How to produce an enewsletter that gets read
Enewsletters improve communication channels with clients, share good news stories, share expertise through tips and also assists in building a database of potential clients.
Not only is it a great way to share your stories, it can also be a powerful marketing tool providing useful information to the reader while indirectly promoting your services.
Make it regular
The first step is to ask yourself – are you committed to sending it out regularly? There is no point in sending out an enewsletter whenever you get around to it. It has to be at least once a month, but preferably once a fortnight. We send out this newsletter 10 a.m. every second Tuesday.
I am a member of the Women’s Network Australia, and they send their newsletter out every Monday evening. I know that it is coming out on that day and time, and so look forward to reading each Monday evening.
Make it relevant
The content obviously needs to be appealing to your readership. Have a think about what type of information they may find interesting. Under no circumstances use the opportunity to sell to your readers.
It is about creating a sense of community and sharing your expertise with them. Keep your articles around maximum 200 words and keep your sentences and paragraphs short. If the article is longer, place it on your website or blog and hyperlink to it from the newsletter. This is a great way of getting your readers to see other material you have written. Use plain language and always check for spelling and typos before distribution.
Make it easy to read
The layout needs to be easy to read. Many people just scan enewsletters to find the stories that interest them. Stats shows that 51 seconds is all we usually spend scanning an enewsletter and most people won’t read past the first three items on your list.
Limit your colours and watch for bad contrast. Simple is often best, with one banner heading. Avoid flashy, distracting graphics, and use low resolution relevant images. Use lots of white space to draw the eye to the text.
Importantly, include a table of contents at the top of the enewsletter so readers can decide what to read. Create hyperlinks on the entries in the table of contents to the articles for quick navigation, but don’t let this take away from your main items.
Never spam
Always ask people to opt in to receive the newsletter. So make it easy to subscribe and unsubscribe. Frustrated subscribers are not likely to return. There must be a simple Unsubscribe link. The email must clearly state the sending organisation and why it was sent.
Add contact details
You want readers of the newsletter to contact you! Make sure you add all of your contact details including phone, email, blog, Facebook, etc. Remember to hyperlink them to make it even easier to contact you.
So you arn't you using an enewsletter to build your client database?
Sydney Public Relations Agency, CP Communications provides specialist media, traditional and online PR strategies that get amazing results. Contact us today. For more PR tips see www.PublicRelationsSydney.com.au.
How to create a great business blog
Our blog has been listed as one of the 25 finalists in the Smarter Business Ideas Top Blogger competition. This has prompted us to think about what makes a great blog.
Blogs can be a great addition to your business’ PR strategy because they can help you to communicate with your target audience, share your stories and engage with others.
Here are some of our tips for creating a great blog for your business.
Pick your topic
Choose a topic for your blog and stick to it. Ideally this topic should be related to your business or its industry to raise your profile as an expert in your field.
Once you have chosen a topic you should avoid writing about anything else. If you stray from your chosen topic then your readers may become disinterested and stop reading.
Consider your target audience
Think about who you want to read your blog and why. For example you may want potential customers to read your blog in order to build their brand awareness.
Your blog should then aim to reach this target audience by posting content that is interesting and appealing to them.
Have great content
Having great content is extremely important to the success of your blog. With great content people are more likely to read your blog or recommend you to their friends.
Your content should be interesting and relevant to your readers or contain information they might be looking for.
You can help to keep your content interesting by posting in a variety of different ways. For, example you could post videos, infographics or run a giveaway.
Be consistent
Regularly posting fresh content on your blog is important to attract new readers. If your blog hasn’t been updated in a long time then readers may lose interest in it.
A great idea is to set a specific day that you will publish your blog post and make sure you adhere to this deadline. For example, you may choose to post content every Monday and Wednesday. It is a good idea to post at least once a week.
Make it easy to read
Make sure your content is easy to read by splitting up large chunks of text into short paragraphs and using subheadings and bullet points.
Catchy headlines
Interesting headlines can increase the chances of people reading your blog post. Your headline should also convey the main point of the blog post.
Use images
It’s a great idea to use images in all of your blog posts because it helps to attract readers’ attention and makes the content more interesting. When sharing the blog post on your social media sites a picture will be more eye-catching then a block of text. This may encourage more people to read the blog post.
