If you believe you are having difficulty with publicity, then maybe it is timely that you already employ these simple DIY PR tips to help you out.

Start getting the kind of publicity that you want by employing these four simple techniques:

1. Simply ask

You do not need to wield complex procedures to generate publicity for your business. It is not really as hard as you might think it is. You simply ask the media people to promote your business for you and some of them will be more than willing to spare a few minutes of their precious time writing and talking about your products and services.

2. Do your PR works personally

I am not saying that securing the services of a PR firm will do you no good; in fact, it is a great help in conveying your message to your target audience. However, it is a known fact that PR firms and agencies cost a lot. Sometimes the monetary requirement is just beyond your capacity to pay. That is why it is only justifiably practical to suggest that you handle the PR works for your own business as long as the tasks are still manageable. Sometimes it will even work to your own advantage if you are the one dealing with the journalists because most of them prefer to extract comments from the business owners rather than just with public relations representatives.

3. Research before you plunge

Publicity could spell your demise if you do not know how to handle it or you are not ready to engage. This happens if you did not make sure to make the needed research about vital information before you made contact with the journalist. Make sure you have already pretty much covered anything that you wish to talk about by the time that a spontaneous interview will materialize.

4. Make good use of the principle of timing

Make your story trendy to make it more appealing and newsworthy for the media people to work on.

Customise your new business according with the latest outfit

When your business is something new and is conceptualized according to the latest ideas, the media might generally like it to use in their story.

Always be ready on opportunities of associating your stories on the latest happenings. Nothing could be more in timing than that. Like at the height of economic crunch, the media feasted on stories about financial management.

Use the seasonal holidays to provide you an idea of what materials to produce to create a great impact for your message.

When you share your expertise to the public, your story will definitely gain popularity with great impact and effect.

5. Deliver only relevant news materials

You have to be able to determine the kind of headlines of which you want to hook your own generated news. Make sure to give your best in offering only significant news.  These are a few pointers to help you out in determining whether the news will interest your target audience.

1. It has to be relevantly new. Time is of the essence if you wish to capture the interest of your audience.
2. Make sure your news is within the premises of your area of concern.
3. As much as possible, your news must feature people that are readily identifiable, such as politicians, celebrities and sports figures.
4. Unusual news will definitely generate curiosity and interest, so it is also a great way of gaining publicity.
5. News with a touch of conflict is another way of tapping people’s interest.
6. Some hyped-up products use suspense to entice the audience’s attention, capitalising on the people’s building curiosity.
7. News that has a shade of human struggle and success, emotional and inspirational will definitely capture the interests of the readers and viewers.
8. Your news must be something that will have a direct impact to the hearers. It is a lot more enticing to listen to news when you know that you are involved, directly or indirectly, with the given situation.

You might have to invest a few extra cash in marketing your business, and this is particularly difficult when cash is hard to come by. However, there are various means for which you could secure free business PR that are proven to work.  Here are a few of the ways of gaining free PR for your small business.

1. Establish your expertise

You can greatly utilise your expertise in marketing your business. You could really be great in doing something else. All you need to do is establish the fact that you are extremely good at what you do. Write articles and submit them online, write an e-book, attend speaking engagement, anything that will back up your claims of expertise.

2. Utilise the power of the media

Make connections with the local media. Establish good relationship with them. Extend enough effort to feature your small business in all local media outlet. Introduce them to your business’ background, nature and advantages. Make them a part of your business’ important activities, such as pilot opening, anniversary and any other important details. Make a catalogue of the entire media outlet in your locality, and every time your business engages in something important, let them know through sending a press release. You may also post your media releases to any free PR websites for an additional exposure and coverage.

3. Offer something relevant in return for significant details

Collect as much information as possible. Ask for important details like name, address and contact number, among other things so you could include them in your network for future reference and business opportunities. In return, you may offer something relevant to your customers for their cooperation, such as your authored e-book or newsletter. You may also find it helpful to gain the collaboration of other businesses with the same target bracket as you do. You may exchange relevant information, thus increasing your market universe.

