Why Your Business Needs a Blog

17/09/2018By scandinaviancomContent Marketing, PR, PR Tips & Trends, Public Relations Global Network, Social Media

 
By Judy Kuramata, Executive Director of Integrate Communications

Today’s media landscape is becoming increasingly dominated and disrupted by digital. It’s everywhere you turn. On the way to work, while eating breakfast and even when we’re with friends, we are constantly absorbing digital media and the endless amount of information technology provides.

Blogging is a highly-effective content marketing tool; it is no longer a “back stage” room to hold your content. It’s a space for you to have complete ownership over your brand’s story and the way it’s told. There are thousands of ways to target potential customers through blogging. Specifically, you sell context, not products. It’s great if your blog leads to a direct purchase, but more often, a blog’s purpose is to draw potential customers to your website.

So, who does your blog attract? Potential customers may not immediately contact you to purchase your products or services after they’ve read your blog, but search engines and keywords will, at least, draw them to your website.

Offer readers something valuable for free, using relevant keyword phrases they are searching for, and they may turn into a customer down the line.

Plus, when you provide thoughtful, free content, you might end up with completely new customers that you did not foresee. For example, an entrepreneur might be searching in Google for some quick tips on how to market her business online, and stumble upon a blog post written by your PR agency. She’s so impressed by the tips provided that she now wants to hire your agency to help her sell her product. She wasn’t originally looking into agencies, but because your blog provided valuable content, she was successfully converted into a customer.

A mixture of valuable context, consistent messages, effective keywords and timing are very important when getting started on your blog.

Now that you have valuable content, do make sure you have some way of monitoring and measuring your blog’s success. Your blog posts should be shared on your website, as well as your social media platforms. Track how much traffic the post brings to your website, how many ‘likes’ or ‘shares’ you receive on social media and how many inquiries come in.

Blogging requires strategy and implementation planning just as any other traditional marketing method does. By developing a target audience, creating the right content, being consistent and tracking, blogging can be a highly effective marketing tool for your business.

Integrate Communications is our partner agency in Japan. Article originally published at PRGN.com

7 PR Tips On Turning The Tide On Consumer Distrust

10/08/2018By scandinaviancomChristina Rytter, Crisis Communications, Management Communications, PR, PR Tips & Trends, Public Relations Global Network, Scandinavian Communications, Social Media, Strategic Communications

By Sheena Campbell-Royle, CEO, SCR – SCP

We came from a world where selling a product or service was all about how you positioned yourself and how you ‘sold’ your company, through advertising, marketing and PR where you told people what you thought they should know about your product. It was really all about you and how good you were. Now we are in a different global world where this is not enough, a world where the empowered consumer will only buy your services or products if he agrees with you and likes who you are, where your corporate values must be a match to his or her own ideas and they must be transparent and known about.

This is a big change and companies need to get their heads around what this means for them. Quality and price is not enough if what you say lacks credibility.

Consumers have rights and they now think about why they should put their trust in your company, and, as a company, you need to step up to this and make it known who you are, how you think, how you treat others and what your views on the world are.

It’s happening at all levels and forcing some companies who have lost consumer trust to re-think the strategy.

So here are some tips on what your company should be doing in PR terms to regain your consumers, clients and prospects trust and make sure you keep it.

