Your business is great—of course it is! But if your mom, your best friends, and your mastermind group are the only people who know it’s great, that’s just not enough. (Sorry!) A PR strategy that shouts your awesomeness from the rooftops is what you need to reach the next level. 

            Solid public relations is all about making a favorable impression. Imagine your friends keep saying good things about someone you haven’t met yet. It’d pique your interest, right? Maybe you’d want to meet that person for yourself, and when you did, you’d already have a positive impression of him or her, simply based on what people you trust have been saying. The same is true in PR. When bloggers, influencers, and journalists are telling your story in their own words, they’re spreading so much good mojo around for you and your brand. 

As part of a broader marketing effort, PR is an important step in making your business known to potential clients and customers. Public relations’ specific role within a marketing effort is to make sure the story being told about your business is a constructive one—one that builds not only awareness of your brand but also trust and confidence in it, because people respond better to credible content that’s coming from folks they consider to be experts. 

A study from Nielson found that 85% of consumers seek out trusted expert content, including third-party articles and reviews, when considering a purchase. A good majority of consumers (67%) also say an endorsement from an unbiased expert makes them more likely to consider purchasing a product or service. 

If you’re looking to get in front of new potential clients and customers, Nielson’s research found that expert content lifted brand familiarity 88% more than branded content. Pause for dramatic effect. Friends, this research is saying that PR efforts are almost 90% more effective at lifting brand familiarity than advertising. And typically, PR is much less expensive! So you tell us where your money is best spent. We’ll wait … 

Here are three top reasons you want—no, NEED—to add PR into your marketing mix:

• PR is a proactive strategy. We hope you never have to deal with bad press, but negative reviews happen. People get mad, and you just can’t and won’t please everyone. If you’ve been investing in PR from the get-go, if something negative happens, you already have more good press than negative press out there on the interwebs. Then, you’d need to flex your PR muscles to get things back on track!
• PR bolsters both awareness and credibility. Public relations helps you get seen—be it in search results or organically online. Once you are seen, potential clients or customers are more likely to trust an objective media source to tell them about your value add. To put it simply, your story is just more believable when it’s coming from someone else.
• PR builds invaluable relationships with members of the media. Having a network of objective voices who value your business is extremely important. Next time you’re launching something new, getting ready for a special promotion, or announcing an exciting collab, you’ll be glad to have some media support to help you spread the word. 

Ready to get started with PR or build out your existing PR strategy? Fill out our intake form, and let’s come up with a plan!