Use internal links
You can use internal links in your blog post to direct readers back to a previous post for more information.For example, if you use the phrase ‘marketing tactics’ in your blog post you can link this to a previous blog post about marketing tactics.
This is a great way to provide your readers with more information without having too much text on one page. It also means readers are less likely to leave your blog to search for more information.
Social it
You should share every new blog post on your social media profiles by posting a link on your Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn and Pinterest profiles. This will help to drive traffic back to your blog and encourage other people to read it.
You should also include social media share buttons on your blog to enable readers to easily share your content.
Ask a question
Encourage your readers to interact with your content by including a question at the bottom of each blog post. This will help to create a conversation with your readers and allow you to gain valuable feedback or build a relationship with them.
Make sure your blog allows readers to comment by ensuring the comment section is available under your content.
Creating a blog for your business is a great way to communicate with your target audience in a different way. Include blogging in your PR strategy and discover the communication benefits today.
Public Relations Sydney is a finalist in the Smarter Business Ideas Top Blogger competition! Please help us win the People’s Choice award by voting for Public Relations Sydney here.
What do you think makes a great blog?
Sydney Public Relations Agency, CP Communications provides specialist media, traditional and online PR strategies that get amazing results. Contact us today. For more PR tips see www.PublicRelationsSydney.com.au.
Exclusives: Are they worth it?
If there is one thing a journalist loves, it’s a big, juicy exclusive. It means no-one else will be running the same story and readers will need to go to their publication to get the dirt.
Of course it’s not always ‘dirt’, good news stories and general company news can be treated as an exclusive too, but before you go offering everything to one publication, it’s important to weigh up whether an exclusive will offer you the best results possible.
The argument for exclusives:
- Exclusives are a clever way of building a relationship with a specific journalist. PR is all about relationships and by offering an exclusive and following through on that promise to give the story to only one publication, you can build up a good rapport with a journalist that will definitely help you with future pitches.
- You might get a better deal by offering an exclusive. If a journalist can convince the editor that no other magazine or website will be running this story, there is always the chance that you’ll land the prime position within the publication. Maybe you’ll be given a full page spread, rather than a small column towards the back.
- It’s not terribly common, but you will find some editors who only want a story if it is an exclusive. By choosing one publication that you really want to get in to and offering the story to them alone, your story may get picked up by that one editor as opposed to three editors saying ‘no thanks’ if you’ve pitched it somewhere else.
The argument against exclusives:
- Journalists don’t make any promises. They may do their best to include your story but if a hotter news piece becomes available or their editor decides to bump you from their pages, it could result in losing the opportunity to get any coverage at all. Do you really want to put all your eggs in one basket?
- An exclusive might give you a nice big story in a publication of your choice but is this necessarily any more effective than a number of stories in a variety of publications? This way, if your story doesn’t get a run in one, you still have the opportunity to be seen everywhere else you pitched your idea.
- Do exclusives even exist anymore? In the age of social media, anyone can break news and share stories online before a journalist has even had the chance to ask Who, What, Where, When, How? How often have you read a tweet, or a Facebook page update before hearing about a story on the news? Perhaps exclusives have had their day?
There is no right or wrong answer when it comes to exclusives, it’s up to you and should be judged on a case by case basis. As long as you know all the pros and cons, you’re set to make the best decision for your business.
Want more tips? Download this FREE ebook:
Sydney Public Relations Agency, CP Communications provides specialist media, traditional and online PR strategies that get amazing results. Contact us today. For more PR tips see www.PublicRelationsSydney.com.au.
What you can learn from Halloween for your PR strategy
Halloween is coming up and you may be seeing some zombies trick or treating in your neighbourhood!
There are a number of ideas you can borrow from Halloween that can help to bring your PR strategy back from the dead. For instance:
Use evergreen stories: Each year there are many calendar events which the media will publish stories about such as Halloween or Christmas. From a media perspective, stories around these events remain interesting and newsworthy every year. You can use these evergreen stories to your advantage to gain publicity for your business by coming up with a fresh new angle. For example a business media angle around New Year’s Eve could be ‘New Year business resolutions’.
Don’t be a zombie: Mindless zombies wander around at Halloween without a clear goal where they are going. Don’t let your PR activities turn into a zombie by not having a clear goal for how you will communicate with your customers. You need a PR strategy for your business to help target your communication to the right audience and the right publications at the right time.