4. Make good use of the web

You need not be a tech savvy for you to greatly utilise the benefits of the internet. Make good use of its usage. Take advantage of it. It will greatly impact your business if only you employ the many uses of the internet. Social Media sites are really good breeding ground for fledgling businesses; you can use this medium to reach out to hundreds of customers, either current or potential.

5. Stay grounded

You have to keep improving your new-age techniques of marketing without neglecting the proven old methods. Do not be limited in your approaches. Diversify! Associate with people from your industry and make solid connection with them. Hand out your business cards. Stay in contact with your clients and customers. These may be the ways of the old, but these are also proven to work.

First impression matters especially if you are meeting possible clients. You are not getting another chance, so make the best out of it the first time. A personal PR could be your answer.

There could be a great possibility that first impressions are true. The image you project at first meeting could be interpreted as your general characteristic by clients. You have to protect the image you have especially when you are in business where you get to have so many opportunities of meeting professional people the first time.  Because your image is your ticket towards building a much needed credibility, you must take good care of it. Every single gesture and actuation you deliver is subject for interpretation, so you need to act appropriately as to what the circumstance requires. First impression impacts your business in a great way, so make the best of yourself while you’re at it. In the eyes of your potential clients, you and your business is interchangeable; when you project yourself a lousy image, you are sending a message that they will be venturing with a lousy business. Therefore, project yourself the best and the most appropriate way, develop your personal PR.

Your image is the gauge other people will measure you and your business. You cannot deceive them into believing that you are not really what you are showing them at the moment. It is impossible to let them know you run an environmentally conscious business when you do not even dispose your wastes properly. No matter how trivial, people will notice every off-handed remark or gesticulation you make. Potential clients will pretty much use their first impression of you in evaluating you entirely.

Building a healthy image will definitely work to your advantage. Make an effort to evaluate yourself, and do a personality makeover if need be. Your manner is your message to others about who you are without uttering a single word. If you dress smart, if you smile a lot, if you always make sure to make it on time, then you are sending a message that you are great to work with. Your business skills may not necessarily be enough to bring your business into a higher level; learn the skill of personal PR as well.

• Make every effort to project a professional image even to the slightest detail, from your business communications down to your logo
• Be smart. Dress accordingly. Neat grooming will do you good.
• Be cordial, warm and friendly to everyone no matter their station in life. Develop healthy and proper manners.

You can make your articles work for your benefits; its advantages are great. It will help you project the right image for you and your business as long as you inform your customers that you are the writer of the said article.

1. Notify people about your written article by placing a link from your email

This is a very reliable method in advertising your article. There is a great probability that people will click the link in your email signature, thus paving a way for them to be informed that you have recently written an article.

2. Post your articles in the website regularly

When you regularly update and add articles to your website’s content, the greater your credibility becomes. And when your credibility increases, so is the number of visits you get in your website because people trust your ideas and opinions.

3. Submit articles in prominent article directories

There are free article directories for which you can post your articles for exposure and coverage. Make sure to post them in prominent article directories to ensure greater possibility of viewership. These directories may have some strict guidelines, but once you get through the process, you will have an opportunity to secure massive viewership from its readers.

4. Post your articles in the open

Do not be limited to posting your articles online only. There are various ways of promoting your article. You can post it in the open like placing your article in an area where it can easily be seen by people such as reception area and bulletin board in the office.  You are trying to project an image of confidence and authority in your area of expertise.

5. Have a portfolio of your best articles

You will certainly create a very good impression when you are ready to show your portfolio when the client asks for it spontaneously. It allows your client to think highly of you. Always carry your portfolio with you, bring it wherever you head.

6. Make your article a great promotional tool

You may also utilise the power of article marketing by promoting your other methods to achieve the common goal. This is a very good avenue where you could create an image of being a true expert in your chosen field. When you are in any events, hand out any form of marketing materials together with your article piece.

