Public Relations – Page 2

27 October 2014

Four ways to manage your business reputation

With your business reputation directly linked to your bottom line it is important to do everything you can to build and maintain it.

While your business will inevitably take knocks from unhappy customers, mistakes you make and decisions you wish you could do-over, by following these four ways to safeguard your reputation you can still preserve your standing in the business world.

1. Be personable, not personal

A lot of people get this concept confused, especially in the online world. Keep your personal life out of your business life as much as possible. Know what you will and won’t disclose and discuss with your customers, and be mindful of who is on – and who can see, your personal social media profiles.

2. Assume that nothing is private

As a publicist I can’t tell you how many times I see private information become public. Be careful what you put out in the public sphere and who you trust with information. You can only protect your content so much.

What you write or say can be taken out of context, forwarded on to others or downloaded before you have deleted it, and programs or website changes to rules and settings can leave your information vulnerable.

The best way to protect yourself and your business is to assume that nothing online or on your devices is private. If you aren’t happy for everyone to see it, don’t send or upload it.

3. Don’t run from adversity or negative feedback

You don’t need to be a saint to maintain a good reputation. We all make mistakes; it’s what we do after that makes the difference to our reputation.

Your character is proven in how you handle adversity, conflict and negative feedback. By taking responsibility for mistakes and handling adversity and negative criticism well (whether right or wrong) not only protects your reputation, it also wins you respect, and can result in more people coming to your aid and wanting to work with you simply because of the attitude you have.

4. Monitor your reputation

As your profile builds it is important to monitor what is being said or published about you. Monitor social media, do regular searches and set Google Alerts for your name, key staff and business name. Being proactive will not only allow you to stay on top of any negative feedback, you will also be able to thank those who are referring and promoting you.

If you do find negative feedback (depending on what has been said), don’t rush to delete it or complain, it can be an opportunity to turn the situation completely around. Many businesses gain likes and customers from social media simply by acknowledging, apologising and offering a solution to an unhappy customer.

How do you manage your business reputation?

Amanda

13 October 2014

Seven tips for writing content quickly

Sometimes in business we are presented with opportunities that require us to produce a lot of content quickly. It could be for an editorial, a guest contribution to a blog or e-book, an awards submission, a presentation or pitch or even our own book or e-course.

While you can know your topic inside out, putting it down on paper can trigger all sorts of procrastinating behaviour and overwhelm, slowing down or stopping the writing process altogether resulting in lost opportunity or revenue.

To help you overcome distractions and package up your knowledge easily here are seven tips for writing a lot of content quickly.

1. Decide on your topic and audience

The first step in producing content quickly is to work out the audience you are writing for and the topic you will be writing about. In order for your writing to be successful, from a sales and public relations perspective, you want to have the two well aligned and write about a relevant issue that is of interest to your target audience and the media.

2. Map out chapters, pages or sub-headlines

Depending on what you are writing, do up a quick mind map of your chapters, pages or sub-headlines and then break it down further again to include the main points under each. Structuring your writing like this will give you more clarity around your topic, ensure you stay on target to achieve the outcome you want and help you avoid overwhelm.

3. Start anywhere

Once you have your content mapped out you can make a start in the area you feel most inspired. You don’t need to start at the beginning and work through in order. In fact as a copywriter I can tell you that 99% of the time I start in the middle. I prefer to do the introduction last so I can make sure the beginning sums up and leads into the rest of the writing project.

4. Use anecdotes

Stories, examples and case studies not only create an emotional connection with your readers, they also make your points more memorable, easy to understand and your content more inspired and fun to write.

5. Use a voice recorder

While sitting down and writing can work for some of us, for others it can stifle creativity. If you recognise that you are more creative standing up, walking around, speaking or being in front of the white board jot down brief notes and speak into a voice recorder. Leverage your creativity by finding the process that works best for you.

6. Record all ideas

Once you start the writing process you can find yourself being inspired at all different times throughout the day and night when you least expect or want it. For this reason make sure you have a way to record your ideas keeping a notepad and pen or your phone near you at all times.