Also zombies aren’t the most engaging creatures. Avoid becoming a PR zombie by engaging and building relationships with the media. Journalists are more likely to read your emails and call for interviews if they know who you are and that they can rely on you for an interview. You can start to build a relationship with a journalist by understanding what they are interested in, knowing the topics they write about, being mindful of their deadlines, getting their name right and delivering on your promises.
Trick or treat: Sometimes in business you can be surprised by a ‘trick’ or a crisis that occurs. This could be a negative comment on social media which, if escalated, could potentially be reported in the media. If a trick does occur you need to know how to resolve the issue before it escalates into a crisis. For the above example, you would need to respond to the negative comment in a polite manner on the social media platform it appeared. Show your customers the process you will take to resolve the issue and ensure it doesn’t happen again.
If your PR strategy if effective you may receive a ‘treat’ by gaining great media coverage for your business. When your business is featured in the media it can help to build your brand, reach your target audience with your message and boost your reputation.
Halloween parties: An effective PR tactic is holding events such as a launch party to announce a new product, a press conference or an opening ceremony for a new building. Events are a great way to gain direct access to your target audience, secure media coverage for your business and build your brand.
Don’t let your PR strategy turn into a zombie. With the end of the year fast approaching, now is a great time to re-evaluate your PR strategy and ensure it’s working effectively for your business.
Have you used Halloween to promote your business?
Sydney Public Relations Agency, CP Communications provides specialist media, traditional and online PR strategies that get amazing results. Contact us today. For more PR tips see www.PublicRelationsSydney.com.au.
How to make your key messages interesting
Key messages are the core messages you want your target audience to hear and remember. They can be used in all of your communication such as your website, in media releases, during media interviews, at networking functions and any time you need to describe your business.
A large part of public relations is repetition. The more times your target audience hears, reads or learns your key messages, the better recall they will have about your brand.
Here are some tips to help make your key messages memorable.
Make them original
Make your key messages unique and specific to your business in order to differentiate your business from its competitors. This way they will stand out more with your target audience.
Keep it short
Write your key messages as short sentences. Long winded and complicated messages are harder to remember. This will help your business and your customers to remember them as well as making them adaptable to any situation.
Don’t have too many
If you are creating key messages for your business you should aim to have around three or four key messages for each target audience. Concentrating on only a few messages will have a bigger impact and be more memorable.
Consider your audience
If your business communicates with a number of different target audiences consider creating specific key messages for each target audience.
For instance, if your business targets both large and small businesses, you may want to think about having key messages for both segments as each has specific needs and may require a different approach.
Focus on the benefits
Focus more on the benefits your business can offer your audience to make your key messages more appealing. Key messages should never be purely sales orientated. Think about how you would like people to see your business.
Avoid jargon
Make your key messages simple and easy to understand by avoiding the use of industry related jargon. This will help your key messages to be understood by a wider range of people.
Update them
It is important to review your key messages on a regular basis for example, once a year or when the business goes through a change. For instance, perhaps you’ve added a new service or are targeting a new customer base. Your key messages will need updating to reflect these new changes.
Key messages are the foundation of a strong PR and communication strategy. They will help to ensure your target audience views your business in a certain way and can help to build greater brand awareness.
Want more tips? Download this FREE ebook:
Sydney Public Relations Agency, CP Communications provides specialist media, traditional and online PR strategies that get amazing results. Contact us today. For more PR tips see www.PublicRelationsSydney.com.au.
What to do if a journalist says no to your pitch
Have you spent hours carefully crafting a media pitch, sending it to a journalist, following-up a few days later with a phone call and they say no, not interested? So where do you go from here?
Don’t get disheartened, there are many reasons a journalist may have turned down your media pitch. If this happens to you, there are some steps you can take to still get media coverage.
Here are some reasons why a journalist may not have been interested in your media pitch.
- Timing: You may have pitched your idea right before a breaking news story. Journalists will then be extremely busy gathering the latest information about the breaking news and may not have time for other stories. There’s not much you can do about this, except re-pitch your idea when the breaking news is over, if your pitch is still timely and relevant.
- It’s been done: A journalist may have already covered the topic you have given them. If your story idea doesn’t provide the journalist with a fresh angle they won’t write about the same topic again. You will either have to come up with a fresh angle or hope they keep you in mind next time they write a story on a similar topic.
