Forum of Private Business - Mini Guide - Promoting Your Business PR

Promoting your business A guide to PR for small businesses

MGPR001 JAN2016

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The success of your business relies on its reputation. Public relations (PR) is all about getting your business name known and managing the information you give out about it.

PR or advertising?

Every organisation, no matter how large or small, ultimately depends on its reputation for survival and success.

PR can be used to build rapport with employees, customers, investors, opinion leaders, voters, but quite often it’s the general public who are the intended end consumer.

Most bigger companies and public organisations use PR to affect how they are portrayed in public. While institutions such as government departments, local authorities, the police or hospital trusts for example will be looking to promote important messages to the wider public, private sector organisations are more typically seeking publicity for commercial gain or to raise their profile in order to drive business.

”Public relations is about reputation – the result of what you do, what you say and what others say about you.”

The Chartered Institute of Public Relations

If you are familiar with methods of direct advertising, such as in local or regional newspapers, and/ or in trade publications, you will know how expensive this can be – a quarter page advert in a local newspaper can cost several hundred pounds for just one showing.

With PR, no money is paid to the media outlet, it relies instead on the news value of your ‘story’ as decided by a reporter, editor, or broadcaster. It is this endorsement that gives PR its power and credibility.

While coverage can’t be guaranteed like a paid-for advertisement, stories that ‘make’ – in journalists’ parlance – carry considerably more weight with the audience.

Outsourcing?

Most businesses, however small, could usually benefit from PR, but often just can’t afford to employ communications professionals, especially as this could be more expensive than direct advertising.

So it’s usually a case of making do without, or appointing a non-qualified member of staff to take responsibility.

The Forum actually helps you do your PR by providing a platform and distribution to relevant journalists, broadcasters and bloggers. This is through our exclusive partnership with Journolink. They not only help you get your news release posted but also put you on a directory for journalists to find your business for requests and comments “Some are born great,

some achieve greatness, and some hire public relations officers.”

Those that can afford it will sometimes employ a PR agency, usually at high cost, involving contracts, and often retainer fees. This can be off-putting for many SMEs looking to minimise costs in the current economic climate and who perhaps only have a one-off story to tell.

Daniel J. Boorstin

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What is a press release?

A press release, also known as a news or media release, is a written communication directed at members of the news media for the purpose of announcing something ostensibly newsworthy.

Press releases don’t have to be aimed at just the print media as the name suggests, but can be sent to broadcast media and online journalists as well. They are the simplest form of communicating a message or story to a news organisation, and for the small business owner dabbling in DIY PR, they are the tool of choice.

Their aim, typically, is to attract favourable media attention, but they can also be used to raise awareness of an upcoming event – in this latter form they are usually called a press call or press notice, and are basically an invitation to journalists telling them of an event that’s happening, and that they are welcome to come and report on the proceedings.

Why write a press release?

There’s some good news about a successful recruitment, or a new contract landed which means you’ll soon be expanding. Or perhaps a staff member has raised money for a good cause and your company helped them do it or simply match funded their efforts. Maybe you want to take part in a debate that’s affecting your industry. Or perhaps you just want to raise the profile of your organisation locally.

Whatever it is, you need to say something to the media – but how, when, and to whom? The following will explain how to write a release, and some other useful tips to help along the way.

Befriend a journalist Local newspaper reporters are busy people, and shrinking news desks mean the search for content has never been more rushed and frankly, less choosy. Although most newspaper editors would not admit it, it has become something of quantity over quality in recent years, particularly with the rise of the Internet, meaning news reporters are now under more pressure to find fresh content. But this is great news for the small business looking to self-publicise.

To start with, make contact with your local newspaper reporter – they are now your friends. The better the relationship the better the chance of getting something in print in the future. So check out the details of your local newspaper on the web (Wikipedia is a good starting point and has a list of the main local newspapers in the UK with links http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_newspapers_ in_the_United_Kingdom) then ring up and ask to speak to whoever covers your patch, even if you don’t have a story – they’ll be glad to make a new contact, but don’t keep them long, remember they are busy people too.

And don’t forget, you can set the news agenda yourselves – this is what PR is all about. For example, you’re a new business and you want to get in the local paper, but you don’t want to pay for an advert.

So instead, you organise a charity event for your staff to take part in. It doesn’t have to be big, but if it looks fun and you can take a picture, that’s a picture caption story in the local paper, and your name out there.

