Quantifying Public Relations For Your Business

Setting quantifiable PR goals makes it easy to measure your PR initiatives’ progress and track your campaigns’ effectiveness.

Improvements in analytic tools and innovative tracking methods, helps make quantifying your business’ PR initiatives easier and more precise. That said, the availability of analytical tools doesn’t mean that business managers are measuring the right KPI’s or analyzing them correctly.

Evaluating outcomes requires more than just checking earned media metrics, such as how many people saw or read a piece of content. To truly measure the success of your PR campaigns, you need to look beyond impressions and clicks. You need to focus on measurable results that clearly connects a campaign to your business goals and ROI.

5 Methods For Quantifying PR Results

Using a combination of these methods, your business will be better positioned to measure the impact of your PR efforts. As a result, you’ll be able to make informed decisions regarding the direction of future campaigns.

Social Media Engagement

Social media metrics are a powerful way of measuring your PR efforts. From social media metrics, your business can get real-time data on the total engagement of your campaigns. You can track social media engagement from the number of followers, impressions, likes, comments, and shares of your content across different platforms.

High social media impressions indicate brand awareness. Increasing followers, likes, comments, and shares indicate growth and interest in your content.

Ensure you calculate your social media engagement rate when measuring PR efforts. This will tell you how your content performs independent of your number of followers.

To calculate your engagement rate, divide the total engagement by the number of followers, then multiply by 100.

Press Mentions

Press clippings are a traditional but effective way to measure PR success. A press clipping refers to a published piece of content that mentions or features your business in some form. To effectively measure press clips, it’s essential to look beyond the number of articles and focus on the quality of coverage instead.

For instance, consider the reach and credibility of the publication where your press clip appeared and its relevance to your target audiences.

To track how many clips you’ve secured, it’s important to maintain a central repository where all the articles are stored and easily accessible.

Some of the indicators of success from press coverage include:

  • Further coverage by other media outlets
  • Increased brand recognition
  • Increased shares of the article on social media
  • Improved website traffic and leads

Media Impressions

Media impressions refer to the total number of times your business is seen and heard through different media channels. Impressions differ from reach in that they account for the number of people exposed to your content as opposed to the number of people who clicked it.

To get the number of impressions on your campaign, multiply your number of press clips by the circulation of each outlet. This will help you determine the impact of your strategy. That said, don’t rely on impressions alone to quantify PR. They don’t necessarily translate to clicks or conversions.

Traffic And Backlinks

How many unique visitors and page views did your website or blog receive every month of your PR campaign? Evaluating website traffic helps measure PR ROI, particularly if you can link the traffic to a particular campaign or content.

With tracking tools, such as Google Analytics, that track both organic and referral traffic, you can measure the number of visitors that come from a specific source, such as a press release or article.

One important metric you shouldn’t forget to check when analyzing traffic is bounce rates. These are the number of visitors who land on a page and leave without engaging with the content.

A high bounce rate may indicate that you’re targeting the wrong audience or that the audience feels that your content is not useful. Cushion your site against high bounce rates by sharing useful content and linking to relevant pages.

You can also track backlinks to your website or blog. This will help you determine how many websites link to your site and share its content on their platforms. A high number of backlinks indicates increased visibility and potential leads for your business.

Market Surveys

Another effective way of quantifying PR is conducting market surveys. Before beginning your campaign, research how many people have heard about your product or service. After your campaign, do the same kind of research. Then you can compare the results to measure how successful the campaign was in increasing brand awareness and recognition.

Surveys are also great for measuring customer sentiment, engagement, and satisfaction. All these metrics can give you an accurate snapshot of the success of your PR efforts.

Final Thoughts

Quantifying public relations helps you gauge the ROI and success of your PR campaigns. Hire a professional PR agency to help you set measurable goals and develop effective strategies to ensure your PR campaigns are successful.

Leeza Hoyt

How Branding And SEO Work Together

Branding and SEO have a symbiotic relationship that markets must take advantage of to experience the full benefit of each.

When used together, branding and SEO create an effective marketing strategy. This can drive organic growth, increase visibility, and strengthen customer loyalty and trust. Ultimately, using these two strategies together leads to tremendous success in business.

When considering how branding and SEO work together, it is important to first understand their individual roles. Read on to learn the basics of branding and SEO and how you can use them together to achieve maximum results.