- Interest: Each journalist has a preference for the kinds of stories they are interested in. If you are pitching to the media it’s then your job to find out what those interests are. You can do this by reading their articles, looking at their bio, finding them on LinkedIn or searching to see if they have a blog. With this information you can then gain an insight into the topics of interest to the journalist. This will help you to pitch ideas that a journalist is more likely to say yes to.
How to still get coverage
If your media pitch has been rejected, there are a number of different tactics you can implement to try and get media coverage with the same pitch.
- Pitch it somewhere else: This one is an obvious tip, but ensure to personalise the pitch before sending it somewhere else. If you send the pitch to another journalist but don’t update their name they may become angry at you or ignore the pitch.
- Edit the pitch: If the journalist gives you feedback on why the pitch wasn’t interesting to them, take their feedback on board, edit the pitch and send it somewhere else. If you didn’t receive feedback from the journalist, have a brainstorm with your colleagues or mentor to figure out what you can do to make it more interesting.
- Target different media: Did you write the pitch with a specific industry in mind, for example a travel journalist? If so, you may be able to adapt the pitch to suit a journalist from a different industry such as hospitality or marketing.
- Write the story yourself: You can write an article or blog post based on the media pitch. Many trade publications are looking for good quality content and will happily accept submitted articles. You can also post the article on your company blog, if you have one.
Sometimes, as hard as you may try, you just have to let the pitch go and accept it wasn’t the right time for it to be published. When pitching to the media, not everything you do will yield fantastic results. Public relations is a long-term commitment that requires effort, creative thinking and resourcefulness in order to be successful.
Want more tips? Download this FREE ebook:
Sydney Public Relations Agency, CP Communications provides specialist media, traditional and online PR strategies that get amazing results. Contact us today. For more PR tips see www.PublicRelationsSydney.com.au.
Getting your customers talking
Word-of-Mouth marketing is simply conversations about a brand, product or service. It is an unpaid form of promotion in which satisfied customers tell other people how much they like a business, product, service.
Think about the last time you talked about a consumer experience with friends, family, or colleagues. Maybe it was how much they’d like a movie that you have just seen, or a restaurant you went to on the weekend or even talking about how much you love your ipad. Word of Mouth is all about sharing stories and experiences as consumers.
McKinsey & Co estimate that two-thirds of the economy is influenced by personal recommendations. So it’s not only telling people about an experience, it’s also about recommendations. Think about the last time you needed to find a new dentist, doctor, or PR agency! You most likely asked people you trusted for their recommendations.
Word-of-mouth is one of the most credible forms of advertising because the endorsement comes from a trusted source rather than a corporate third party.
So for marketers and business owners, it’s about earning the right to airtime in your consumers’ conversations, and giving people a reason to talk about your products and services, and making it easier for that conversation to take place.
So why should you use social media to build word of mouth for your business?
Pre internet days, it was neighbours over the back fence sharing an experience, or mates talking down at the pub. Now with social media, amplify those conversations by about a zillion - because we have consumer connectivity like never before.
We still share recommendations and experiences face-to-face, but with the internet and especially with social media we can also share them instantly with thousands, if not millions of people.
No longer do consumers rely on advertising or their family to influence their purchasing decisions – they also now look to their online community.
Consumers are active participants in your brand, they can now significantly influence the health and success of your brand and business.
They now have the power to talk to each other about brands quickly, frequently, easily and on a local and global scale.
This means there is a huge opportunity for brands and businesses to harness people to stimulate word of mouth about their products and services.
How can you spread the word about your business using Social Media and Word of Mouth?
The first place to start may sound simple, but you need to have a good product or service. You won’t get people to recommend you or have positive conversations if you don’t.
Secondly – if you haven’t started using social media – start today! You need to be in the conversation and build a following.
Once you have those two things you can start with you strategy.
Make it easy for people to talk about you and to share your material. Don’t aim to make a video that with go viral – if you are using social media tools you already have great viral content, it’s just not viral yet. Use sharing tools such AddThis, ShareThis, Tell-a-Friend so people can easily share content across channels. These are the social media share buttons you see on the bottom on blog posts so readers can easily tweet or facebook it. Make your material easy to copy and forward, and make it discoverable through search engines.
