The Public Relations Blog

A guide for a PR informational interview

At some point during their education, most public relations students receive the assignment to interview PR professionals about the industry, the job and to offer advice to someone considering a career in the profession. Trying to find a PR practitioner who is willing to speak to you can be frustrating. We know that PR pros are busy; and we also understand how important it is to help students prepare for their future in PR. Therefore, we created a list of the top six questions we get from PR students in informational interviews.

5 ways to enhance your blog

Most companies start a blog with good intentions to reach more people. Too often though, the content starts to dwindle and may even cease altogether. Here are five ways to help keep your company’s blog full of fresh content.

4 reasons to stick with public relations for the long haul

The insightful Warren Buffett says it takes 20 years to build a reputation. Public relations shouldn’t be a short-term investment. PR is about building relationships and building results. It’s important to know that every company’s needs and objectives are different. PR isn’t a cookie-cutter process. In fact, the best results come from a strategic and proactive PR campaign. Companies that don’t stick with public relations for the long haul are making mistake #15 of Axia Public Relation’s list of the top 15 mistakes companies make when they hire a PR firm. Below  are four reasons you should commit to a long-term relationship with your PR firm.

It’s important that the news your company puts out via a news distribution site is newsworthy so you get the maximum benefit from your investment. Some company news isn’t actually appropriate for a news release – it won’t interest journalists or your target audience. How can you tell which stories are worth telling? And when is the best time to announce your news to gain the most traction?

Don’t waste the media’s time with non-newsworthy details.

There’s a difference between internal news that you share with your employees and your company’s board of directors, and external news that’s worthy of a share outside the walls of your company. As a public relations firm, we work hard to educate our clients about what news they should share with the media. Expecting your PR firm to pitch media outlets stories that aren’t newsworthy is mistake #13 on Axia Public Relations’ list of 15 mistakes companies make when hiring a PR firm.

One reason companies hire a public relations firm is to raise awareness about their products. When you’re ready to gain media coverage for what your company offers, it’s critical that you provide samples of your product for media representatives to try. You should also be sure to ready your spokesperson for interviews.

When a company is unwilling to share product samples with media or to give the media access to certain people within the company, it's making mistake #12 of Axia Public Relations’ 15 mistakes companies make when hiring a PR firm. Don’t let this be your company. Educate yourself and prepare before you hire a PR firm. Here are four factors to consider when you’re ready to launch a campaign for your product.

Prospective clients often ask us about news wire distribution services as part of their public relations campaigns. We find that many companies are using these services incorrectly. If you aren’t using a distribution service the right way, you aren’t receiving the full value of the news release and that could be hurting your brand.

To that end, we created a list of how, why and when your company should use a news release distribution service.

Many companies want to see their news releases published on a newswire or a press release syndication site.

Axia Public Relations recommends clients only publish news releases on a newswire when they have a big announcement – or if they have a comprehensive budget to support the cost of a distribution service.

Your money is often better spent on direct, one-on-one pitching and building relationships with reporters. If you’re still interested in using press release syndication, check out these pros and cons.

A few years ago, Axia Public Relations made the transition to HubSpot, a developer of inbound marketing software products, and we’ve been tremendously pleased with the results. One of the biggest reasons our team enjoys HubSpot so much? It gives us the ability to manage all our clients’ blogs as well as make updates to various website pages. We like HubSpot’s blog functionality and manageability so much that we think you should start using it too! We listed our top seven reasons we love HubSpot below so you can see why we’re hooked!

Axia Public Relations teaches you how to market efficiently and effectively in its new inbound marketing book

Business leads are what keep a company growing. As your leads dwindle, so do sales. Some companies are still pushing their messages out in order to bring customers in, and it isn’t working. Perhaps you’ve realized that your online presence is static – that your company isn’t achieving the results it seeks – and you want to do something different. What else is out there?