Marketing
Issue No. 40 - April/ /
What to expect from your PR guru
by Cathy Gray
It seems the communication roadmap is becoming more complex and confusing every day with online print, radio and TV . Marketing, Public Relations, Advertising. How do you get the word out to your marketplace?
How does PR cope with new and established media and how does it generate ‘cut-through’ to achieve positive messaging in the mass media for its clientele?
Public relations has been slow to join the ranks of better known advertising and marketing functions. For some, PR is the icing on the marketing cake, for others PR is the cake. For many, PR remains an immeasurable quantity it’s best to shy away from.
But what exactly is PR? How can it work for your business and how can it leverage your advertising/marketing campaigns to achieve relevant and credible press results?
It’s easier to explain what it isn’t.
The idea that PR equates to ‘happy snaps’, a nice cocktail party or champagne lunches, is wrong. This function can form part of a marketing mix but partying without a purpose is irrelevant.
PR does not mean ‘press release’ either. That quickest, easiest form of publicity can get a simple news message across but the real task of PR is to generate unique press opportunities which capture the attention and mindset of your market at a critical time.
Advertising achieves a specific, measurable result because it is predictable - it is paid for. You know when and where the ad will run, and you choose its content.
It’s difficult to measure PR results against your bottom line because the function is more complicated. With PR you cannot guarantee a result, nor can you guarantee a favorable write up.
If PR cannot be measured in column centimetres or seconds of news footage, what value can you give public perception of your brand or confirmation of your messaging?
Measuring PR against an advertising value is folly. To say a positive PR article should cost as ...