Branding And SEO

Branding is the process of making your business, products, and services known to the public. It’s also about differentiating yourself from your competitors. Branding entails creating a positive image/perception of your company and its products or services by using marketing communication channels. These include emails, social media, and advertising.

SEO (search engine optimization), on the other hand, is a set of strategies used to optimize content and web pages for search engine results pages (SERPs). The goal is to get your pages to rank higher in the SERPs for relevant search queries.

So, when done right, it increases traffic to your site and boosts brand visibility as you become more visible to more potential customers. This is accomplished through keyword research, local SEO, content optimization, link building, and site architecture.

Branding builds awareness, trust, and authority for your company and its products and allows you to build customer relationships.

SEO helps your business reach your target audience quickly, efficiently, and cost-effectively. It aligns with branding by ensuring your content is seen by more customers and engaging them to take action.

How SEO And Branding Work Together

Branding and SEO can create a powerful combination to reach more potential customers, stay ahead of the competition, and increase profits. They allow marketing to be useful to target audiences by providing them with your brand’s solutions when they’re looking for answers from search engines.

Here is how they work together to boost your business:

Quality Content That Reflects Your Brand

Branding gives you complete control over your business’s public image and perception. Therefore, you can use it to position your brand as an authority in your industry by publishing quality content.

Coupled with SEO, branding can significantly increase your brand’s visibility. SEO helps ensure that your content is visible when people search for information relating to the solutions that your products or services provide.

Quality content created with SEO best practices that also reflects your brand provides value and a great user experience to customers. As a result, it builds trust and is favored by search engine algorithms.

Make sure that the search intent of your content is clear in order to ensure higher rankings. Use keywords to help search engines understand what your content is about. It’s also a good idea to regularly update your content to keep it relevant and accurate.

Moreover, share new content frequently to keep your content fresh. The more you share new content, the more your site ranks for hundreds or thousands of keyword topics. This signals to Google that you’re an expert or authority in your niche. Thus, it sees that your brand is valuable to customers and will rank your site higher. The end result is more visibility and traffic to your website.

Boosting Brand Image Through Improved Rankings

Google and other search engines rank their results from the most to the least relevant. If your brand appears on the first page of Google, it will be seen as a reliable source of information. In fact, the first page results on search engines get 71% percent of all clicks.

Ranking high on Google boosts your brand image as a large number of people on the internet use your information for decision-making. Also, you get more qualified visitors on your website, leading to more leads and conversions.

Building Backlinks

A backlink is any link to your website from an external source. Part of SEO is gaining quality backlinks from high-authority websites. This shows search engines understand that your website is providing quality content as other sources are linking to it.  In turn, this boosts your credibility and authority, resulting in higher rankings.

With higher search engine rankings and more traffic being directed toward your site, you can boost brand awareness and enhance the reputation of your brand.

Conclusion

SEO and branding go hand in hand when it comes to growing your business and achieving success. They both play an important role in gaining visibility and credibility, ultimately leading to more sales.

With the right strategy in place, you can build a strong online presence without compromising on quality content or neglecting either of the disciplines.

Leeza Hoyt

What Is The PESO Model For Public Relations?

Public relations is a key tool that can help your business manage its reputation and accomplish goals. It can help with establishing trust, building relationships, and creating a favorable public image.

Due to its ever-evolving nature, there are many models of PR. Your business might find it difficult to know which one to adopt. While there is no one-size-fits-all approach to public relations, the PESO model is an effective framework to follow. PR professionals can use it to plan and execute effective campaigns while covering all bases.

What Is The PESO Model?

The PESO model is an abbreviation for Paid, Earned, Shared, and Owned media. It is a modern public relations model that integrates different media forms to create more effective and holistic campaigns.

For a long time, PR has relied solely on earned media to reach its goals. Over the past decade, the business world has been introduced to social media and owned media as effective ways of reaching their audiences. The PESO model helps PR practitioners adopt and realize the full advantages of these new media forms.

Aside from integrating paid, shared, and owned media in public relations efforts, this model aligns each media with different outcomes and objectives.

Your business will reap maximum benefits from optimizing the overlapping outcomes of different media. Essentially, you utilize all media in a coordinated way to achieve your company’s objectives.

Let’s take a look at each medium and what they entail for PR purposes.

Paid Media

Paid media is when you pay to place your messages or content on certain channels. It includes sponsored content as well as advertising.

Sponsored content

Sponsored content is when businesses pay a publication, brand, or individual to feature their product or service in their content. This type of content focuses on providing real value to the reader as opposed to being purely promotional.

