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    Public relations

    The masses of information we all have at our fingertips has led to a fundamental shift in the way people buy products and services.

    No matter where someone has heard about a business, or seen a product, they are likely to go to the wider internet to do their research before buying. This could include searching for a company website, looking for reviews, checking out social media channels, looking for blogs, news or industry articles, or anything else that helps influence the decision to buy.

    What they find will largely depend on how invested that business is in its public relations strategy.

    A successful marketing strategy recognises that there are several different pieces of the puzzle that need to come together to result in truly impactful outcomes.

    Public relations (PR) activity is an important piece of that puzzle. Even if a business has invested heavily in an extensive advertising campaign, it’s highly likely that, having seen one of those adverts, a potential customer will go and do their own independent research before deciding to buy.

    A study commissioned by Google during the pandemic showed 84% of shoppers were using online sources to support their purchases. More recently, a Global Retail Study found that 56% of people shopping in-store turned to their phones to research items while they were in the shop.

    Investing in public relations activity will help boost the return on advertising spend, as well as generating income and sales in its own right.

    Therefore, rather than being an additional ‘nice-to-have’, good public relations is integral to business growth and success.

    PR is all about building relationships, trust, and credibility. It’s the activity that takes place alongside paid advertising to gain publicity, raise awareness and demonstrate knowledge.

    It often involves working with other agencies, such as media outlets, influencers, partner organisations and peer groups to win ‘earned’ content – information that exists about a business that it does not ‘own’.

    This could take the form, for example, of press articles, guest columns or quotes in a news or industry publication, an interview on a podcast or webinar, a review or blog by a key person in the industry, or endorsements by other relevant voices of authority.

    As well as helping to build that reputation and trust, public relations can win customers in its own right. A potential client reading about a business’s latest eco-friendly development, for example, may be moved to buy a product or service from that one article alone.

    Consumers care about a brand’s stance on sustainability and social issues, and PR is one of the ways in which this can be communicated.

    In addition, when a credible authority links to a business online, this creates a backlink, which is also a powerful tool for SEO.

    We help businesses devise their PR strategies, including taking time to understand the business and its objectives, the brand and the key messages that need to be conveyed.

    As well as producing content in several forms, we also use our network of contacts to identify opportunities for media coverage, then measure and monitor the performance of that coverage.

     

    Summary

    Earned media coverage is the most powerful form of marketing, with many direct and indirect benefits for businesses.

    A successful PR strategy enables a business to tell its story to the world. When a potential customer goes off to do their research, they’ll then be met with a wealth of information from a variety of sources – all of which help create a narrative about the business’s values and ethos.

    We have extensive experience in this area which has seen us working on campaigns as varied as film festivals, the engineering sector and emergency services.

    Get in touch to find out how we can help build reputation and credibility.

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