7. Edit upon completion

The biggest productivity killer in writing isn’t procrastination it’s perfectionism. Give yourself the freedom to write the entire first draft before you start editing and critiquing. Editing as you go can slow the process down (or bring it to a halt) and waste periods of inspiration.

Have you had to produce a lot of content quickly? How did you go about it?

Amanda

2 September 2014

The biggest point of difference you are underselling

If you are like most business owners your biggest point of difference comes not from what you do or even how you do it, it comes from what you know.

The knowledge you have around your industry, products and services, your customers needs, problems and challenges, the lessons you’ve learnt and the formulas, templates, processes and systems you’ve created based on your knowledge and experience is all extremely valuable.

What’s more it could be what influences a potential customer in doing business with you over your competitors. Yet most of us undersell it.

So if by chance you are underselling your knowledge, here are four reasons why you should stop doubting and start sharing.

1. Your industry knowledge isn’t “common sense”

When something comes easy to you, it can be easy to think that it comes easy to everyone else too – but it doesn’t. The truth is you have distinct skills and knowledge that most people will never have. Even the most researched customers won’t come close to what you know.

2. You may share the same expertise, but not the same experience

While you may feel that the industry knowledge you have isn’t unique, that it is shared by anyone working in your industry, your experience is. The experience you have gained from working in your industry day in and day out can’t be replicated.

No one has been exactly where you are today. They haven’t had the same life experiences, the same customers, learned the same business lessons, or had the same setbacks and wins. You are far more knowledgeable than you realise.

3. Your explanation and application could be just what someone needs

Each of us respond better to particular communication and learning styles and build rapport quicker with specific personalities.

While you may not be the most knowledgeable person in your industry – or even close at this stage, how you explain, implement or package your knowledge could be what spurs a customer or potential customer to finally take action on something they have “heard a hundred times” before.

4. Every great expert started as an amateur

Remember that every great expert and every successful entrepreneur and business leader started out as an amateur. The only difference is they kept learning, growing and sharing what they knew with their staff, customers and the world.

Are you underselling yourself?

Amanda

25 August 2014

Three ways to be more compelling in your sales and marketing

Your ability to compel your customers, readers and followers to read on, act or buy, directly determines your leads, conversions and business profits.

So how do you become more compelling in your sales and marketing? Here are three ways to get you started.

1. Keep a little mystery

In the same way you wouldn’t tell your entire life story in the first few dates with someone, don’t feel you need to inform your potential customer, reader or follower of every facet of your business, industry or topic in the first few touch points. Leave a little mystery by informing them slowly.

Mystery leaves your potential customers wanting more, providing of course that you give away the right details to begin with. To use mystery effectively you need to know who you are targeting and what key selling points will most appeal to them.

Infomercials and your answer to the common question “so what do you do?” are great places to practice a little business mystery.

2. Offer information teasers

Key information like statistics, industry insights, inside secrets, usability tips, and handy hints on areas your target audience are interested in can spark interest and get them to take a level of action like giving over their contact details to you.

Knowledge is power, and in this day and age it is our most valuable commodity – not to mention our biggest point of difference. Sharing relevant and interesting information builds your credibility and positions you as an expert in your field, giving potential customers the confidence in doing business with you.

The trick here though, is in knowing how much of your knowledge to give away, as it will depend on the action you need a potential customer to take. Being a ‘teaser’ your information should be limited, but at the same time it needs to be enough to build trust and leave potential customers, followers or readers feeling like you’ve given them real value.

Always keep some information under lock and key for your paying customers, or to get potential customers taking bigger steps of trust with you.

Social media, newsletters, website opt-ins, blog posts and advertisements are great places to tease with compelling information.

3. Limit options and choices

While potential customers want to feel like they have a choice in what they do or buy, too much choice can overwhelm your buyer and cause you to lose control in the sales process.

Before you do any sales or marketing you should map out the steps you want to take each customer through. While not all will follow and some will jump ahead, having this planned out allows you to guide potential customers to the decision you want them to take.

In a service-based business it could be having a few core packages, memberships or services with the ability to customise or value-add further should you need too. For online product-based businesses it could be having a clear category headings and links to the most popular products from your home page as opposed to listing all products immediately.