Long-form content is a type of sponsored content that can help your brand demonstrate thought leadership. Sponsored content can also be in the form of social media posts. You can also use newer media, like podcasts, as these are rapidly gaining popularity among audiences.

A study by Edelman shows that brands boost their credibility by 33% if they place sponsored content on well-respected sites.

Advertising

Of course, paid media also refers to advertising like PPC (Pay-per-click) campaigns, social media ads, and native ads. This places your business in front of your target audience and is one of the most traditional ways to boost brand awareness and reach.

Now, brands are leaning more towards native ads, which blend in better with surrounding content. They take on the form and function of the platform they’re placed on. Native ads can help your business boost your brand, increase purchase intent by 53%, extend the shelf life of earned media, and bring measurable results.

Earned Media

Earned media refers to the organic promotion of your brand or products. Unlike paid media, earned media is more trusted by consumers. This is because it was not created by your business or paid for by it.

Some examples of earned media include reviews, influencer mentions, media coverage, and social media shoutouts.

Earned media can help your business raise brand awareness, offer social proof, increase credibility, and reach a wider audience.

Shared Media

Shared media mainly refers to social media. However, it also includes all content shared on third-party platforms such as partner networks.

Shared media offers you some levels of control over the posts that you share. However, you cannot control what other users share about your brand or how they interact with your content once it’s been shared.

You can use shared media to start conversations, listen to what others are saying, and build relationships. If user engagement with your brand is below your expectations, shared media allows you to start and participate in conversations that can help increase engagement.

Additionally, you can use these media to generate awareness for your brand, product, or service. It can help amplify your message by sharing it with a larger audience.

Owned Media

Owned media is any form of media that you own. This includes apps, emails, websites, blogs, podcasts, and e-books.

Organizations have full control over owned media. So, use it to ensure that all communication aligns with your business goals and objectives. Owned media should reflect your business values. It should show your target audience who you are and what you stand for so that they can connect with you.

Managing your own media allows you to create a more personal relationship with your audience. Owned media platforms are great for sharing company updates, announcements, and insights to communicate your messages to your target audience directly.

Final Thoughts

The PESO model is a valuable tool for businesses that want to stay ahead of the curve and make the most of their public relations efforts. Integrating all four media types in your PR plan will help you tap into various audiences and achieve your desired results.

At its best, this model will help you get quantifiable results, and establish yourself as an authority and thought leader in your industry.

Leeza Hoyt

What Brands Need To Know About Marketing In The Metaverse

The metaverse is more than just a trending buzzword. If you were around during the birth of social media and digital marketing, you know big things are coming.

Statista reports that there are currently over 4.2 billion active social media accounts. Another study determined that 93% of all marketers use social media to market businesses.

There’s no doubt that your business uses social media for marketing its products and services. If you want your business to succeed in an ever-changing world, it’ll pay to keep an eye on the metaverse.

Luckily, preparing your business for the metaverse doesn’t have to be a daunting task!

At The Hoyt Organization, we help brands authentically connect with their audiences and tell stories that inspire growth and loyalty.

Here is our concise guide to everything a brand needs to know about marketing in the metaverse.

What Is The Metaverse?

The metaverse, short for “meta-universe,” is a virtual world that connects directly to the physical world. You can think of it as the next generation internet or Web 3.0.

Individuals will be able to instantly connect to the virtual world while interacting with the physical world.

For instance, instead of meeting your coworkers on Zoom, you can don a pair of VR goggles and hold the meeting in a virtual reality boardroom.

Just like in the physical world, people will be able to do the same things in the metaverse. They’ll be able to buy clothing, accessories, or even art.

Some innovative companies plan to sell physical copies that you can also take into the digital world.

Imagine buying a rare painting for your office. You can scan in a code and display this rare painting in your digital boardroom to impress visitors and staff.

This connectivity between the physical and the digital is the metaverse. It brings many incredible benefits that brands and marketers can capitalize on.

How Can Brands Prepare For The Metaverse?

The metaverse will provide marketers with plenty of new opportunities to promote their products, services, and brands.

The most obvious opportunity is renting ad space, similar to how you’d rent billboard space in the physical world.

Yet, it’s not the only way to prepare for this new marketing frontier.

Companies, big and small, should also start investing in augmented reality (AR), virtual reality experiences (VR), and non-fungible tokens (NFTs).

