So, what hasn’t changed about PR?

• The essential PR plan. No matter your objectives, planning is the first critical move that any PR team must make. Regardless of what tactics you choose and the methods in which you conduct your PR, a plan must first be in place to ensure that: everyone involved is on the same page; tactics are derived from strategies; target markets are understood; and budgets, implementation schedules, and responsibilities are determined.

• The need to connect. Though connecting with the public is done in a very different manner today than it was 15 years ago, the point of conducting PR is still the same: to create a connection with someone, the customer, potential buyers, etc. In the past, this was done through the media. Today, this can be primarily done through two-way communication initiated through press releases that everyone can read (not just the media), blogs/websites, and companies simply talking to the public.
• The necessity of the media. I know I just said that you don’t really need media to connect to the public anymore, but you still need to utilize what the media continues to do. While you can do all of your communicating to the public without the use of the media, it would still serve you well to pitch the media for coverage online and offline. This sort of coverage is still seen as valuable because consumers still watch the news, still read the newspaper, and use the Internet for a source of new.
• The value of a network. This can be a network online, a network of media contacts, or a network of companies in your industry. These networks will be indispensable, especially online. Social media is shaking up the PR world, and as a company looking for valuable PR it is important to connect with bloggers, influential users on the various social media networking sites, and other companies partaking in the online community.
• The crucial act of crisis management. PR will always be the best source of information for the public in light of a crisis. As we’ve seen in recent events (BP, Tiger Woods, etc.), the PR team really needs to be aware, present, and fast-moving to take care of a crisis and to address the situation at hand. If they fail to do so, the company, brand, or image can greatly suffer. In most cases, PR simply needs to diffuse a situation; in other cases, it needs to serve as the formal apology, acceptance of responsibility, and revelation of plans to remedy the situation. The difference today is that a company really has no excuse to not take advantage of the many ways they address a crisis, answer a customer complaint, and even remedy a situation immediately before a crisis begins. Many companies ignore that opportunity, or don’t see it as a necessity.

Things have definitely changed, and companies need to be more proactive in regards to the responsibility new opportunities present. Buyers expect a company to be responsible, accountable, and working for the good for all consumers, the community, and the planet. Technology has made things more transparent and customers know more than they’ve ever known. This makes it a necessity for companies to be more aware of their actions and the repercussions they can have, if not just to be a morally responsible company.

Though the economy is beginning to turn around, budgets for public relations still seem to be somewhat of a hard thing to come by. To get more of a budget allotted to you as the PR professional(s) in your company, you have to sell its benefits. How do you expect executives to want to give you a budget if the reasons for utilizing and partaking in PR activities are never defined? On top of selling the benefits of PR, try to tie the PR activities into other business activities, such as marketing and business development. They are, after all, becoming more and more similar with the tools and tactics available to companies online.

Public relations can be seen as a necessary evil, but it’s a rather useful activity for businesses to partake in; not only are you now able to connect with your buyers one-on-one (which was never done (or able to be done) in the past), but you can help to shape your public image. In this way, PR is crossing the lines that separated it from marketing. You can send out a press release, respond to customers, and be active on social media; these are all things that can help to shape how the public sees you. In the past, companies had to hope the media would portray them in a positive light. Now, when that’s not done, a company can respond in the attempts to remedy an issue/potential crisis or write a letter to an editor to ask for a correction.

What does this all mean for you and your company? Well, that depends. How connected do you want to be with your audience? How much do you value customer/buyer feedback? Do you want to stay up-to-date with what your buyers are looking for? PR can assist in all of this (and more). What you need to do first is to establish your needs, goals, and objectives and those of your buyers. Then, and only then, can you move forward by conducting proactive, effective, and well-planned public relations activities.

Public relations isn’t all that difficult, and more often than not it does not require the assistance of a “professional”. Doing PR correctly requires an understanding of your audience and your company, both being things that you can learn and know. From there, it requires an understanding of how to implement tactics that you’ve defined from your strategies. (For more on tactics and strategies, read ). It may make sense to hire a consultant to get you started but don’t be afraid to try things out.

Marketing is more closely related with selling than public relations. While the ultimate goal of both marketing and PR is to gain customers and business, PR is more focused on the relationship aspect of the buying process that a buyer goes through. Moreover, PR helps to maintain the relationships with current users and new customers, whereas marketing is primarily focused on gaining new business. PR also helps to maintain and build relationships between the company and the public.