By having limited choices buyers can quickly determine the products or services most relevant to them, or what their next step needs to be without being overwhelmed by information. It also means you can use sneaky call to action tips to help boost your conversions.

Keep in mind that too much information or too many choices can stall the buying process and even drive them to a competitor who keeps choices simple. This is particularly important for websites and sales meetings.

What are some ways you can be more compelling in your sales, marketing and copywriting?

Amanda

12 August 2014

Five sneaky call to action tips to boost conversions

Your call to action is one of the most important parts of any copy you write. While your words may be clever and compelling, and your images eye catching and engaging, if you aren’t calling people to act, you won’t get the results you want.

So how do you make sure you are calling your potential customers to act effectively? Here are five sneaky call to action tips to help boost your conversions.

1. Map out your sales process

The key to an effective call to action is to know what actions you need your potential customer to take. While it would be nice for a potential customer to go from not knowing you to spending thousands with you instantly, and yes it does happen, in most cases though trust and rapport need to be established first.

This is where your sales process comes in, working out each step that needs to be taken to build trust and turn your potential customer into your ideal customer.

For each marketing piece you write, whether it is a sales letter, brochure or website think about the very next step they need to take. Is it to call you? Answer your phone call? Sign up to your mailing list? Go to a landing page? Download a free resource? Make a small ‘teaser’ purchase that will lead them to a bigger purchase?

Break each step down, giving clear instructions as to what needs to happen next.

2. Create urgency

The whole point of a call to action is to get your potential customers acting now, not saying, “I’ll do that later”. But to do this you need to communicate the urgency.

You can do this by using scarcity and competition to hint at what they could miss out on if they don’t act quickly, and/or using urgent language like “try it now”, “immediate access” or “call today”.

3. Use triggers

Sometimes you need to give potential customers a little extra help to get over the line, that is where sales triggers, little messages that motivate, come into play.

It could be a testimonial with results you know they will want, a risk minimising message like a guarantee or even some bullet points that overcome common objections and establish your value all put near your call to action to ‘seal the deal’.

4. Make your ‘buy buttons’ green or bright coloured

We have been programed in society that green = go and red = stop or a hazard, are your buy buttons giving off the right signal?

While green is a good idea for your buy button, bright colours, particularly against duller colours (if you were wanting to highlight a particular package, membership or option for instance) can also draw the eye and send the right signal.

5. Get rhyming

While it may sound funny or corny, research has shown that rhyming phrases are perceived to be more truthful and accurate. Get a little creative and give rhyming a go for one of your calls to actions and test your results.

Hopefully this has helped you a fraction, what tips will you use in your next call to action?

Amanda

9 June 2014

How to become a market leader (not a competitor follower)

In business it can be easy to get distracted by what your competitors are doing. When they bring out new products or services, branch out into new markets or change their course of action you can be tempted to do the same.

But when you change the way you do business or take an alternate course of action because of what your competitors are doing, they become the leader and you become the follower and you’ll always be one step behind.

So to prevent you from taking actions you may not have taken if it wasn’t for feeling threatened, here are three tips to ensure you remain a leader in your own business not a follower of someone else’s.

1. Stay focused on your customers, not your competitors

The best and quickest way to grow your business and expand your market share is to stay focused on your customer not your competitors.

The more you can get inside your customers head, the more relevant and targeted you can make your products, services and marketing. Give your customers what they want and they will not only keep coming back, they will also refer more people to you.

So be a leader, find opportunities to be different, stay focused on what your customer wants and continually value-add and innovate to give it to them. Do this and you won’t have to worry about your competitors. They on the other hand will have a lot to worry about with you!

2. Anticipate needs and trends

A true market leader will not just meet current customer needs and wants, they’ll also anticipate future needs, wants and trends.

Look for patterns that are forming, frustrations that are growing, trends and technology that are going to impact how you provide and deliver your products and services or how you customer will use them, and watch for what no one else is doing. Most importantly listen to what your customers are saying – and not saying.

If you are taking these market-leading actions yourself, you’ll have no reason to follow what your competitors are doing, you’ll already be on it.

3. Play on your strengths

Each business has it’s own strengths. It could be your knowledge, specialist staff, results, your high quality products and services, your level of customer service and follow up, your creativity and ideas, your industry experience, your client base, your large budget, your size and infrastructure, your available resources, your website and quality of content, your entrepreneurial thinking, or your agility.