Tailoring your story Let’s develop the theme and take it a step further. You’ve done your charity event and you’ve raised a few hundred pounds for a good cause. So invite your local MP to hand over the cheque to a representative from the charity you’re donating to. MPs are usually in their constituency on a Friday when they are back from Westminster, and love a bit of local exposure. Just ring the constituency office and ask

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the question. Few will say no to a bit of free PR like this, and it’ll give more weight to the story. A good starting point to find out who your local MP is and to get their constituency office contact details is http://www.parliament.uk/mps-lords-and-offices/mps Pick your charity carefully too – children’s charities are always a good choice. Have a look in your local paper first – do they have a chosen charity already? If so, that’s now your charity, and this will increase your chances of success.

Think creatively too – the more creative the better. Here’s an example: so it’s Red Nose Day and, as instructed, all your staff come to work with red hair or red fingernails or red anything for that matter – it’s not important.

This is all about the great picture opportunity, and it’s not the occasion to aggressively market your business, just an opportunity to get your company’s name out there.

It’s worth remembering on occasions such as these (Children in Need, etc) every media savvy business, organisation or school will be inviting the local newspaper to come along and see how they’re celebrating the day. You need to be prepared and get the invite in early, or take the snap yourself. If you do the latter, still let them know your intentions.

”If I was down to my last dollar I’d spend it on PR!” Bill Gates Founder of Microsoft

There are loads of clever ways to manipulate the media to your advantage – that’s essentially the purpose of PR.

Know your media Spend some time looking through your local newspaper and see what kind of stories feature. As well as the usual crime stories, there’ll be lots of human interest stuff, and much of it will only be in there because either the journalist has heard of it through his or her network of contacts, or they’ve been contacted by the individual concerned. So make sure your news is out there.

If you’ve just landed a huge contract that means you’ll be recruiting staff, that’s local news and needs to be shouted from the roof tops. And not just to your local newspaper either, think about trade publications. Most industries have a trade press, find out what they are, and fire them a press release.

The key thing to remember is that many things your business does could potentially be news. It’s down to you to recognise this, and work out how you can dress it up as a story before presenting it to the relevant journalist in a timely manner. That latter point means if you are targeting the weekly newspaper, don’t take two weeks to send them the info – send it ASAP.

The key to press release writing Journalists are busy people and get hundreds of unsolicited emails, phone calls and letters a day. So your announcement has to stand out from the crowd and grab their attention. Your first point of entry to a news desk is therefore crucial. A well-crafted press release written in a clear and concise way, featuring choice quotes to help tell your story is a great way to start.

Size matters Press releases usually need to be short, sharp and to the point. They must begin with a punchy headline that sums up the story, or at least sets the scene and provide the reader with a brief, tantalising taste of what’s likely to follow.

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Length is also important. A simple story does not need to be pages and pages. If the story is short and simple, and can be explained in several sentences, that’s usually more than enough. Reporters needing more information can always give you a call back if they need something extra, so obviously the best phone number to get you on needs to be clearly visible in your release.

The trick is to make the journalist’s life as easy as you can, and that’s why they love well written press releases. Because the better it is, the less re-writing is required. A poorly written offering that needs an hour spent reworking is likely to be binned, even if there’s a good story in there.

Reporters and journalists don’t have the time nor the inclination to wade through reams of information, particularly in the current climate when editorial teams on local and regional newspapers are shrinking.

The golden rule for story telling all journalists are taught mantra style is: who, what, where, when, and why? Take a look at the stories in your local paper, and most will be written with this in mind, and so should any press release you produce. All the key information should ideally be summed up in the first three paragraphs, four at a push.

By this point you will have either whetted the journalist’s appetite, or it will be in the bin. If the reporter reads on you’ve got them interested, and so you can then go in to a bit more detail. This is the point where you may want to quote somebody from your organisation as well.

Bells and whistles Don’t forget to jazz up your press release with some colourful language too. Think big, colourful, descriptive words. For instance: “It was a really good day and we raised lots of money for charity.” Could become: “It was a great team effort and thanks to the hard work of everyone involved we’ve raised a whopping amount of cash for this great charity, and had a huge amount of fun along the way.”

Don’t forget the all important picture. Visual imagery helps tell a story and can add huge news value to an article which could be quite bland without it. Say for instance a small business did a sponsored car wash, with all proceeds to the local hospice. A picture of staff getting soapy as they go about their commendable work is going to have more chance of being published than a simple statement saying company A raised X amount of cash for charity.