Some state that public relations is all about building relationships. While that is true, PR also has a dual purpose in a company: to help maintain relationships, as noted above. Once marketing has helped to instill recognition of a company in a buyer’s mind, it is PR’s job to foster these relationships and ensure they continue to grow in a positive manner. This can be done through communication, honesty, and engagement of those audiences.

Reading materials from other blogs to see what my take on this was, I came across a few things that made me wonder: ‘What is the difference between marketing and PR?’ Other bloggers were stating that the difference between the two were that marketing asks buyers to take an action, whereas PR does not. (I disagree.) Some were stating that marketing has nothing to do with relationship building. (I disagree here, too.)

So, what does differ between PR and marketing? I think perhaps it boils down to the bottom line: marketing aims to increase sales and overall company performance. While that is an outcome desired from having great PR, that is not what drives companies’ PR. We do PR because we want to have another side to our companies that customers can see, talk to, and engage with. This PR side of our companies is a more personified and honest interpretation of our company that does away with the advertisements and marketing seen in our other business objectives. While we would love for this tactic to earn us more business, we know the ultimate PR goal is to build relationships with our customers, potential customers, communities, and general public.

Marketing, on the other hand, is looking to convince customers of something, whether that be that our company is awesome or that our competitor is not; we are trying to force-feed customers and buyers the beliefs we want them to hold. This is more difficult than what PR does, which is to allow customers to make their own interpretations of our company (with a little help). We want to put our company in the best light, but there is only so much we can do without reverting back to marketing or advertising. With public relations, customers are given more to go off of, and can create a message or idea of their own in terms of what our company means to them.

Public relations, then, is seen as more credible than marketing. When a customer comes to a conclusion on their own, it is easier to believe and it makes more sense to them than the overdone methods of advertising and marketing. There is a very fine line between marketing and PR that is being ever blurred with the available online tools. The Internet has made it easy to perform tasks that were once labeled marketing and are now classified as PR, such as distributing press releases to the public.

When it comes down to it, customers will embrace the company they like more. Getting a customer to like your company more cannot easily be done with marketing, though it is possible. It is easier for them to like your company when they hear about you from someone else (PR), when they read about you in a newspaper article written by the paper’s staff (PR), when they see your press conference on the news (PR), or when they see the news at your awesome fundraiser event (PR).

What do you think the difference between PR and marketing is?

1. How do you define PR? What do you believe its purpose is?

   PR deserves a somewhat long definition as it encompasses so much of what a business does in regards to the public. The definition has definitely changed in the past 10 years and entails much more of a connection between the public and the company. In the past, PR was about talking to the media, getting press clippings, and sending our press releases that no one but the media saw. Today, PR is much more like marketing, and that can be attributed to the changes the Internet has created for business worldwide.

   Marketing entails, well, marketing, or your company. PR is about getting others to talk about your company. But, when you can submit your press release and post to your blog directly without having to contact the media, how to define that? It’s a line that is becoming more and more blurred. Some would call that marketing, others would call it PR since it involves press releases. A blog is a social media tool, which again, some people would consider to be a marketing venture and others, PR.

   To avoid picking sides, I’ll say that it is all a part of PR. You are putting yourself out to the online world and connecting with your buyers, making “Public Relations” public again. Your blog and other social media tools help to craft your image online; they also help to make it easier for others to talk about you online and to share your content.

   The only real way to define PR is to define advertising, which is the actual purchasing of space online, space in publications, etc. PR involves getting that space for free.

2. If someone came to you and said, “I want to do PR for a career” what are some characteristics you would tell them are necessary? Why?

   - Excellent writing skills. (Or at least a network of great writes that can help you learn to write, edit your work in the beginning, and assist you in your career journey.) Writing is such a large component of PR; a press release, a blog post, a speech, these are all writing based. Everything one does in PR involves writing, so the PR professional must be very good at this task. The reputation and brand of the company or client the PR professional represents depends on this writing being good.Personable. You need to connect with the public, media, and your buyers.

   Attentive. To detail, emotions, and one’s overall surroundings.

   Understanding. This goes hand in hand with the above; don’t push a customer, understand their needs and needs of the media when you are talking to them, and be understanding of the way the company you work for or represents affects the community at large.

   Common sense. This is necessary in all aspects of business, but even more so in PR. The PR professional is the face of the company, or in other cases the “behind-the-scenes” worker helping to mold the face of the company to prepare for a speech, press conference, interview, etc. PR professionals need to watch what they say and how they say, and know that all eyes are on them and the executives they help.

3. Do you see any similarities between the PR and journalism fields? If not, what do you see as the main differences?

   Yes; they both involve a great amount of writing. The main difference: journalists are writing on companies whereas PR is getting those journalists to write about their company/client.