Whatever your strengths are, use them to your best advantage. Too often we focus on other peoples strengths and our weaknesses. But for a competitive advantage in business you need to be focused on your competitors’ weaknesses and developing your strengths.

How do you ensure you are leading not following?

Amanda

19 May 2014

Why you need to be a shameless self-promoter

When it comes to self-promotion and marketing there tends to be two kinds of business owners, those who are their brand and those who hide behind their brand. But, in order to create a truly successful business you need a balance of both.

So here are three reasons you need to become a shameless self-promoter, and for those who want to run a mile at the thought of being more in the spotlight, how you can do it while still being somewhat in the background.

1. People need a personal connection

To create a valuable business that you can sell one day (it’s good to have the option) you need to build a powerful brand that isn’t solely dependent on you. But at the same time to create that marketing momentum there needs to be a face, someone they can connect to, a person that embodies the expertise, experience and personality of the brand to build trust and relationships with potential customers.

Now that doesn’t mean your face needs to be on everything, you just be an expert in your own right. If you are not comfortable with being on video, getting up to speak or having your photo everywhere, consider writing, blogging or being active via social media to build your profile that way.

Doing this will also help secure your future, when you have your own profile it is easier to launch new projects, businesses or causes because people know you outside your brand.

2. Your business won’t grow by you playing small

We each have a contribution to make, in life and in business. We have the power to make a difference and impact lives. But playing down your talents and abilities, staying small and hiding in the background doesn’t help you serve your purpose.

Many business owners shy away from talking about their skills and experience as they don’t want to seem egotistical or boastful, knowing this can be damaging to their reputation and relationships. But you don’t need to be arrogant in order to establish your value, and what these business owners also forget is that being too humble and underselling themselves can also damage their business and stunt their growth.

Would you buy off someone who was unsure of themselves and downplaying their abilities? I know I wouldn’t.

Own your skills and talents and have confidence in your abilities to deliver for your customers. Your confidence will in turn grow your customers and potential customers confidence in you leading to more sales and more opportunities to help people.

3. If you deliver a better product or service you have an obligation to tell your customer about it

There are so many people out there who are ready and waiting to take advantage of people with below average products and services, or grand promises they can’t or have no intention of keeping.

That is why you have an obligation to let your customers and potential customers know about you. If you provide higher quality products or services, have more experience or offer more value you owe it to them to try and help them.

Self-promotion doesn’t need to be boastful, salesy or cheesy, and you certainly don’t need to put your head on the side of a bus if you don’t want to.

But in order to generate more publicity for your business and attract and convert more customers you do need to step out of the shadows and build your own profile up too.

By doing so you will find that as your own profile grows so will your business simply because people will want to be involved in what you are doing.

Amanda

20 April 2014

How to make your business newsworthy (with steal worthy news angles to try)

With journalists bombarded with hundreds of pitches and media releases each day, your ability to generate media coverage is directly determined by how newsworthy and interesting you can make yourself, your business or your topic.

But with so many different media outlets with differing opinions on what is newsworthy to them, how do you choose the right angle to make sure you don’t end up deleted?

Here are some tips to help you find the best newsworthy angle for your business and some steal worthy news angles to get you started.

1. Know why you want media coverage

The first step in making your business newsworthy is to determine why you want to generate media coverage in the first place. Is it to build brand awareness and get people talking about your products or services? Is it to raise awareness for a cause or issue? Is it to gain credibility and be able to say that you or your business have been “featured in…” or perhaps it’s to be the go-to source on your area of expertise?

Why you want to generate coverage will not only impact what media outlets and journalists you target but also the angle you use to make it more newsworthy to each of them.

For example if you want to be an ongoing source you wouldn’t send off a media release about how great your product, service or business is. You would be leading with statistics, figures, trends, industry insights and other valuable information that will prove your worth and credibility.

2. Determine who your target market is

Like any form of promotion you need to know who you are targeting and why. While the journalist will be the first point of contact, they won’t necessarily be the primary market you want to target, unless your goal is to become their expert source.