Give people a reason to talk. People won’t share your content if it isn’t useful or interesting. So good content, interesting visuals, and relevant information are critical. With a product, give influencers the product to sample. For example, if you are a café, invite key food bloggers to lunch. For a tax agent, give people free tax tips which they can easily share with their colleagues.
Build your reputation. Reputation is the new currency – and you want a bucket load of it for word of mouth to work effectively. People do business with people and brands they trust. So start building your online reputation. Start a YouTube channel offering tips. Write guest articles on blogs your customers read. Offer free amazing content on your website or blog. On social networking sites offer helpful information, share interesting links and content and interact with people. Soon, you’ll hear yourself be talked about as “great to work with,” “very authentic” and “recommended.”
Get influencers talking about you. In the word-of-mouth industry they recruit ‘influencers’ which are 100’s of people recruited to be ‘your brands well-connected friend’. They have a lot of friends online and offline. And they share their thoughts with their social network. You can do this on a smaller scale by looking to key people within your industry and start connecting with them and sharing your brand information with them – in a genuine way.
Be where your customers are online. To join the conversation you need to know where your customer’s conversations are happening. If your customers are heavy users of Twitter, your company should be using Twitter. If your customers on Facebook, then you need to be on Facebook. Word of mouth can only happen if a conversation happens. And the more places where conversations happen, the more opportunities to build buzz around your brand.
Track online conversations. Social media enables companies to know the pulse of their customers. You have a direct medium to communicate with customers, act upon their grievances, understand and meet their needs. The more a company knows about the likes, dislikes, etc. of customers, the better they can develop products and services to meet their needs to drive business success. So set up Google news alerts, use Twitter Search, tweetmeme, trendpedia, howsociable or buzz numbers. Track online and offline conversations and listen and respond to both positive and negative conversations
Now let’s talk tactics
There are so many online word of mouth tactics you can use to get people talking and recommending your brand. It worth noting that we all can implement online word of mouth tactics, they don’t have to be complicated or expensive.
Create communities and connect people
Form or support niche communities that are likely to share interests about the brand such as user groups, fan clubs and discussion forums. Create a VIP program and support independent groups that form around your product. Contribute to organisations such as local meetings and other in real life events.
Contribute to communities
Rather than starting from scratch with a new community, find out where people are talking and contribute to that community. So find it, sponsor it or host an event or forum. This can be as simple as dedicating time to post discussions and answer question in LinkedIn groups your customers are members of.
Build relationships with advocates
Identify people who can be key referrers for your business. Help them refer or talk about your service or product. Introduce yourself and teach them about the benefits of your product. This can be as simple as replying to an advocate on twitter so they are aware of you. For example, a café in Crows Nest where my office is, started following me on twitter, and started interacting with me without any promotion of his café. We just chatted online and I ended up going there for lunch. Now I’m a huge advocate of Montague’s. I tweet when I’m there, we have team lunches there and I’ve lost count how many business meetings I’ve had a Montagues.
Co-creation and information sharing
Involve consumers in marketing and creative programs such as allowing them to create commercials or name a new product. Taronga Zoo did this very successfully by asking the public the name the baby elephant.
Let key customers have first access to information and content. This is used often by software companies who chose key influencers to beta test. Provide further opportunities for consumers to work alongside your brand such as consumer poll voting which you can do easily on Facebook and Linkedin.
Start blogging
Blogs are a fantastic way to share information. They not only build your reputation and credibility, they also provides create material for content sharing.
Start interacting with bloggers as are key opinion formers and the gatekeepers to audiences of hundreds and even hundreds of thousands of readers. Invite them to events, attend the meet-up events where they hang out, add comments to their blogs, send them product samples. This is being widely used for food bloggers, mummy bloggers and fashion & beauty bloggers.
Go Viral
Viral are entertaining or informative messages that are designed to be passed quickly and easily along. The most recent high profile viral campaign is the Jennifer Anniston video with Smartwater, which was does specifically to go viral.
Be careful about setting out to create a video to go viral. Most things go viral without any reason, so I would suggest you think laterally. For example, creating a competition can be classified as viral. Ask your community to create and submit their own video showing what they would do for a win a trip, or your product and drive it through social media channels.
