Posts Tagged ‘Recession’

Smart PR – Idea No.1

In these recession-hit times, all businesses are having to think smarter financially.

Over the coming months, PR Superstar will be giving away a few trade secrets to SMEs about cost-cutting ways you can promote your business on a shoestring PR budget.

Idea No.1:

Consider advertising in school newsletters, and other publications where placing an ad can cost as little as a couple of quid, whilst the literature is read by many hundreds, if not thousands of people!

On behalf of a client wanting local promotion, I rang a school who offered me a reasonably-sized advert in their monthly newsletter for £3 and another school demanded, wait for it, a fiver. Bargain!

More Smart PR, courtesy of PR Superstar, follows soon…stay tuned folks :-)

Tags: , , , , , , , | Posted in PR Tips December 20th, 2008

The Power of PR: Growing Your Business in a Recession

Below are just some ways you can harness the power of public relations to help grow your business or organisation — even in a recession!

They’re designed to increase your public profile and media presence, and drive word-of-mouth.

Word-of-mouth is considered to be the most effective form of communication because it’s from a third party (eg: a journalist writing in a paper or a recommendation from a friend) and is deemed highly credible; advertising, as it’s paid-for promotion, is widely thought to be the least effective.

Anyway, on with just a handful of PR Superstar’s suggestions:

* Stage a PR Stunt - help create a buzz about your business with innovative and eye-catching stunts, amazing media stories and on-street ambient marketing

* Write regular press releases - about newsworthy events and activities connected with your business; where there is no news, a PR specialist can ‘create’ it

* Boost community relations – sponsor a charity or worthwhile cause, and shout about this on both your own and their website, in company literature, in the media, and so on

* Call on influencer relations – stage a profile-raising press party for key journalists and business contacts to help them get to know you and your business, for example

* Place profile-raising editorial - most newspapers and magazines will be happy to run free editorial in the form of a competition or reader’s offer, if you fulfill their minimum prize value. The competition can promote a service and product and be a very cost-effective way of getting your business on to the pages of papers and magazines — and under readers’ noses!

To find out more about how PR Superstar can help grow your business or organisation, call Jill Kent on 020 8274 0807 or e-mail hello@prsuperstar.co.uk

Tags: , , , , , , , , , , | Posted in PR Tips December 13th, 2008

Never A Better Time to Invest in PR

Businesses are battening down the hatches and tightening their belts for the recession that looms in 2009.

Whilst it’s always good business sense to be prudent, it’s at times like these that business owners should be investing in their business now more than ever.

Even in the good times, around one third of SMEs go out of business after two to three years, and this number is expected to increase dramatically in these tough ecomonic times.

What can be done to increase businesses’ chances of survival?

A year since launching London-based PR Superstar, my public relations and media consultancy is flourishing and I’m very much looking forward to 2009.

However, I’m not taking things for granted and I’m investing in marketing, both online and offline, business coaching, networking and telemarketing, as well as forming strategic alliances and doing my own PR.

Working on your business, and not just in it, will go a long way to ensuring you’ll come out the other side of the recession, and probably in an even stronger position.

For a compelling public relations campaign, B2B or B2C, that really resonates with your target audiences, contact Jill Kent, Founder of journalist-run public relations consultancy, London’s PR Superstar on 020 8274 0807.

Tags: , , , , , , , , , | Posted in PR Tips December 7th, 2008