7. Send your articles regularly to your current and prospective clients

This makes you look more professional. You may send each of them a copy of your articles as your way of reaching out to them on a regular basis. This will help you maintain brand recognition among these people.

Writing Great Articles For PR

Is my content relevant?

Your content should make a difference to your readers. They must find it worthwhile. Make sure that every word you pen down is beneficial to your customers. Make every effort to have every bit of your information relevant.

Does it have integrity?

When you write a factual article, make sure you are not just making up the details. Make sure to be ready to provide proof of its authenticity. A writer’s work is only as good as its integrity. When you say you are an expert, then you must mean it in every sense of the word.

Do you have the integrity and credibility?

You have to ask yourself whether you have established enough credibility and integrity in your field of expertise. Can you name other people to support your claims? Have you acquired various recognitions and commendations to fortify your credibility? Do you have a good standing within your association and community?

Establish and develop your expertise further

Continue to learn the systems of your business. Establish your expertise by submitting more articles and any other materials that will establish your authority on the subject. Be steady and reliable with your trends and routine. And make every effort to build meaningful relationship with people from the media. Make yourself known; establish your name and reputation until you start getting recognized for your efforts.

Writing an article may take some time to practice but once it gets going, you will become better in crafting and writing ideas. You can start slow while you are learning until you have enough experience to go full blast. Start crafting your article, start learning and posting your articles online until you get noticed.

Be sure to make a collection of your work. Keep it ready to be shown to your potential clients. Any copy of your work that you can keep, include it in your portfolio, you will need it soon enough.

Have you done something that defies convention? Have you tried emulating the publicity stunts that Richard Branson is famous for? Maybe it is now the right time to try to take a plunge and see if indeed it works.

Richard Branson is a very daring businessman. His audacity defies the established marketing and publicity methods and conventions but his results are stunningly positive. He has done a lot of publicity stunts that he is on his way of making a great name for himself aside from being an astute billionaire. He is even a lot more famous with all his stunts than the companies he tries to endorse.

It would be relatively easy to pull a publicity stunt when you are considerably famous already. To site an example is the known skirmish between Gordon Ramsay and Tracey Grimshaw.  Their public battle is a huge publicity opportunity waiting to be utilised and exploited. It has been a subject of interest within the political community, domestic and abroad. Publicity however is not strictly limited to those who are originally famous. Ordinary citizens could definitely do the same with almost the same effect. An example of this was when Alain Robert , an ordinary Frenchman, climbed the RBS. Had you been able to convince him to advertise your business while on top of RBS, sure your business would have generated an unprecedented publicity. That is the true power of publicity; it could literally change and revolutionize a business. It does not necessarily have to be as daring as what Richard Brandon usually does; it only has to possess the essentials of an effective publicity stunt. It has to be creative enough to capture the interest and grab the attention of your audience. When my mother-in- law owned a number of dressing salons many years ago, someone threw a brick against her windows. She made the situation productive by getting creative with the incident. She painted the cracks to project an artistic effect and then had it photographed to be included in the daily newspapers circular saying that people can’t wait until morning to gain entrance into her salons.  That was such an impressive publicity stunt!

If you wish to do your own publicity stunt, make sure to have solicited enough ideas from your mentors and closest friends to give you a good grasp of the risks and preparations involved. Ask for advice, learn from those people who benefited from it, and ask them how it could have worked.

You might need to change your public relations strategy in time for an ever changing market trends. Your previous strategies may not work anymore to gain business deals. You should start using attraction in developing your business.

Attraction is presenting your business in front of your potential clients, with all its strengths, capacities and capabilities, in such a way that they feel attracted to doing business with you. Simply put, your business should hold out a performance that will surely entice your clients. That is how attraction works.

Attraction could best be exemplified in an event where your audience will have a firsthand experience of you and your business’ unquestionable expertise. They must literally be able to test the authenticity of your claims for you to gain their trust and confidence. You must obviously get the attention of your audience by making a connection with them. Give them some practical examples that they could readily identify and relate with. Identify their needs and talk how you could respond to those needs. When you do this, you are certainly doing the principle of attraction.