Make it visual News desks love a good picture. They also love cute pictures of kids, couples, animals, anything a bit cheesy or cutesy. So the message is always aim to submit a picture if at all possible. A good picture can sometimes be enough on its own to see a story published.

Remember the old saying: “A picture is worth a thousand words”. Think colourful, fill the frame, and no head chopping which won’t go down well with news desks who may well look at the picture first before the story and that won’t reflect well. You don’t have to be an expert with a big digital SLR to take a great picture, even mobile phones take great shots these days, although don’t add in any special effects.

If you do submit a picture with your press release, always remember to include a caption. Label names, and always name from left to right, indicating this is how you’ve done it. Also include the post/position of those depicted. So for example: Pictured, from left, are: Joe Bloggs, shop manager; Joe Bloggs Junior, shop assistant; Joe Bloggs Senior, caretaker.

If your picture includes children, most newspapers will want you to include the ages as well, particularly if they are little ones. Newspapers are also funny about surnames, in that they will always want them.

Many will have an editorial policy not to include photos where surnames are missing.

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The issue tends to be many people who submit pictures, particularly those of children, mistakenly believe they should omit the surname for legal reasons, or to safeguard the child’s identity. In most cases this is just plain incorrect, and as long as the subjects are aware of how you intend to use the image for media purposes, and parents agree, there’s no issue. Omitting a surname will not only anger the newsdesk who are operating under strict editorial guidelines, to leave it out can jeopardise your release’s newsworthiness. You are also making work for the reporter because they will have to ring you up to ask for missing details – if they can be bothered.

Getting the attention of the journalists Not of course saying that journalists are like this, but as a starting point make the assumption that you are dealing with someone who only looks at their e mails once a week, gets 3000 of them, and treats every press release as spam.

So that’;s the challenge. Short of sending a fire cracker to grab the attention you have to be very focused on differentiating your story from everyone else. And you need to present it well and through several channels.

There are three key rules: Differentiate it well Present it well Send it well Differentiating it means that you should not simply try to promote your product and brand, but you need to come up with an angle that is interesting to the most cynical reader, and aligns itself to a current major news article or news theme, such as employment numbers, obesity, or even a sports event.

Anticipate a news event, and link your release to it and be a bit provocative. Work on basis that you need to seize the reader’s attention, and keep it.

Its all about presenting it well, assuming that you will have 15 seconds of the journalist’s attention before they move on. So splitting into three, with a catchy headline followed with a succinct summary paragraph of what’s coming next, and finally a fuller, but still succinct, piece, with facts, a good news hook, and at least one credible quote. Don’t forget to add a link to a graphic and contact details.

Send it well, using several channels, using different journalists and bloggers will use different routes to access content. Using a traditional press release and post it either through a regular PR agency if budget allows. If budget is limited us an affordable online service like Journolink: a recommended partner of the Forum. Use social media, through Twitter, Facebook or Instagram for example. If you can get to the journalists directly, don’t be afraid to pick up the phone.

But more than anything, put yourself through the ‘teenager test’. Don’t just try and convince yourself that your news is interesting, when in truth you yawned when writing it. Get the ‘irritating teenager’ to tell you its got an edge before you send it off.

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Examples of press releases Here are two examples of actual press releases put out by the Forum which demonstrate much of the previous advice. The first is a press release, the second is a press call. Note the difference.

Introducing who you are .

Forum of Private Business RELEASE DATE: 08.04.13 RELEASE TIME: Immediate

This is the first clue about the story and can be crucial.

Forum members give Chancellor face-to-face verdict on Budget Osborne quizzed on business rates, bank lending and Cheshire LEPS

The golden rule of who, what, where, when and why are addressed in the opening four sentences .

Members of a Cheshire-based employer support organisation got the chance to have a frank and open discussion with the Chancellor George Osborne at a business themed event in Knutsford on Friday (5th April).

The Tatton MP agreed to the post-Budget round-table event at the Forum of Private Business’s Cheshire HQ, where he faced a series of questions from a panel of small business owners.

The panel, handpicked from the Forum’s membership to represent a variety of sectors, included a financial expert, the owner of a logistics firm, a computer software developer, a new start-up business owner, and a food retail distributor.

Topics broached ranged from access to finance and what the government was doing to help SMEs with reference to Funding for Lending, business rates, the Heseltine Report into growth, and on a more local level issues around the Cheshire Local Enterprise Partnership (LEP).

