You might have the best product in the world, but if nobody outside your office is aware of it, then you aren’t going to be able to sell it—which makes your PR department one of the most important parts of your business.
Effective public relations (and the marketing that goes hand in hand with it) is the key to spreading awareness of your business to a wider audience. So it’s important to make sure you’re getting everything you can get from your PR team and their marketing-complementary strategies.
To get more from your PR department, here are five essential steps:
Optimize your use of email
Your email communications need to be both informative and interesting. It’s no longer enough to simply send out a new product catalog every six months and hope to be remembered. Make sure that your PR team is harnessing the power of email newsletters—and encourage your customer base to sign up so that you can communicate with them directly through their inbox.
Target your audience on the social networks they frequent
Facebook has changed the world in many ways, and your business needs to be using social media platforms if you want to remain relevant. Social media interactions on your business page can benefit you in a number of ways, so make sure that you’re using the platforms that your market research has shown your target customer demographic are using.
Invest wisely, but proportionately
Channeling money into any single department in your company is rarely the sign of good management. However, there are sources of funding available that may be directly applicable to individual strategies that your various departments are working on. There are a number of research & development tax credits schemes available that you can apply for and receive if you are shown to be being innovative. Check your R&D tax credit suitability, and you could be boosting the budget of your PR team.
Create content—and spread the word
If your marketing and PR department is not yet creating content for your customers, then you may have a serious problem. Content marketing has become the key element of the modern-day marketing team, and your business is in a weaker position if you are not using it. There are plenty of ways to make sure that you are creating the right content for your customers, but having zero content to share and interact over is a major failing of the digital business landscape.
Hone and amplify your media relations
Don’t send out mass emails to a ton of journalists and consider that to be a job well done—your PR team needs to follow through and develop relationships. So if a journalist does use your latest press release, contact and thank them, and remember to share what they have written on all of your available platforms. Building a relationship is one of the best ways for your PR team to invest their time, and chatting with journalists should be second nature.
Your PR team is the bridge between your business strategy and your public. Make sure that you are investing time, money, and energy into their ongoing strategies and personal development, and your business will become far stronger as a result.
