Tips and Advice for Handling Your Own PR
Hiring a management firm that specializes in handling the PR of companies and individuals is not always something smaller companies can afford to do. If you are just now getting your feet off the ground with your new business venture it is highly likely that you will need to handle your own PR.
Before you get stressed out over the proposal of handling your own PR you need to realize that this is not going to be like moving mountains. You are capable of doing the job and the task is not extremely hard. It is time consuming when you first begin to handle your own PR, but after you get everything set up you will not have to devote as much time and energy into this project.
All you really need is some friendly advice that everyone can understand, because you know your company better than anyone else, and you know what you want to achieve better than anyone else does. So you are, in fact, the number one choice to handle your own PR, because you are the resident expert.
Your first job when you set out to handle your own PR is to set the goals for the company. Decide what you want the company to be doing six months down the road, and one year down the road, and five years down the road. Once you have a goal set for the company you can break that goal up into increments that you can achieve. It is important to make realistic goals that are possible for you to meet. Do not set a goal of making a million dollars in the first six months, because you will likely not achieve that goal and you will be disappointed in yourself.
The second thing that you are going to do when you handle your own PR is decide what makes your company better than all of the other companies that provide the same thing. If you have a unique product that no one else sells then that will be what makes you stand out. If you have the same product that everyone else has, but you have better service then that is what makes you stand out from the crowd. Whatever makes you stand out from the crowd is what is going to be your main focal point in your PR campaign.
The third step to handling your own PR is to use the media to get the word out about your company. You need to use the media to run advertisements so that people will learn about your company. You need to think about who you are targeting with your product, or who would be most likely to purchase the product. Then decide what type of media those people are most likely to respond to. For instance; if you are attempting to reach teenagers you would advertise on the internet, on the radio, and possibly in teen style magazines. If your target were people in their thirties you would advertise on the internet, in the newspapers, and on radio stations that people of this age are more likely to listen to.
The fourth thing to remember is when you send PR information to any media source keep it short and simple. People do not want to hear you ramble. They want you to state the facts quickly, but in an interesting way.
The last thing you have to know about doing this for yourself is that you have to follow up with every media source that you sent information to. You cannot just send the information once and forget about it. You have to build a relationship with the media and then maintain that relationship.