These technologies all form an essential part of the metaverse. If your company isn’t familiar with it, you may not be able to outperform your competitors within the metaverse.

5 Tips For A Long-term Business Strategy In The Metaverse

Marketers and business leaders need to understand the power of the metaverse. It would be best to stay updated with the latest trends and developments.

Knowing what’s happening and how it’s occurring will make it easier to adapt your marketing strategy for the metaverse. Here are our top tips for capitalizing on the growth of the Metaverse.

1. Embrace Parallel Marketing In And Out Of The Metaverse

The metaverse seamlessly merges the digital and the physical world. Your marketing efforts should reflect this.

For instance, AB InBev’s brand, Stella Artois, worked with Zed Run to create a unique marketing experience for the Kentucky Derby. Together, they created an online platform where users could trade horses, race them, and even breed them.

This marketing experience offered a digital adventure while nurturing brand loyalty in the physical world.

2. Create Immersive Experiences

Offer immersive experiences. For example, several savvy realtors offer prospective buyers VR tours of prestigious properties.

Architecture firms also offer VR tours of proposed buildings, allowing investors to walk through the structure before finalizing the construction plans.

3. Make Collectables

Let your fans and followers collect unique items. People love collecting things!

One brand that embraced this was Gucci with their Gucci Garden Experience. Users could collect limited Gucci items in the metaverse. They could even sell these items.

So, consider releasing some sort of NFT items that people can buy for their VR avatars to wear when in the metaverse.

4. Engage With Leaders And Promoters

People are mostly opposed to ads. So, engage with your community. Search out promoters and leaders that can help take your brand into the metaverse.

If you’re not sure how to do this, check out our guide on why your brand needs an influencer PR strategy.

5. Continue To Experiment

Don’t be afraid to experiment. This area of marketing is relatively new and brands should embrace the opportunity. There are no concrete rules for what works and how you should do it.

Be flexible and experiment when looking for new, creative ways to grow your brand in the metaverse.

Final Thoughts

As the metaverse continues to grow, more and more brands will adjust their marketing strategies to make the most of this digital world. So, it’s important to ensure your brand stays on top of it too. If all of this sounds complicated, don’t worry! We’re here to help simplify your marketing and PR strategies.

Connect with us, and let’s see how we can grow your brand within the metaverse.

Leeza Hoyt

Why Your PR Strategy Needs Digital Marketing

Traditionally, PR was print-based. However, today’s world is all about digital channels. As such, your PR tactics need to embrace more digital strategies. This includes digital marketing to help boost your brand awareness and image.

If you’re looking to evolve your business and create an impactful online presence, then digital marketing is the way to go. From driving traffic to relationship building, we’ll discuss how digital marketing and PR go hand-in-hand in building your brand.

The Connection Between PR And Digital Marketing

Digital PR is an online marketing tactic used by businesses and marketers to increase a brand’s online presence. This strategy is used to:

  • improve SEO
  • enhance brand awareness
  • increase traffic to a website
  • boost sales
  • improve social engagement

Digital PR strategy is therefore a combination of digital marketing and public relations.

Digital marketing involves the use of online technology to promote brands and their products or services. Public relations, on the other hand, is a process of communication. It is used to build relationships between companies and their customers.

By using digital marketing in PR, brands can further boost their brand awareness and build better relationships with customers.

Why Is Digital Marketing Important In Your PR Strategy?

There are many ways in which you can use the internet to your advantage with PR. Digital marketing helps your PR strategy to include interactive and user-driven tactics that may help build better relationships with customers.

Digital marketing has become an essential part of PR as its benefits exceed those of traditional marketing.

Although digital PR may be similar to traditional PR, it provides an opportunity to reach a much broader audience than traditional methods. Strategies such as SEO, content marketing, influencer marketing and social media marketing help your brand to connect relatable content with the right audiences.

Digital PR can achieve its goal of improving online presence and visibility as well as building long-lasting relationships with users as information can now be turned into real conversations.

By investing in a digital PR strategy, you  can connect with users by speaking directly to them at any time of the day. Not only is this quick and effective, but it is available 24/7.

How Digital Marketing Can Boost Your PR Strategy

Analytics Improves Performance

There are many helpful tools available to give your organization a competitive advantage in the world of PR. Analytics tools help track the performance and metrics on your pages, posts and campaigns. As a result, you can see what is working and what isn’t.