Examples of successful social media Word of Mouth campaigns
One example famous example is Wine Library TV. Gary VAY NER CHUK started reading blogs and forums to find out what wines people wanted to know about. In February 2006 he started uploading videos talking about wine on Wine Library TV. It has blossomed into a full-fledged community with viewers participating in an extremely active forum. Using social media, and word of mouth he turned the small New York bottle shop into the world’s biggest online wine store.
Another example is Starlight Cinema. My agency, CP Communications, do the PR and social media for Starlight Cinema, which is an outdoor cinema on Sydney’s north shore. Every Tuesday during the season we ran a Twitter competition asking followers a question. In order for followers to find the answer needed to visit the website. The first five followers to answer the question correctly won a free double pass. This competition not only generated conversation, but also encouraged people to visit the Starlight website.
The final example is where an advocate created a viral affect without any prompting. You may know about Greenhouse by Joost – a pop up sustainable restaurant that was the Rocks in Sydney created by architect Joost Bakker. Greenhouse was a solar-powered shipping container turned into a restaurant, made all of recycled material. The only reason I know about it is because people have been tweeting about it!
A friend of the owner posted a video on his blog, The Design Files, about the restaurant, and it went viral. It was posted at 9am, by 11am Joost Bakker mobile was pinging with texts & email, by 10:30 that night, he was on the phone with this year’s London Design Festival and they had seen the video. As a result, its likely Londoner’s will experience something like Greenhouse as well.
Tips to build buzz
- Give people a reason to talk about your products and services, and make it easier for that conversation to take place.
- Social media and word of mouth are both about creating and contributing to conversations about your business and brand. So engage and interact as much as possible.
- Be authentic – with anything on social media, be authentic and don’t blatantly promote – give something in return.
- You don’t need to think big – your word of mouth strategy can be as simply as taking 10 minutes a day to answer questions on LinkedIn and reply to people on twitter.
- IRL is still very powerful. In Real Life I have made some amazing connections and advocates through social media – both personal and professional – and many were created because we met in real life after we met online. So where possible, also organise in real life catch ups and events.
Sydney Public Relations Agency, CP Communications provides specialist media, traditional and online PR strategies that get amazing results. Contact us today. For more PR tips see www.PublicRelationsSydney.com.au.
How to monitor your media mentions
If you are conducting a successful PR strategy then hopefully you will be receiving lots of media coverage.
This means there may be a number of stories written about your business in various media publications online and in print.
It’s a great idea to set up Google Alerts for your business’ name, your spokesperson’s name, key messages or the industry your business is in.
There are a number of media monitoring services which will monitor print, TV, online, radio and social media for mentions of your business. However you will have to pay for most of these services.
Have you Googled your business lately?
One of the best ways to monitor your media mentions is to keep track of potential media coverage yourself.
How to use case studies to promote your business
Case studies are a great way to promote your business, build your credibility and position your business as an expert. They show potential customers how your business operates and the results you can achieve.
What are case studies?
Case studies are short explanations of a project your business has worked on for a client or customer. They describe a problem, show how you achieved a solution and detail the results you achieved.
How to write a case study
To write a case study you will have to interview a client or customer about how your business has helped them. You can develop a standard set of questions to help you interview each client. Based on these results you can then write the case study or hire a PR professional to write it for you. Make sure the client always has final approval before you publish the case study.
Here are some tips to help you structure a great case study:
- Introduction: provide a brief overview of your client and what they require your business to do.
- Objectives: provide details of the client’s problem and what your business can do to solve it.
- Strategy: Explains the steps and processes you took to solve the problem.
- Results: Provide detailed statistics or measurable data to back up your results. Explain how the results solved the client’s problem.
Here are some ways you can use case studies to promote your business.
On your website
You can publish case studies on your website, either on your home page or on a separate case study page. This is a great way to establish the credibility of your business and show potential customers the results you can achieve. It will also encourage potential customers to consider your business.
Social media profiles
You could post the entire case study on your social media sites or just post a link to the case studies on your website. This allows you to share your achievements with your followers, promote your business and attract potential customers. You may also be able to tag your client in the post, which will share the case study on their social media followers as well.
Speaking opportunities
If you speak at an event about your business or your expertise, case studies are great practical examples you can include in your presentation. They will help you to explain an issue and its resolution or teach others how to solve a client or customer problem. It will also help to raise the brand awareness of your clients and promote the results your business can achieve.
