them to take a step back and restrategize at the initial stage of the outbreak, it’s yet again necessary for journalists to modify their work habits and preferences to suit the times.

Handle reporter calls and media interviews with tact and skill

Sometimes, a company might receive an unexpected call from individuals identifying themselves as news reporters. Organization spokespersons attend media interviews to represent their brand in the media. However, if the company representatives aren’t adequately trained for such situations, such engagement might end negatively.

Here’s how to successfully deal with reporter calls and handle media interviews.

Ace an in-person news interview by following these PR pro tips

Whether you are doing a live, in-studio interview or an interview on Zoom or Skype, you must prepare for it. For in-person news interviews, these are the best ways to prepare before arrival and on the day of the interview.

When the pandemic hit in 2020, a majority of TV interviews shifted to Zoom. The pandemic allowed TV stations and news producers to look at interviews in a new light. For a local station, the ability to conduct interviews on Zoom allows them to connect with experts in different areas without having to connect with an affiliate station to procure content for you. While you aren’t sitting face-to-face or knee-to-knee with an anchor, there are still tips and tricks you should utilize to make your Zoom interview a breeze.