4. How would you respond to people who say that PR has an agenda involved?

   PR is agenda orientated, at least it should be; why would a company create a PR plan without an agenda? That’s philanthropy. PR is meant to advance a company and connect with the public, which is a pretty good agenda to me. It being controversial is a bit silly, as most companies do it for the recognition. Where companies can differentiate themselves is by doing things to create PR without the intent of creating PR. That’s a fine line, too, though.

   While there ought to be other reasons to partake in PR than profits or sales, that is the overall end results companies are looking for when they embark on any PR campaign or venture.

5. What measures (if any) do you use to determine whether a PR campaign is successful?

   I’ll answer this with a blog post I did not too long ago that can be applied to evaluating the ROI on any PR activity.

   1. Google Analytics. This free tool can help you track traffic, traffic sources, and keyword statistics. This is crucial to your understanding of what is and what is not working online. You can determine if your efforts are paying off by seeing if your press releases, networking with other bloggers and getting them to link to your site, and participating on Twitter and Facebook are bringing traffic to your blog or website. Though this is the most frequently used tactic to measure the ROI of social networking efforts, there are other methods.

   2. Measuring traffic is an important way to measure ROI, but another method not used as frequently is to measure “soft metrics” that includes participation on your blog or forum, engagement with your online profiles/ social networking sites, and WOM (word of mouth). This is part of an active PR plan that monitors your online brand.

   3. Try searching for your blog, website, or company in Google. How are you faring? Having great content that changes and is linked to by other sites can increase your search engine rankings, which can result in more traffic. If they are not ranking highly, give it some time; seeing results and being able to determine any ROI takes patience. The Internet, though instantaneous in many ways, has a bit of a delay when it comes to seeing your pagerank (from Google), Alexa rating, and search result appearances. Know that creating great content and utilizing the right tools is the best way to ensure your website’s success.

   4. Conduct research and simply ask your customers what they think. This can help you to really pinpoint what your customers are feeling and what areas you can improve upon.

   5. Lastly, and perhaps in a more trivial manner, measure your followers on Twitter, Facebook, and now foursquare; for a brick and mortar company, foursquare can be a great way to measure your ROI and PR effectiveness.

6. What are advantages of working in the PR field today?

   The Internet makes PR a more accessible field to work in, meaning that more and more people can learn and work their way up that learning curve to advance their experience and knowledge. In the past, you had to work hard to foster relationships with just the media; now, you are working to foster relationships with the media, your buyers directly, and others in your industry to help advance your PR efforts.

7. What are some disadvantages or challenges of working in the field?

   Along the same lines, there is now more to do as a PR professional; there are more places where that PR person needs to be spending their time because the Internet has opened new avenues and opportunities for PR to be done internally, by the company, and without the help of media. That isn’t to say that media is unimportant, however; they are. There’s still a lot of value to having something like an article in the New York Times or the Wall Street Journal.

8. Where do you see the field of PR going in the future? How do you think it will change or stay the same?

   I’m not really sure; I think marketing and PR will continue to merge, and more and more companies are going to jump on the PR and social media bandwagons because it is so easy to implement. That ease doesn’t solidify their ability to maintain it, as we’ve seen in blogging and other social media platforms, but getting things started is easier than ever because you don’t need a PR boutique/firm to do it for you; you can bypass the media, connecting with your buyers directly.

   Moreover, you can have a two-way conversation with your buyers, which is something new and very valuable. I’m sure there are many changes coming, and the younger generations are going to help shape that for sure. Preferences are changing and so are peoples’ views of the world; this will definitely help to shape the way PR is done.

Want to add your take on one of the above topics? Feel free to do so in the comments!

Here are some PR basics you should know and become familiar with:

1. The Press Release. While people think this is all there is to PR, this is simply one of the small pieces that make up the entire PR arsenal. This is a tool meant to assist you in your PR efforts and will help you to spread your message. For some tips on writing a press release, check out: 3 Important Things to Consider When Writing a Press Release

2. The Press/Media Kit. This is your company’s calling card. Use this packet of information to ask the media for coverage, share your expertise with others, and to give an overall introduction to who you are. Predominantly, these are used when sending a pitch to media to give the reporter, journalist, or writer more information on the company. It is also a collection of materials a company uses to send to prospective customers and clients. This can include a number of things, but normally includes company information and history, services offered, press coverage, and team players (key executives, etc.). It can also include advertising materials such as flyers, newspaper ads, or cards. (Here are some effective ways to use your media kit.)
3. Social Media. This includes the blog, social networking tools, forums, and wikis. These are all things you monitor, create copy for, and need to be a part of (so long as it makes sense to use for your company, situation, and audience.) Social media is a wonderful tool to utilize for most companies, and for a majority of the companies that do use it, it is a relatively low investment of funds. It does require time, especially if you want to see results.