New business opportunities
Case studies allow you to show potential clients or customers how your business has achieved effective results in the past. This helps you to show clients and customers practical examples of the results you can achieve for them instead of just telling them. You can use case studies in your marketing materials, new client meetings or in a portfolio on display in your office reception.
Relevant publications
Some media publications will accept well written case studies; however they must conform to the publication’s guidelines. Before writing a case study research the publications in your industry you can send case studies to. Write your case study according to their guidelines or it will not be published. This allows you to position your business as an expert in your industry, build the credibility of your business and attract potential customers and clients.
Share your successes
Before writing a case study decide where you want to publish it and write it to suit that format. Case studies allow your business to share its success, attract new customers or clients and promote itself. By publishing a variety of case studies it demonstrates to potential customers and clients you can achieve consistent results for a range of clients.
To read some case study examples see the case studies on our website.
Want more tips? Download this FREE ebook:
Sydney Public Relations Agency, CP Communications provides specialist media, traditional and online PR strategies that get amazing results. Contact us today. For more PR tips see www.PublicRelationsSydney.com.au
PR tools of the trade
If you’re starting a public relations strategy for your business there are some PR tools of the trade you should be aware of. No, we are not talking about using a hammer and nails, but using a range of specialised tools to make PR easier and more effective for your business.
Simple tools such as spell check and a content calendar can help you save time and organise your PR efforts more efficiently and effectively.
Here are a few PR tools of the trade you can use today.
Media lists: It would be difficult and time consuming to send out a media release without first creating a media list. A media list documents the key media contacts that would be interested in your media release. These contacts can include journalists, producers, bloggers, freelancers and editors. They could be in your industry or the industries your clients are in. You can buy media lists from companies like AAP of Media Monitors or create your own by doing some research.
Google alerts: It’s almost impossible to check every media outlet on the internet each day for media coverage of your business. However, you can make the process easier by using Google Alerts. Google Alerts is a free service which will send you an email alert when a new web page, article, blog or video is uploaded to the internet that matches your search terms.
You can set up Google Alerts for your business, key spokesperson, clients, competitors or even your key messages. This will help you to find online media coverage as well as mentions of your business in the media.
Google Alerts also help you to be aware of current stories or articles about your industry in the media. However it often misses some media mentions, so they shouldn’t be your only form of media research.
Social media scheduling tools: An easy way to manage your social media accounts is by using scheduling tools such as TweetDeck. These tools allow you to save time on social media by scheduling your posts. For example TweetDeck allows you to create your tweets and chose different times to automatically post them during the day. This means you could spend half an hour on Monday morning setting up all your posts for the rest of the week.
Spell check: A major part of any PR strategy is writing content for articles, blogs, websites, projects and even emails. It’s important your grammar and spelling is perfect in any piece of writing you publish or send to a journalist. Spell check is a great tool to help you find any words you may have misspelled. Make sure your spell check is set to Australian spelling.
Spell check is not 100 per cent reliable so make sure to proof read your writing for spelling and grammatical mistakes or even ask a colleague to read over it.
Content calendar: If you are writing lots of articles or blog posts it’s a good idea to use a content calendar to help you plan your topics. A content calendar can be as simple as an excel document listing your story ideas with the week you will write them. This tool can save you time and effort in coming up with new article topics. It will also help you to align your topics with what’s happening in your business. For instance if you are an accounting firm, you can plan to write an article about tax planning before the end of the financial year to give clients time to implement your tips.
Electronic devices: As part of any PR strategy you need to be constantly checking the news, responding to emails, managing social media platforms and writing new content. A great idea is to carry around a portable electronic device such as an iPhone or an iPad with access to the internet. For example, on an iPad you can access documents on the go, use it for presentations, or check emails while travelling.
You may not find these tools in a hardware store but they are essential for any PR strategy.
Want more tips? Download this FREE ebook:
Sydney Public Relations Agency, CP Communications provides specialist media, traditional and online PR strategies that get amazing results. Contact us today. For more PR tips see www.PublicRelationsSydney.com.au.
LinkedIn endorsements - a new way to build your profile
You may have noticed a new panel on your LinkedIn profile where you can give and receive endorsements for skills and expertise.
This new function was recently introduced by LinkedIn as a new ‘one-click’ endorsement aimed at being a more user-friendly method of recommending your connections rather than the more formal ‘recommend’ feature.
