Public relations (PR) is the art of strategically sharing information to improve the public’s perception of your brand.
So, naturally, marketing and PR are a perfect match. By integrating PR into your marketing strategy, you’ll craft a compelling, positive, and consistent brand story that resonates with your audience.
Continue reading to learn more about how this powerful synergy could transform the narrative of your employer brand.
Understanding Public Relations
So, what does PR entail, and what’s its role in managing public perception?
Simply put, PR is an umbrella term for describing the actions your brand takes to manage how information about your business or its members is shared with the public and the media.
It’s about shaping and maintaining a positive public image, controlling the spread of information, and handling any negative publicity that may arise.
With that said, generally speaking, PR’s purpose is:
- To inform – for example, if you have big company news or are launching a new product or service that you want to publicize
- To strengthen and maintain your company image, you may want to raise awareness of your company or elevate the public profile of your team members.
- To create a positive spin on any potentially harmful damage to your brand’s reputation – for example, if your company has recently performed poorly or one of its products or services is receiving poor online reviews
There are several ways to achieve the above, including:
- Press releases sent to trade, local, national, and broadcast media and published on your website.
- Events to which the media are invited (for example, a press conference) can be an excellent opportunity to network and get your message across.
- Spearheading media relations activities to communicate your message, for instance, creating and distributing press kits, hosting interviews with journalists, creating YouTube videos, posting on social media, and running media relations campaigns to promote new products, people, and services.
Benefits of PR in Marketing
Integrating public relations into your marketing strategy has plenty of benefits, and we’ve touched briefly on some of those above- let’s dive into this a bit deeper:
- Boosted brand awareness: PR can enhance the visibility and credibility of your employer brand. How? By getting your message across to your target audience using the abovementioned practices. Your marketing strategy should have identified your core audience, their habits, and so on. With this knowledge, you can leverage PR techniques to reach your audience and showcase your brand’s credibility.
- Trust building: A successful PR campaign is key in building trust with your audience through consistent and authentic messaging and storytelling across all communication channels. This approach ensures your target audience understands who you are, what you do, how you do it, and why they should choose you over your competitors.
- Crisis management: PR plays a crucial role in managing negative publicity. For instance, if someone in your company has done something that attracts negative attention, rather than hiding and hoping it goes away, a solid PR approach could help you manage the story. This might involve utilizing media-trained spokespeople, having pre-prepared messages to convey, etc.
Strategies for Integrating PR into Marketing
Hopefully, by now, you can see why PR is an essential ingredient in your marketing strategy, but how do you do it?
Here are a few ideas:
- Collaborative campaigns: Work on joint marketing and PR campaigns with companies whose goals align with yours.
- Content creation: So your press releases are written and gaining some positive coverage. That’s great! How do you leverage them in your marketing materials? For starters, ensure any positive media is re-posted on your socials, website, and that you celebrate positive press with everyone on your email lists. Don’t assume they’ll just know. Tell them.
- Social media: It’s a fast and easy way to communicate with your audience. For example, you might want to celebrate a successful recruitment round or share insights into industry-related events. Whatever the circumstance, if you have something to say or shout about, use social media to talk about it and drive traffic to your website.
Measuring PR Impact
Measuring the success of your PR campaigns allows you to track the effectiveness of your efforts and make informed decisions for future campaigns.
To do this, you need to pick a few key performance indicators (KPIs) to track and then evaluate them regularly. Armed with this information, you’re better positioned to optimize your strategies.
Here are a few examples of KPIs you may want to measure:
- The active coverage you’re receiving (secured by your PR team) and how that compares to your competitors
- Social engagement, for example, how many social views, comments, and click-throughs you gain
- Event attendance
- Website traffic
Moving on from the “what” to the “how,” here are just a few tools, some free, some not, you can use to measure your PR KPIs:
- Google Analytics: To better understand your social and website/app visitors
- Geckoboard: An affordable, customizable dashboard that tracks social media metrics, email campaigns, etc.
- Meltwater: Helps you estimate your PR campaign’s ROI and provides insight into the media coverage that’s making an impact.
- Hootsuite: For social media analytics
- CoverageBooks: View PR metrics concerning online articles and social media posts
Are You Ready to Leverage The Advantages of PR?
Incorporating PR into your marketing strategy from the start is an investment that will help boost your employer brand and gain trust with high-quality candidates.
Want to learn more about how you could leverage PR’s benefits? Connect with us to see how we can help!