   If you’re on the fence about implementing it into your own PR mix, and for more information on determining social media’s role for you, try reading: Public Relations & Social Media | Make Sure it Fits in Your PR Mix.

4. The Public Relations Plan. This is a pivotal component to your overall PR efforts. Moreover, it contains all of the pieces (with their individual pieces) above. This also takes time, and requires that you actually plan to have success in this area. This term may be a bit misleading, as it implies that plans are a one time thing that you do and walk away from. They are very much the opposite. A plan is created when you have a specific goal or objective in mind and need to create a plan in order to better define the strategies and tactics that you will use to reach that goal. From there, it requires maintenance, improvement, and perhaps termination if you find that the goal has been reached and the campaign is over.

   The main point here is that the PR plan is a blueprint for your next moves, how you plan to acheive those moves, and what the results were so that you can create an ever better plan to follow. Remember, though, that all of your efforts will have been done in vain if you don’t measure and analyze your ROI! Return on investment is often the only reason companies conduct PR activities, and even if it isn’t the only reason, you still need results to show to your board, investors, and shareholders to get future backing. This is such a large part of constructively creating better plans, yet companies often opt out of doing this step. This is especially important when measuring the effectiveness of your social media use. (For tips on measuring your social media ROI:Public Relations Strategies | 5 Ways to Measure Social Media ROI (Return on Investment) For a step-by-step breakdown of the PR plan: 6 Characteristics and 7 Components of a PR Plan That Works)

The key to using all of the above together in a successful and pertinent manner is to ensure that you do your research before just jumping in. To be successful and to create a productive and effective campaign, be sure to define your needs and the needs of your buyers. Additionally, be sure you can define your tactics and strategies well so that you can effectively carry them out!

Good luck on your PR adventures!

Here are some reasons I gathered from the book (and from my own experience and education) that help to reiterate this point:

- Companies often times look at only innovating a new product. What they do in turn is ignore (or forget) that innovation means revamping and creating anew to benefit customers, consumers, and the business. “When it comes to identifying organic growth opportunities, an amazingly large percentage of companies are one-trick ponies, focusing only on coming up with new products, excluding anything else. What’s worse, the emphasis is often on quantity over quality.”

- Customers are the only thing that matter. No matter what you tell them, what you sell, or what you do, nothing matters but what they think. As such, it is important to take into account the following benefits that your product offers your customers: (you may remember this from your marketing or consumer behavior classes)

1. Emotional benefits – how your product or service made them feel.
2. Functional benefits – what makes your brand superior over your competitors, in their minds.
3. Attributes – the things that benefit the above benefits.

- Horizontal growth is less productive and beneficial to a company than vertical growth. Spreading your resources thin can make it hard to do business. “Trying to grow a business through innovation means spreading resources horizontally, developing new brands, new customers, and new directions. It’s a tremendously risky and expensive path to take.” (pg. 270)

Overall, there are many reasons to renovate something you have to make it better instead of spreading yourself, your brand, and your company so thinly. Instead, build your brand and products vertically, ever improving their quality. While the concept of “new” can generate you some buzz, longer lasting buzz will be generated when you show buyers that you are dedicated to creating a better product from what they’ve already fallen in love with. Lastly, create effective measurements so you can see where your renovations have been successful and not.