Analytics tools can provide metrics such as post reach, number of clicks, views, bounce rate and demographics. When you use this in your PR strategy, it will provide you with the consumer insight that you need to improve your strategy.

You can easily adjust campaigns where necessary. And after finding what works for certain target groups, you can target your audience more precisely.

Creative Content Creation

Content is the key to building credibility and authority. It is a key aspect of digital marketing – and it can work wonders for your PR strategy, too.

Creative content can be a powerful persuasive tool that can drive conversation. As part of your PR strategy, make sure you create content that engages and interests your customers. Including video content is a great way to do this while boosting ROI for your campaigns. This is because video content has shown to be the most effective among different types of content.

All content created for your PR strategy must be creative and exciting. It also needs to be relevant to your audience. You can create content in the form of graphics, video content, interactive content, and blog posts. Digital content can reach a large audience across various channels. So, it is a sure-fire way to drive traffic, increase brand awareness, build trust, and boost conversions.

Links To Drive Traffic

Receiving backlinks from reputable, authoritative sites can not only drive traffic but can boost your website’s authority too. This is an effective digital marketing and SEO tactic but it can be a valuable PR tactic as well.

Other websites in similar industries or affiliate sites will include a link to your site if the content is valuable and relatable to their readers. This will give your site credibility and a good reputation.

If you want your PR campaigns to reach and impress these types of reliable sites, you must create consistent content and promote it well. Implementing a digital marketing strategy can help you to do this.

Key Takeaways

By incorporating some effective digital marketing tactics into your PR strategy, you can improve brand awareness, boost your credibility, and increase traffic to your site.

Gone are the days of traditional marketing. It’s crucial to embrace what the digital world has to offer. This will help you stay in a competitive position in your industry and boost your online presence and success.

Leeza Hoyt

Why Your Brand Needs An Influencer PR Strategy

In today’s fast moving, ever changing digital world, you have to invest in effective marketing strategies that resonate with your audience to get your brand noticed. By incorporating an influencer PR strategy into your strategic digital marketing plan, you have a better opportunity to really connect with potential customers.

Unlike any other marketing tactic. consumers find influencers more trustworthy than brands.

Consider the following facts:

  • The average consumer has 8.4 social media accounts
  • Over 60% of marketers report that influencer marketing outperforms other type of marketing
  • 93% of marketers have used influencer marketing
  • Influencer generated content outperforms brand posts

And this is exactly the kind of advertising connections you should be looking for.

Below, we’ve outlined why your brand needs an influencer PR strategy, and how you can create one.

Why Invest In Influencer Marketing?

Hearing about the advantages of a product or service first-hand is one of the best ways to effectively boost brand awareness.

With social media taking over the digital world, word-of-mouth publicity has evolved into influencer marketing. Influencer marketing involves collaborating with carefully selected social media influencers in an effort to get more people to notice your brand on a myriad of social media platforms.

Is it effective? Yes.

Is it a more lucrative investment compared to traditional marketing? Well, it depends on what industry you are in and how you leverage influencers that complement your brand.

One thing is for certain, though. Compared to more traditional marketing tactics, social media influencers are considered more credible. Influencers are great brand ambassadors because they tell people what they honestly think.

If you team up with an influencer that loves what you offer, he or she will be able to authentically sell your product or service.

Social media influencers introduce their whole following to your brand. This can make it easier for you to reach a new target demographic.

If a well-loved influencer gives your brand the stamp of approval, then your business will automatically have more credibility in the eyes of that influencer’s following.

The Perks Of Influencer Marketing

It’s Affordable

Apart from email marketing, influencer PR marketing is one of the most cost-effective PR tools. If you have a set budget to work with, you can collaborate with influencers that are in line with the amount of compensation you can offer.

Up and coming influencers who are still finding their feet are a great option for brands that want to spend their marketing budget as efficiently as possible.

It Begins A Conversation

Consumers are tired of traditional and digital adverts. In general, conventional ads are viewed with skepticism and as closed-off, one-sided conversations.

However, with influencers, you have the opportunity to start a conversation on a particular topic. Your brand isn’t the main focus of the conversation. Instead, it can feature as an add-on or a solution to a specific problem that is mentioned in the conversation.

Most influencers will only endorse products that they have used themselves. After all, they also have a reputation to maintain. Moreover, they share a strong connection with their followers, making them a trusted and credible ally to have in the marketing sphere.