Using quotes to flesh out the story .

“Our members had lots of pertinent questions for George and he was happy to tackle them all head on,” said the Forum’s Managing Director, Ian Cass, who chaired the meeting.

“He gave some really interesting answers and our members all went away with a lot to digest. On business rates for example he was receptive to the idea of a freeze. He was also really interested to hear thoughts on the weakness of the pound and how this was affecting small businesses who import and export.

“He also spoke about the regional LEPs, and stressed the need for strong local leaders to ensure areas could take advantage of proposed new powers. With 39 Local Enterprise Partnerships the need has never been more vital for regions to have dedicated business people willing to champion the needs of the local business community.

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The obligatory quote from George Osborne, without which the release would not have been complete.

Following the meeting Mr Osborne said: “The Forum is a strong voice for business and entrepreneurship.

I’m really grateful to its Managing Director, Ian Cass, for bringing together a collection of new and established firms to talk with me about what more we can do to support the economy.”

The all important picture, with the Forum logo positioned behind the two subjects.

The crucial caption. In this case it’s obvious who George Osbourne is but that won’t always be the case.

Caption: Ian Cass, The Forum’s Managing Director, pictured with Mr Osborne.

Always end a release like this - if nothing else it will give an air of professionalism.

ENDS

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Forum of Private Business RELEASE DATE: 16.11.12 RELEASE TIME: Immediate

Date, time and a brief overview of what’s happening.

Press Call: MP Andrew Stephenson will be presenting a certificate to Pendle Borough Council after it was identified as one of the top 10 fastest councils in England for payment of supplier invoices.

When: Friday, November 23, 9.30am.

Where: Nelson Town Hall, Nelson.

This puts some meat on the story’s bones and is your chance to tempt a reporter to cover the event afterwards, attend or send a photographer.

Why: MP for Pendle, Andrew Stephenson, will present a certificate to Pendle Borough Council on behalf of the Forum of Private Business in recognition that they pay their suppliers promptly.

The Forum – a not for profit employer support organisation – carried out research earlier this year which asked all local authorities for their supplier payment times, and specifically the percentage of invoices they were paying in less than 10 days. Pendle came eighth nationally for paying 91.5% of its invoices within this time frame.

Late payment is a huge issue for small businesses in the UK. Thousands are often forced to cease trading because of problems with cash flow caused by slow or late payment once a service or product has been delivered.

Prompt payment can help reduce the number of small businesses going bust, and last year the Government asked all local councils to pay in less than 10 days.

The Forum research has helped show which councils are leading the way, and those which are not.

Always end a release like this - if nothing else it will give an air of professionalism.

To contact the Forum’s press office team telephone 01565 626015.

ENDS

Always end a release like this - if nothing else it will give an air of professionalism.

Notes to editors Images of key Forum spokespeople, along with the Forum’s logo, can be downloaded here Broadcast media – the Forum has ISDN capability and can provide comment, in quality audio, at short notice.

The Forum can also provide journalists with localised and sector-specific case studies.

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Twitter account: http://twitter.com/the_fpb Forum blog: http://blog.fpb.org Representing thousands of small businesses across the UK – including retail, service providers and manufacturing companies – the Forum is recognised by the Government as one of the six main business support and lobby groups.

About the Forum of Private Business: The Forum of Private Business is a proactive, not-for-profit membership organisation providing comprehensive business support to small businesses.

The Forum delivers value to members through practical, cost-effective and tailored services - for complete peace of mind.

Membership benefits: Achieve significant savings on your overhead costs Grow your business with expert marketing and PR support Access the finance and credit your business needs Take advantage of free and discounted business services Ensure your business is legally compliant Manage your financial risk Make your voice heard in Government Unrestricted access to a business helpline For full list of services and membership packages, visit www.fpb.org/join-us or call 01565 626001.

Media contacts Thomas Parry Media and PR Department Tel: 01565 626015 Email: thomas.parry@fpb.org

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Be part of a growing business community Keep in touch with the Forum to stay up to date with the latest business advice, opinion and news.

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“The Forum is a major voice for the UK’s small firms. They keep us informed and stand up for us when they recognise something isn’t right.

Why every privately-owned business isn’t a member surprises me, as the benefits far outweigh any costs.”

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Linda Cook , Managing Director 121 Direct Mail

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