Why Your Clients’ Stories Define Your PR

February 13, 2012 Leave a Comment

Your best stories are those that show how your product or service helps your clients.  For example, if you’re a physician, your best stories are patient success stories.  A doctor is the expert who can explain how to treat a disease or how a particular procedure works, but it’s his or her patient stories that are going to connect with the media and the public.

It’s the same in any business.  Regardless what your profession is, you have an impact on the lives of others.  And the impact you have on your clients can make for your most compelling stories.  Those are the stories that, in essence, tell your story.  Perhaps you made someone’s life easier by saving her time, money, or stress.  Maybe you helped someone lose weight, feel better, look better.  What are your success stories?  Whether you’re an attorney, a plumber, a life coach or an artist, you have an impact on the lives of others. And the impact you have on your clients can make for your most compelling stories.  Those are the stories that, in essence, tell your story.

Before launching a marketing or public relations campaign, take some time to work on the anecdotal stories which you feel best illustrate what you do, those which most effectively tell your story.   Now match the various anecdotal stories to the appropriate media outlets.  For example, using a medical story again, a story about a ten year old struggling with Autism, would be pitched differently than a story about the latest in bio-identical hormone replacement therapy.  If you’re an author of a how-to book, the stories you’d pick to pitch to Redbook or Ladies Home Journal, would differ from those you’d pitch to Forbes or the Wall Street Journal.

Make a list of clients you have worked with who have interesting, impactful or inspiring stories they can tell.  You want these stories to illustrate how by working with you, their lives were changed or transformed.  Keep in mind; these transformations don’t have to be huge.  You don’t have to save someone’s life for your stories to resonate; your stories could be serious, fun, lighthearted, or practical.  Perhaps you made someone’s life easier by saving her time, money, or stress.  Maybe you helped someone lose weight, feel better, look better.  All of these make for good anecdotes, which in turn can lead to great PR pitches, which can land you media coverage – which in turn can help you land more clients, build your business and grow your business.

Copyright © Anthony Mora 2012

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Making The Right PR and Marketing Choices

February 7, 2012 Leave a Comment

You need to market, that’s a given.  The question should not be if, but how.   Your best choice is to hire a firm or a professional consultant.  If you’re on s shoestring budget, that makes it tougher, but there are still myriad ways to approach it.  Going the do-it-yourself route is one choice, but if you do chose to go this way, you have a big learning curve ahead of you.  For example, let’s say you decide to handle, create and launch your own media relations campaign; to start, you need to learn the hows and whys of putting together a successful campaign.  And you need to know how to define a campaign.

Keep in mind that landing an interview on TV program, or in a magazine, is not media relations.  That is simply one small step.  I’ve had potential clients tell me that they tried PR and it simply didn’t work.  When I asked them to define exactly what they did, they usually explained that they were featured in a magazine or newspaper or TV segment and nothing happened.  When I then asked them how they utilized or maximized that one media placement, I’d generally be met with blank stairs.  In their mind, that one media placement was a PR campaign; it didn’t change their life, so PR didn’t work.  The trouble was, they never really tried a public relations campaign, they simply appeared in a story or two.  Being featured in the media a few times is not a media relations campaign.  It’s a start.  It’s nice.  It can help, but it’s not a campaign, and that’s what public relations firms focus on creating, launching and implementing effective PR campaigns.

This is not to say that you can’t do some initial PR work on your own.  You can, but your goal should be to shift from doing your own marketing to brining on a professional as soon as possible.  Your job is running your business.  Your marketing team should be marketing your business.

Effective media relations is an art and a full-time job. It takes skill, know-how, experience persistence, and contacts. The art of effective PR entails more than writing releases, posting releases on paid wire services, putting together press kits – and praying. If a campaign is launched haphazardly or incorrectly, it’s often best not having been launched at all. The last thing you want to do is alienate the press, which is often what happens when well-meaning but inexperienced individuals try their hands at running their own media campaigns.

So until you can bring a team or a consultant on board, do what you can on your own.  But be selective.  Keep your efforts targeted and focused.  Once you’re ready to hire a PR firm or marketing company, choose wisely.  Choose a firm or individual you’re comparable with.  You need to be able to communicate with you representatives. You also need trusted advisors who will tell you when they feel you’re steering off- base or making a wrong move. If you pick wisely, do your part and work with your PR firm, (to paraphrase Bogie in Casablanca) this could be the start of a successful and profitable relationship.

Copyright © Anthony Mora 2012

Filed under Marketing Tagged with , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Starbucks’ Spirited PR Gamble

January 25, 2012 Leave a Comment

A Big Mac along with a glass of chardonnay?  Who knows?  That could be on the way.  Starbucks is heading in that direction.  The chain will soon be selling beer and wine in select locations.  Four to six stores in the Southern California area will offer alcoholic beverages by the end of this year, as will some stores in Atlanta and Chicago

The chain began testing its new spirited approach in Seattle in 2010. Starbucks now offers beers for $5 and wines by the glass for $7 to $9 in five locations in that city and one in Portland, Oregon.

The questions are: what will this move do to the Starbucks brand? And how will customers have to change their habits in order for it to pay off?  Currently the chain makes most of its daily sales by 2 p.m., which explains the foray into the spirit business.  On the other hand around 75% of Starbucks customers are there for take out.  That won’t work in the beer and wine business.  These customers will have to say and enjoy their beverages in-house.  And what about the kids and teens that have made Starbucks one of their staples.  Will mom and dad be happy sending their kids to a beer and wine establishment?

If this were Europe, there would be no issue.  There families are used to going to pubs or cafes where coffee, food and spirits are sold.  But, the U.S. isn’t France or England and we generally have a different take on where liquor should and shouldn’t be served.  And what happens when a Starbucks barista has to 86 someone?  What will be the protocol for that?

Starbucks has built an amazing worldwide brand.  It has regularly changed its menu offering different types of drinks and food items, but a jump into the world of beer and wine is a big one.  Adding a new pastry, sandwich or fruit drink does not risk compromising the chain’s brand, but offering a happy hour where sprits flow freely will challenge the way many of its customers view the company.

Only time will tell if this gamble will pay off.  Because it directly impacts their brand recognition, it could either turn out to be a PR miscue or a public relations homerun.  Chances are it will land somewhere in the middle.  Since they are only experimenting with a handful of stores, if the publicity effect is extremely negative, they can quickly shut the program down.  But if the reaction is simply lukewarm, or only somewhat negative, they will most likely give the news stores a fair shot and launch a media relations campaign extolling the virtues of this new approach.  If it works, it could become a one stop shop for buying one’s stimulants in the morning and depressants in the evening.  The next big question could be, how are they going to get people to leave?

Copyright © Anthony Mora 2012

Sato, Kiichiro. “Starbucks’ alcohol menu being tested in a handful of shops in Seattle and one in Portland, Ore., includes Rogue Dead Guy Ale, a Pinot Noir from Oregon, a Prosecco from Italy and a Malbec from Argentina. Above, a Starbucks in Chicago. ” Photo. Los Angeles Times. 24, Jan. 2012. 25, Jan. 2012. <http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-starbucks-beer-20120124,0,5910879.story>

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