Influencer Marketing Allows You To Track Your Return On Investment

Unlike traditional marketing efforts, the success of influencer marketing is a lot easier to track. In the past, the success of traditional PR campaigns was mostly guessed through the impact they had on sales. But it was never an exact science as monthly sales were subject to a myriad of factors.

However, the emergence of digital marketing has made it possible to accurately measure the success of PR campaigns. A variety of metrics can be used to measure the performance of a social media influencer campaign. These include metrics like brand mentions, social media likes, referral traffic, click-through rates, and revenue.

Creating Your Influencer Marketing Strategy

If you have set your sights on creating your own influencer marketing strategy, we have the action steps to get you started.

  • Create a budget. A well-thought-out budget is the first step to figuring out how much money you can allocate to influencer marketing. It will also help you to monitor your spending and see what marketing avenues are truly lucrative for your business.
  • Outline your unique goals and brand message. Knowing what your goals are will help you to focus on your unique brand needs. This will enable you to find the right influencer.
  • Determine your target audience. You have to invest time and effort in various research initiatives that will allow you to hone in on your target audience. At first, you can target more widely, but to see results you will have to narrow your reach. The more intentional you are with your marketing initiatives, the more successful you will be.
  • Identify potential influencers. You need to build long-lasting relationships with influencers who align with your goals and target audience.
  • Measure your campaign results. Unique hashtags, affiliate codes, tracking links, and revenue are great ways of monitoring your marketing efforts. Be sure to use all of them to determine the effectiveness of each of the influencers you collaborate with.

In Summary

With the right influencers by your side, you can take your brand to the next level. By doing your research, monitoring the effectiveness of your campaigns, and collaborating with people that believe in your brand, you will be one step closer to achieving success.

Leeza Hoyt

How Content Marketing and PR Are Similar

Are you wondering if you should invest in a Los Angeles PR Firm or maybe just increase your content marketing efforts to get your brand’s name out there? Many may not think it, but content marketing and PR are actually quite similar in a myriad of ways.

Both fields can be an invaluable resource for companies when it comes to brand awareness, crisis management, and online marketing.

In this article, we explore the similarities between content marketing and PR and how they can benefit your business.

5 Ways PR is Similar to Content Marketing

Research-Based Marketing Strategies

Both PR and content marketing professionals base their campaign strategies on thorough research.

When it comes to PR, both formal and informal research is done to create a two-way street of communication between a company and its target audience. This research allows a brand to engage with its audience in a relatable way. As a result, it helps to foster trust and sustain new relationships.

Thorough research gives PR professionals a well-rounded understanding of the science behind human behavior. Because of this, they are well equipped to give advice on marketing strategies. Moreover, they are able to nip any crisis situation in the bud.

When it comes to content marketing, it is critical that you understand your target audience. This is key to success. It also involves conducting research on content channels, trendy topics, and digital advancements. This way, you get maximum use out of every article or email.

A Love of Language

Whether you prefer a Los Angeles PR firm or a content marketer to help your business out, both industries require perfect grammar. A love of language is simply a must, as well as attention to detail and an interest in marketing.

Seeing as both PR and content marketing revolves around communication in all its forms, many rounds of edits are conducted before publishing any content.

It may seem like content marketers are more focused on marketing communication and that PR firms are best at protecting a brand’s public image. However, in reality, the duties of both fields tend to overlap a lot.

A brand’s story, no matter which angle you approach it, is one of the most powerful tools to pocket new clients with. Because of this, all content marketers and PR professionals are experts when it comes to telling a brand’s story using the written word.

Know Who You Are Marketing To

Fully understanding who you are marketing to is essential if you want to make a great first impression on your niche market. In order to create impactful content, both content marketers and Los Angeles PR Firms need to have an in-depth understanding of their buyers’ personas.

This data is usually based on a company’s target audience and gives great guidelines on how to reach new clients.

Both PR professionals and content marketers spend hours poring over demographic data and customer surveys. This enables them to fully understand their ideal demographic and adjust their marketing campaigns based on their findings.

Because the data is always changing, this is usually an ongoing process. However, it’s completely worth it. This is because it allows for the retargeting and fine-tuning of current and future marketing campaigns.

Building And Nurturing Relationships

Traditional PR is known for creating and sustaining mutually beneficial relationships with clients. In the past, this was mostly done through magazine articles, public addresses, and other forms of traditional marketing.