Endorsements create more opportunities to forge stronger bonds with your connections and add a certain amount of credibility to their profiles. Getting an endorsement from a trusted contact enhances your profile as well.
While it is as an easier, more time-effective method, someone who may only have met briefly at a networking event could endorse your skills on LinkedIn. So this feature lacks depths and certainly doesn’t replace the ‘recommend’ feature.
How to endorse
When you visit a profile you will notice a blue box at the top of the page pre-populated with a list of skills and expertise. You can simple click on the skills you want to endorse. If you know of other skills that aren’t listed, you can type them in manually.
After you have endorsed someone, you will then be prompted to endorse skills for multiple connections at once, making it a quick and easy way to endorse your connections to other people.
If someone endorses you, you will receive an email notification. You can also view your own profile to see who has endorsed you and for which skills. You can remove skills and hide endorsements from specific LinkedIn users.
Viewers of your profile will also be able to see each of your skills listed and who and how many people have endorsed each skill.
Starting point
Take the time to review your skills and expertise on your profile and add or delete skills that may no longer be relevant. Select the skills you want to highlight so your connections know which skills to endorse.
Rather than thinking about how you can get endorsements, think about who you can endorse first. Spend a couple of minutes looking through your connections and find people you would like to endorse. It’s likely that people will return the favour if someone has taken the time to endorse you.
To ensure you maintain your credibility, don’t endorse all of your contacts. If you do choose to endorse a connection, ensure it is someone you know their skills and experience enough to put your reputation on the line by endorsing them.
If you want to add more depth to endorsing someone, write them a recommendation instead of endorsing their skills and experience.
This article originally appeared on LeadingCompany.
Making the most of your LinkedIn connections
LinkedIn is the key social media platform for leading companies to build connections and network with other professionals.
But once you have built your connections, how do you maximise the opportunities of your new expansive network? Here are some ideas.
Start a group
You may be a member of many LinkedIn groups, but have you ever thought about starting a LinkedIn group? It’s an effective way of showcasing your expertise and building your profile as a thought leader in your industry.
When starting a group you can name your group after your company such as LeadingCompany, or your industry such as Australian Marketing Group. I started the group, PR & Social Media for Businesses, which relates to the work we do and so we can have genuine discussions around these topics.
Think strategically about what your target audience are going to be searching for when looking for groups to join.
When you start a group invite all of your contacts to join, and ask your team members to do the same. This is a great way to build up membership quickly.
Groups are not ‘set and forget’. You need to start interesting discussions by posting articles or blog posts to highlight your knowledge and further build your profile as an expert in your industry.
Get involved
There are thousands of groups already created on LinkedIn. Even if you have your own one, you should join others relating your industry, and the industries of your clients or customers and become an active member.
Other LinkedIn groups are a great place to share your expertise and knowledge with people outside your contacts through either posting your own articles or blog posts, or commenting on others’.
Don’t just share your own links though; ensure you are adding value to the conversation by commenting on other posts and answering questions if you know the answer.
Share updates
This is an often ignored feature in LinkedIn. Use the “Share an Update” box at the top of your LinkedIn home page by adding valuable content rich information.
You should be doing this once a day as it will show up in the feed of your connections, ensuring you stay top of mind.
You may like to post an interesting article, blog post or quote relating to your area of expertise or industry. When sharing a URL, simply paste the URL into the status box and the article link and image will automatically appear. You can also post news about your business or your own career, such as award wins or a new business win.
Link your blog
In LinkedIn you can add your blog to your profile through the BlogLink application, so every time you post on your blog it automatically posts to LinkedIn as well.
This will help build your profile and increase your role as a thought leader to your connections. It also means you don’t have to remember to post your blog to your LinkedIn page each time you add a new post!
Media contacts
Journalists use LinkedIn too, just like other professionals.
If you have done a media interview, or interacted with a journalist in some way, connect with them on LinkedIn.
Next time they are writing an article about something within your areas of expertise, they may remember you and ring you for some quotes for an article.
Don’t barrage them by trying to communicate with them every day, but an occasional comment on something they have posted will go a long way in ensuring you are remembered by them.
The key to LinkedIn (and all social media) is to treat it like you would in real life networking. Don’t just talk about yourself but add value to your connections, and you will start to reap the rewards.
This article was originally featured on LeadingCompany.