  1. Analyze carefully all aspects of what you are doing and how you are communicating to your audiences, your ‘voice’. Make sure all your company (people who work for you, suppliers and other audiences) understand your viewpoint and values and identify with them. Include your audiences in the analysis so that ideas are not imposed, but understood and complied with.
  2. Define your position on issues like environment, social issues, even politics. This may be a risk, but being neutral is often seen as aligning with the ‘bad guys’. Look at your social network presence and take into account that some social networks have come under severe criticism. Be careful that consumers don’t see you as part and parcel of these errors, so put transparency high on your ‘to do’ list because trust is tantamount. The culture you breathe in your company needs to speak of authenticity and transparency, this will make consumers feel their needs are being met and less likely to feel they’re always being ‘sold to’.
  3. Get your name to appear and tell people who you are in established newspapers and publications. Get noticed and get your opinion out there, support your corporate values and issues which you think interest and please your audiences. In our era of ‘fake news’, people still trust traditional and digital media with solid reputations.
  4. Make sure your company is meeting its consumers or clients on their terms by making your website and social pages a very positive experience. If a review is left or customer help asked for, ensure that they leave your site or social page feeling reassured and feeling you care about them, that their opinion matters. But this must be real, this is not just the face, this translates into real actions and is demonstrated. Know that each consumer ‘touch’ is an opportunity to humanize your company making it easier for consumers to put their trust into what you do.
  5. Try to engage with ‘earned content’. If you see a consumer interacting with your product, use this, making it public (always after asking and receiving permission) so that others can identify with the action and trust in it.
  6. Offer useful information to your consumers or clients related to your product, service or sector. You could for example use a specific place on your website and social platforms for your customers, clients to ask what they want to learn and you could ask them what they would like to know about.
  7. Last of all, keep your promises. Do what you say you are going to do and live your corporate values making them deep rooted in your company’s ADN

To conclude, flip the coin, be more aware as a company of what the needs and desires of your consumers, clients or prospects are and try to meet them.

SCR-SCP is our partner agency in Spain. Article originally published at PRGN.com

9 Reasons Why Every Company Should Invest in PR

25/06/2018By scandinaviancomContent Marketing, Management Communications, PR, PR Tips & Trends, Strategic Communications

By Anne A. Buchanan, President of Buchanan Public Relations

Public relations has long been a powerful marketing tool for companies. In today’s digital environment, its impact is greater than ever.
Here are nine reasons why every company should be investing in PR:

1. Allows a company to own and manage its narrative. Companies that fail to invest in PR are essentially ceding their narrative to others – the media, unhappy customers, investors, and competitors, among others. Why would you want outsiders to fill in the blanks of a story you should be authoring yourself?

2. Helps an organization amplify its message. A robust PR program typically includes a media relations component. Working regularly with journalists who cover your industry ensures that your company is receiving its share of earned media, a powerful way to share your message.

3. Is custom-made for content sharing. Long before “content creation” became a buzzword, PR professionals were mining company assets to find newsworthy stories and opportunities. If you think your company isn’t doing enough content creation or sharing, start with your PR team. It knows, better than most marketing professionals, how to identify content that will resonate with stakeholders.

4. Permits a company to build authentic relationships with stakeholders. Unlike traditional advertising, which is often a one-way dialogue between a brand and its customers, PR is built around creating and nurturing two-way relationships.

5. Complements a company’s sales efforts. Nothing is more powerful in cinching a sale than an objective, third-party endorsement of your company, which is what earned media gives you. There will always be a need for sales materials and programs, but they become more powerful when PR is used to amplify the message.

6. Helps with recruitment. With a significant portion of the boomer workforce poised to begin exiting, the war for talent will only intensify. PR allows companies a way to brand themselves as employers of choice and to communicate the type of work environment they cultivate.

7. Puts capital in the bank for a future downturn or crisis. You don’t want your first interaction with the media to be when your company is at its worst. Investing in regular public relations ensures that crucial relationships are already in place when you might need support.

8. Enhances a Company’s SEO. Online earned media can have a powerful impact on SEO and keyword rankings. PR teams that work to optimize the content they are sharing can significantly contribute to their organization’s SEO efforts.

9. Forces a company to continually refine its message. Companies that invest in PR are ensuring that their story is constantly being reviewed and refreshed. Not only is that attractive to customers, prospects and search engines, but it keeps an organization sharp and continually thinking about the messages it is sharing with stakeholders.

Buchanan Public Relations is our partner agency in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania (USA). Article originally published at PRGN.com