The Public Relations Blog

Tell stories instead of just stating facts.

Imagine you’ve finally got a good pitch ready to send to the media. You’re well prepared, and now it’s time to get that phone call done. Despite hitting it off with the media contact, your contact ultimately declines to run the story. What happened? You did everything right; you had the main point and some facts to go with it to give context.

When it comes time to give the breakdown of a story in writing, news releases are usually sent. Long and filled with information, they’re viewed as the best ways to get a story to the media. But are they really the best way? Your legal team and, most importantly, reporters don’t like them when they’re for medium or smaller stories. Reporters prefer having information to base their own writing off of instead of simply publishing a news release. If the people actually working with your news releases don’t like them, then what should you do?

SERP is a buzzword used in the digital marketing space. Do you know what it means?

Search Engine Results Page is the web page rendered by search engines like Google to the searchers with a list of relevant URLs answering their search queries.

The search engine algorithm walks through millions of websites to generate the SERP with best-matching results. The idea is to present search results that are in close sync with the user’s search intent.

Every search engine has a unique algorithm and displays two primary types of search results on the SERP.

People want to share their ideas and be heard, and social media is how they fulfill that desire. Having access to various platforms is a valuable opportunity to listen to your audience and gain insight into their values and feedback. However, it’s not enough to simply have an account; you must know both the platform and your community to become a valuable and trusted resource to your audience. 

Here are some things to keep in mind to improve your social media presence. 

Use these two questions to guide your content-making process

In public relations, content of all kinds is important. Whether it’s videos, written content, or any other kind of information people can consume, content is one of the biggest drivers for public relations. Content helps you stand out from your rivals.

However, you need to be making the right kinds of content to further your public relations goals. Simply making anything isn’t enough. Use the two questions below to see if your content is actually helping your public relations plans.

Customer service is hard. Dealing with conflict and complaints is even harder. For many companies, this can be a make-it-or-break-it point. If you have poor relationships with customers and clients, it can even permanently tarnish a company’s reputation. To avoid that and strengthen customer relations along the way, here are three tips for responding to a crisis response when customers have been offended.

Do advertising firms have the focus on PR you need?

A while ago, I was talking with a public relations agent working in an advertising agency. During our conversation, she discussed her experiences, which stuck out to me. 

Work smarter, not harder, to let prospective customers know about your company

News media coverage is important for companies, especially for franchises.

Franchises rely on the local community in which they reside to see success, and positive news media coverage helps to build a franchisor’s brand and improve the specific franchisee’s reputation. News media coverage also places your business at the forefront of prospective customers’ minds. Media coverage that includes the parent franchise also helps to bring awareness to the brand for those looking for franchise opportunities, especially in local areas where your franchise doesn’t have a footprint.

If you are a franchisor or franchisee, you may now be asking yourself how you get your franchise in the news.

Over the years, I’ve heard many businesspeople say, “I’m not sure what PR is, but I know our company needs it.”

When people think of public relations, they tend to associate it with news coverage. This is what PR pros call “earned media.” The dictionary defines earned media as “publicity gained through promotional efforts other than paid media advertising.”

Use three points to make a pitch that a media professional would love

Pitching stories is one of the key parts to a successful public relations plan. Those that want their stories pitched have the story. However, they need one other key ingredient for success: what the reporters are interested in.