1. Know your company’s or client’s current situation. This is essential to knowing where the company now stands, where the company is able to go, what the company’s market/industry looks like, and what direction the company is headed. This helps to put things in perspective.
2. Know your resources. This can be a part of the first step, as it is a part of the situational analysis needed to understand where your company or client currently stands. This can help you better build your tactics and strategies while considering the budget, time, and other resource limitations the company or client may have.
3. Know your objectives and goals. Also essential to the PR plan having success, you must know where the company hopes to go. Like driving with no directions, a PR plan with no goals or objectives is an aimless action with no knowledge of what could come, or even what results are desired. Be sure that the PR plan’s objectives are in line with the rest of the company’s overall objectives, and ensure that they are clear to all involved.
4. Know and define your target audience(s). This means that you’ve defined your target buyer audiences and target media audiences. Each audience will need a different message and a different approach. Knowing these audiences will help you to frame your strategies and tactics so that you can effectively reach the people you hope to reach.
5. List messages and strategies you will use to reach the target audiences you defined. These should be in line with the goals and objectives listed earlier; if they are not, the plan is already off to a somewhat bad start. Know that your strategies and messages also need to relate to one another, otherwise there is some disconnect happening that needs to be addressed.
6. Define the tactics you will use to make the strategies you’ve listed a reality. These tactics will take the messages and strategies listed and make them happen. If, for example, a strategy is to enhance a company’s brand awareness, tactics could include community outreach, social media use, press conferences, etc. There first needs to be a strategy defined before tactics can be addressed and assigned to a message.
7. Create a time-line for implementation. This needs to be realistic but also challenging. Remember that there should be no lapses in the PR plan where press releases are being sent out, events are taking place, or media are being engaged. There needs to be constant reminder to the public that the company is alive and well, and that can be done with constant information being sent out.
8. Delegate obligations and responsibilities to your team or your client’s team to ensure all parts of the PR plan are completed. This helps to ensure that everyone is on board and that everyone knows their own responsibilities and duties. This is crucial to seeing the PR plan come to fruition. This step should be done with everyone involved so that no one feels over-burdened, left out, or given too much responsibility. This can also help to give everyone the feeling of responsibility since the plan was created with everyone together and not just one person’s say.
9. Create measurements of results/ success. To know if your plan is effective, create measurements and benchmarks for the tactics you implement. This is a place for the PR team to gauge the success of the plan and to see if goals were realistic. Creating measurements can also help to show what could have been done with the expertise and estimations of a PR firm or team.
10. Review the plan after implementation and conclusion of the plan. This is the time when all who helped to create and carry-out the plan can come together and share their thoughts on what went well, what didn’t go so well, and what could be done differently in the future. This needs to be done to ensure that future plans have a chance of being successful. This step can help to encourage group members to continue working for the company’s success by giving everyone a chance to talk and contribute to the next planing.

The key to remember when creating a PR plan is that all plans are going to be unique and different for each company, and even within the same company, they will be different for each plan objective/goal. Do your homework before creating a plan, and be sure that you work closely with the company or client to make the plan a success.

What is brand loyalty?

Brand loyalty, in marketing, consists of a consumer’s commitment to repurchase or otherwise continue using the brand and can be demonstrated by repeated buying of a product or service or other positive behaviors such as word of mouth advocacy.

Brand loyalty is more than simple repurchasing, however. Customers may repurchase a brand due to situational constraints (such as vendor lock-in), a lack of viable alternatives, or out of convenience. Such loyalty is referred to as “spurious loyalty”. True brand loyalty exists when customers have a high relative attitude toward the brand which is then exhibited through repurchase behavior. This type of loyalty can be a great asset to the firm: customers are willing to pay higher prices, they may cost less to serve, and can bring new customers to the firm. (source)

Why does brand loyalty keep people coming back?

People who liked Toyota before their recent recalls (and Tiger before his recent personal life story being shared with the world) probably haven’t changed their minds much. Just like in an election, people make up their minds and stick with that decision regardless of the facts. Conversely, people who didn’t like Toyota (for whatever reason) are now running with the recent story telling everyone they were right all along; the facts don’t matter for either person.

For example, if I bought a Toyota years ago and had the best experience imaginable, I would be pretty happy with Toyota. Then, I buy one of the unfortunate vehicles that needed a recall. I may be upset, but I would defend that decision I made to the end, up until I got my recalled car back. I wouldn’t even disown Toyota. (For the people who are not loyal to Toyota, their story is a very different one.) To reiterate again: loyalty is a hard intangible to break. Additionally, brand loyalty is a hard thing to buy. It usually can’t be bought, which is a good thing for companies who don’t have a large amount of money set aside for buying loyalty, but it also means that all companies have to try harder to grab part of the customer’s mindshare.

How do you foster loyalty?

1. Give consumers a cause. People love fighting for something, like Mac fans who have come to hate PCs because of the “cause” they adopted from Apple.
2. Give them reason to be loyal. This can be through great customer service, great products, or great price. Pick one area though, and focus on that.
3. Be consistent.
4. Be available.
5. Be responsive.
6. Be transparent in your PR activities.
7. React and respond quickly.

Pierce Mattie gives this interpretation of brand loyalty:

I’d like to think that brand loyalty is brought about not only because your mom wore the same brand of makeup your entire childhood or your dad wore the same brand of suits each day to the office, but because that brand offered something of value to you–quality, effectiveness and good ole customer service.