So think about it, is it that you want to reach new potential customers and persuade them to buy your product or service? Do you to attract more wholesalers to stock your products or high quality staff, licensees, franchisees and investors into your business?

When you know who you are targeting you will easily identify the best media channels to use to get your message across and the right angle to ‘hook’ both the journalist and your target market.

3. Know the media you are targeting

Once you have a list of the media outlets that attract your target market, get to know each one. What stories and topics do they cover? What do they find newsworthy? How do they put stories together? Are they factually based or more sensational? Have they covered anything recently that you could give more detail on or an alternate opinion? How much information do they require? How long is each story or segment? What segment, section or journalist will find what you have to share the most relevant?

Keep in mind too that there will often be multiple opportunities within the one media outlet that will also require a different approach or angle. Take a magazine for example, which has editorials and features, personal or business profiles, real life stories, product features, reviews and competitions, opinion pieces and letters to the editor.

Each of these segments can offer you media coverage though which one you choose will depend on your purpose. If you want to establish yourself as an expert you may want to go for a profile or editorial article. However, if you want to launch or promote a product you may opt for a product feature, review or competition.

4. Find your angle

When you know why you want coverage, who you are targeting and what media you need to use to reach them, suddenly finding your angle, hook or “in” is a lot easier.

Keep in mind that the media want to appeal to their audience just as much as you do in order to boost their own ratings, hits or sales, so think about what information you can provide that will help them achieve their goals so you can, in turn achieve yours. Always take a win/win/win approach when it comes to targeting the media.

To help you start thinking about angles you can adapt to attract media coverage in your own business, here are some examples categorised by three types of coverage you might be looking for.

A personal or business profile – Include stories of rags to riches, David versus Goliath, overcoming adversity, something or someone lost than found, successes (like winning an accolade, achieving something that is thought to be difficult or “impossible”, making a discovery, achieving a milestone or attaining a big goal), business growth (franchising, licensing, winning a large contract, expanding nationally or internationally) or even key lessons you’ve learnt (what to do or not to do) in any of the above (or other) scenarios
Becoming a source – Provide valuable information people need to know but aren’t told or have no way of knowing like key industry insights, research findings, breaking news, whistle-blower confessions, examples of real world consequences when it comes to new regulations or legislation (or a layman’s guide to understanding it), upcoming trends, public announcements, scams or lawsuits
Product feature – New products, themed products (summer/winter essentials, must-have tools for business owners, products every new mum needs etc.), gift ideas, decorations or recipes for celebrations and events (like Mother’s Day, Father’s Day, Easter, Birthdays or Christmas) or products that are endorsed, used or spotted on a celebrity

A good news angle will be relevant to your the audience, interesting to the media and add value to everyone. Remember that the objective is not to push information out but to draw people to you, a concept that can take more thoughtful planning, but will generate more results and sales.

Amanda

20 April 2014

Five tips to help you pitch more effectively to bloggers

When it comes to getting your message out to a large audience, the first response for most business owners is to target the media. Though what more brands are starting to realise is that bloggers can be equally powerful, if not more powerful, at spreading the word.

Not only are they powerful influencers with their loyal audience, they also provide valuable link backs to your website, give you greater flexibility with more promotional posts than the media and can be a lot easier to gain coverage on – provided you do it right.

There are a number of ways you can work with bloggers, from sponsored posts, link placements and advertising, to guest posts, reviews and giveaways. You will find most PR friendly blogs will have a PR page that lists the opportunities available with them and how they like to work with brands.

Since this is such a great way to get the word out about your business, I thought I would share five tips on pitching to bloggers as both a blogger and publicist, so you can improve your chances of gaining coverage on blogs and building an ongoing beneficial relationship with bloggers.

1. Personalise your email

It is important to understand that bloggers, like journalists, can receive hundreds of PR pitches a day so it is important to stand out from the crowd. To do this take the time to find out their name and interests (you will normally get this from reading their posts and ‘About’ page).

Don’t send out a blanket email to hundreds of bloggers with ‘Dear blogger’ as the header, general statements like this immediately strip any personal touch from your email and can be skipped over in a sea of emails if there is no powerful subject line or headline to capture attention.