Today, lots of Los Angeles PR firms are more readily investing in online marketing. This is largely due to the world becoming more tech-driven. However, it is also because it better enables you to track the success and impact of each marketing campaign. All marketing efforts, whether traditional or digital, aim to strengthen and nurture client relationships.

Content marketing has skyrocketed in the digital age. It relies heavily on creating or sharing articles, videos, podcasts, as well as other media. This helps to attract, engage with or retain a target audience.

When it comes down to it, both PR professionals and content marketers launch strategic marketing campaigns. The goal is the same: to sustain long-term communication with a targeted group of people.

Know Your Way Around Digital Media

When it comes to brand and reputation management, PR and content marketing efforts go hand and hand. Both fields must know their way around digital media in order to better target their audience.

Paid media, articles, press releases, videos, and other forms of digital media all play a vital role in building a trustworthy, relatable brand.

This is why both content marketers and PR professionals are experts when it comes to online content creation and a wide range of digital tools.

In A Nutshell

If you are still on the fence about choosing a Los Angeles PR firm or content marketer to help your brand out, just remember that they have a lot of skill sets in common. When it comes to digital media, brand awareness, and content creation, both PR professionals and content marketers are equally qualified to put your company on the map.

Leeza Hoyt

How to Market to Gen-N

If the Coronavirus pandemic has taught us anything it’s that we need to adapt to survive. The world of e-commerce did just that by creating a contactless, convenient shopping experience. The result: Generation Novel or Gen-N. The evolution of an entirely new consumer from the introduction of conveniences like curbside pickup and click-and-collect.

But, the needs of Gen-N are ever-changing and, as such, your marketing techniques must change with them. In this article, we look at a few tips and tricks to keep your company ahead of the game. So, keep reading to find out more about how to market to Gen-N!

The Current Market Landscape

Against the backdrop of the Covid-19 pandemic, e-commerce saw growth equivalent to 10 years in just 3 months. The United States alone saw an increase in online transactions from 11% to 14%. This was a direct result of confining consumers to their homes.

Therefore, Gen-N (having evolved from a global pandemic) have greater expectations for companies and brands. They value how brands and companies react in a time of crisis. What this means is that while there is an expectation of constant digital improvement, transformation in line with society is also essential.

In other words, Gen-N places greater emphasis on the values and trustworthiness of a brand. So, businesses should not only provide a service but also improve on how they engage with and contribute to society.

How to Market to Gen-N

It’s clear that to compete in the current market brands must meet the needs of the Gen-N consumer. Below we look at 5 marketing tips that will keep your brand both relevant and competitive.

Emphasize your brand values

Covid-19 is teaching many of us to realign our values. While the digital market grows, our personal lives slow down.

People are spending more time at home with family, helping out in their communities, and giving back to the less fortunate. And Gen-N is starting to hold brands accountable and demanding they do the same.

Therefore, the success of your brand also depends on your role in society. For example, how do you help the environment? What are your social practices? Do you value your employees?

These are all important factors to Gen-N that help them to identify with your brand. Our newest consumer is all about spending money with a conscience.

Be transparent

Gen-N expects full transparency when it comes to your brand and its values. In this way, it’s not enough to simply align your business with certain values. Your consumers must see the difference your company makes in society. Showing Gen-N that you are genuine in your attempts to help others builds trust and brand loyalty.

Provide a good user experience

A good user experience is essential to keep Gen-N coming back to your brand. With most consumers confined to their homes feeling anxious or stressed, their digital shopping experience should be as pleasant as possible.

To achieve this consider doing the following:

  1. Offer new ways to get existing products
  2. Expand customer engagement methods
  3. Offer new types of products and services
  4. Make sure that your website is easy to use and that transactions are seamless

Further, a personalized experience is always a good one. Use data to get to know your consumer better and tailor product recommendations and blog suggestions to their needs.

Offer good service and support

Offering good service and support is key to establishing brand loyalty. A study by McKinsey shows that 75% of US consumers have tried different stores, websites, or brands during Covid-19. And 60% of these consumers would switch to these brands or stores at some point in the future.

This shows that as the digital market continues to grow, consumers are just one bad experience away from dropping your brand and finding another. But, by providing good service and after-sale support, consumers feel appreciated and will feel more loyal to your brand.

Be innovative

Gen-N is not made up of any specific demographic. It includes everyone from baby boomers to millennials. So, you can’t use a one-size-fits-all marketing approach.

To stay relevant, you must constantly improve your brand, product, and your online platform. Check in with your clients, ask for feedback, and improve their experience accordingly.