2. Read their blog

There are a number of reasons why you should read the blogs you are targeting. First and foremost you need to determine if they are someone you want to associate your brand with, secondly you want to double check they have your target audience and lastly you want to get to know them as a person to make a targeted pitch.

3. Keep your pitches relevant

Just like the media, don’t send bloggers every bit of information or news on your business. Only send products and services that are relevant to them personally and their audience and do it sporadically. If you email them too regularly or continue to send them irrelevant information they may get into the habit of deleting any email that comes through or block you altogether.

4. Make it win/win/win

Often many businesses get caught up in focusing on the win for themselves and the win for the blogger’s readers that they completely forget the blogger! But bloggers work hard to build their audience and like any human being, want to know what’s in it for them.

So before you approach them think about what you can offer them. With reviews you will obviously give them the goods or services to keep for the review (though make sure it is of a monetary value that is worth their time) and sponsored posts you pay, though what about guest posts? Could you provide them with promotion by promoting their blog and the article across your social media? Could you offer them a reciprocal guest post on your blog or in your newsletter? Think about what they might like or what would help them.

5. Build a relationship

Instead of aiming for a once off mention on their blog, look to build an ongoing relationship with the bloggers you target. Attract their attention by interacting with them on their blog and social media and continue to build rapport by engaging with them.

The better the relationship you build with the blogger the more opportunities you will expose yourself to – particularly if you build a relationship between the blogger and your brand. If they become a fan of your products or services, there is a high chance you will get extra mentions above what you have asked for or arranged.

Do you have any tips or any questions when it comes to working with bloggers?

Amanda

10 March 2014

How to turn a mistake into a marketing opportunity

While mistakes in business can fill us with dread and embarrassment, like many other times of trial and adversity they can be turned into an opportunity to showcase the professionalism, integrity and authenticity of our business.

So how do you recover with your reputation in tact after you’ve dropped the ball? Here are three tips to help you turn a mistake into a marketing opportunity and win the respect of your customers and business associates.

1. Remember mistakes can be the best teachers

When money is coming in, the phone is ringing, our customers are happy and everything is going smoothly we don’t always look for ways to improve, change, update, innovate or leverage to make our business work better. After all if it’s working why mess with it – right?

Just think about it, when are you more motivated and driven to change your marketing approach or bring in sales, in a slow month or a busy month? What about adding value to your customers and increasing your level of customer service? Are you more likely to think about it when you have a happy customer or an unhappy customer?

When are you more innovative and creative in business, when it’s business as usual or you’re under threat because of a mistake, wrong decision or competitor?

Creativity and innovation thrive when we are under fire. There is nothing quite like making a mistake or facing adversity and the accompanying pain or embarrassment, to get us out of our comfort zone and into our creative, innovative and strategic problem-solving zone to find a better way.

So take the education, learn the lesson, find a way to make it better or prevent it from happening in the future and make the change.

2. Realise mistakes can humanize you and help build rapport

The fact is we all make mistakes, and provided it is small, there is limited damage and the intent was innocent, mistakes can actually work for us, making us more relatable and approachable to our customers and business associates.

To give you an example, many years ago I told a potential customer they could get “one product for the price of three!” – a bargain right?! This silly, slip of the tongue completely broke the ice, gave them a good laugh and allowed me to build a good rapport with them over the phone which lead to an ongoing relationship and ongoing sales.

Who hasn’t made a typo, got tongue tied, sent an email to the wrong person, forgotten to do something, misspoke, or made a wrong decision? The key is in how you handle it, recover from it and make up for it.

Could you use the mistake or blunder as a rapport builder, a case study to help your customers avoid the same mistakes themselves or as an opportunity to showcase new and better procedures, methods or measures?

3. Use your mistakes as an opportunity to show your character

There is something inspiring about a person who takes responsibility for their actions, faces the consequences and tries to make it right. It shows character.

So if you do make a mistake own it, if you make the wrong decision fix it and if you have an unhappy customer, address it. Be professional, admit your mistake, apologise and make it right.

By being open, honest and accountable for your mistakes you not only protect your reputation, you can end up having more people want to work with you simply because of the attitude you have and actions you have taken.

Amanda

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