Brand innovation is also key to retaining customers. This is because an increasingly tech-savvy Gen-N will expect online conveniences even post Covid-19. In other words, consumer expectations will not change when the pandemic ends. If anything, the standard to meet will be higher.

Key Takeaways

It’s clear that for a brand to be successful and compete in the market it must do more than develop a great product. The digital-first Gen-N gets behind brands they can identify with and that contribute to society.

The marketing strategies you use can make a big difference to the success of your brand. So, to ensure your brand stays relevant, apply some of these marketing tips and watch your business grow to new heights!

Leeza Hoyt

Combining Digital Marketing and Public Relations For Success

Have you been wondering about the effectiveness of your company’s marketing strategies? In our ever-changing technical landscape, marketing techniques continue to become integrated. Digital media has become an essential tactic. Many businesses have found success combining public relations and digital marketing strategies.

In this article, we will show you how to combine the best of both the digital and traditional marketing world, so you can remain competitive and continue to grow your business.

Why Merge Public Relations and Digital Marketing?

In this day and age, your brand’s story is a critical asset. It should be conveyed on every possible marketing platform. With the help of public relations, the media’s representation of that story can play a big role in influencing public opinion of your organization.

When it comes to credibility, editorial platforms win hands down. This is because the content they provide is endorsed by a journalist or other third party. However, you can’t always control what a journalist will write about you. This is where digital marketing comes in.

Traditional PR deals with channels such as the printed press, niche print publications, TV, and radio. Digital PR, on the other hand, involves press relations conducted via digital channels like websites, blogs, social media, and influencer collaborations.

By making use of both PR strategies, you become your audience’s direct news source regarding your organization through blogs, articles, or press releases.

With social media, you can speak directly to your audience. As such, you can develop solid connections and credible relationships. By cutting out the third party, you are essentially bypassing the middleman. This is what makes Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, and Instagram so vital for connecting with your audience.

PR and digital marketing are closely related as they both involve connecting and building relationships with your audience. Digital marketing enables you to reach more prospective customers and reinforce your brand image.

So, by combining PR and digital marketing, you can both enhance your visibility while strengthening your audience’s view of your brand.

Combining Your PR and Digital Marketing Strategies

Content Marketing and PR

The whole idea behind content marketing is to create high-quality, engaging blog posts. These should touch on relevant topics or common issues and offer practical insight. But, before publishing all your blogs on your own website, consider pitching them as guest content to other websites.

This will not only allow you to create great content for other influential websites, but it gives you access to a whole other audience. As the post will link back to your site, it will direct interested leads to you where they will learn more about your brand.

Guest posting also gives you a leg up in terms of building lasting relationships with other businesses. As everyone always says, it isn’t always what you know but who you know that counts!

Each guest post that provides a link back to your website will increase your brand awareness. These inbound links from reputable sites also contribute to your website’s overall SEO. In turn, this improves your visibility in search engines so that you can reach more people.

Email Marketing and PR

Email marketing allows you to create a great impression and grab your audience’s attention by engaging them in a personalized way. Few other digital channels offer this same kind of instant communication with a brand’s following.

Your welcome email, for instance, should be sent to new subscribers as soon as they sign up to your mailing list. If done correctly, this email can make sure that you establish an immediate connection with your subscribers. When joining email marketing techniques with social media tools, you can get double the exposure.

For example, if you are planning on helping out your local community, you can announce your company’s event by sending emails to your subscribers. At the same time, you can also place social media sharing icons in prominent areas of your email. This can not only help to widen your reach with little to no effort on your part but allows you to leverage all the tools at your disposal.

Connect With Influencers

Traditional PR relies more on journalists for providing them with positive media coverage. However, the digital era allows us to take charge of our own story and company image. This means that you can use traditional journalists as well as marketing experts and influencers to get your name out there.

By taking the time to connect with influencers within your niche, you can offer your followers different perspectives on all your products and services. This can benefit both your company and your influencers.

Influencers also offer an easy way to:

  • target new audiences,
  • increase your brand awareness, and
  • increase traffic to your website.

In Conclusion

Digital marketing techniques and traditional PR strategies work really well together. If combined correctly, they can lead to a boost in brand awareness and increased traffic to your website.

Leeza Hoyt

How Can We Help?

Make us your first call if you’re launching a new product or service, re-branding or encounter a need for media relations or crisis communications. We’re here for you:

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