The following are some benefits of attraction:

Practicality

People will find this strategy practical because they will experience it first hand and will have a good grasp of the message you are conveying.

Less effort, great rewards

You do not spend much effort attracting people than when approaching them. People who basically have the same perspective as you will just easily get attracted to you. People mostly prefer doing business with someone of the same vibe.

Statistically favourable

In attraction, all you need to do is present your business with great craft, and theoretically will leave the people to decide.  There is no failure here, because you did not approach, you just attract, therefore giving you a greater probability of success.

No rejections

Since you do not approach people to avail of your business, there is no opportunity for rejection. You don’t get to experience the demoralizing effects of rejection.

Greater coverage

In attraction, you have no biases whom to approach because you initially do not do the approaching. Your efforts are centred on attracting businesses to you. You are not bound by limitations; on the other hand, you get to have greater coverage because people and other businesses that you do not even know existed, approach you.

Peculiarly relevant

People sometimes need something new, something entirely different than what they are used to. Through attraction, you offer a relevant difference among your competition therefore increasing your chance of bagging a business deal.

Image of leadership

Attraction will afford you the opportunity to present yourself as a leader in your industry, which will all the more attract more people towards you.

No selling

You do not need to worry about selling because there is no actual selling anymore. All you need to do is talk and write about your business, and then start for the attraction to set in.

You are actively participating

One good thing about attraction is you are actively participating to the new ideas available. You are always ahead of the game and are always on the lookout to attract more, to attract more than your competitors do.

You may have to invest time and resources before you see the results of your attraction efforts, but over time you will reap the rewards while you are enjoying the tasks.  Start polishing your public relations strategy now through attraction, and be on your way to success.

Today, do you think that majority of the publicists and experts in public relations still believe in the saying that goes “there’s no such thing as bad publicity”? Well, many of them still have this sign placed on their desks.

Most of them take the aggressive resolution for publishing press releases. The same thing goes for some business owners. And their fundamental hope is to win the many hearts of the public. It upholds acquiring of the approval from the possible consumers on some ambiguous webpage, even with only a small amount of hope, that it will in a way build and expand their existence as body of business. That is the reality business owners are biting into.

It will not always be on the unsatisfactory side though. There are some who come out as victorious. If you want to announce a grand launching of a business through every forms of media outlet, then spreading the good news to your local neighborhood and nearby, adjacent communities and possibly beyond can be as compelling. What are the chances if you came up with your new and good book? Then you may have an interest in offering your business to some Web portals to quote a passage lifted from your book. To be more distinct however, it is more persuasive and striking to take a targeted approach.

Covering the general public with press releases and other advertisements can have four aspects to potentially backfire. Namely, these are:

• Endorsing your own news to uninterested consumers attempting them to patronize your goods and services can just result to financial resource, time and effort wastage. It is just as awful as having an unreturned attention and income.
• Possessing a substandard public relations and connection with the target audience subjects a website to slow down the traffic, or worse, drive the traffic off of the site.
• When the overall appeal of the media outlet you have appointed for your news does not have the quality reputation, is just plain boring, is just jam packed with disrupted layout of cheap pay-per-click advertisements and worse, the website’s contents are unedited and are full of erroneous information, expect that it will do your reputation more harm than good.
• Not putting worth on the contents and not including essential information does not put a competitive edge in your brand or business. That does not at all give justice to it.

Content marketing and public relations have more important purposes. One of which is to create a focus of your proposals to writers, bloggers, editors, reporters and other public influencers and advertisers who exercise similar enthusiasm to broadcast your announcements and thoughts that you generate. Centering your attention to media outlets which have consumers that are interested in your products and services can escalate the chances of you winning over their favors.

Through the ability of the reputable content marketing and public relations, rest assured that out of the billion people worldwide, there are those consumers who will give value to what you are trading them. Through the mentioned aspects, there are no questions about the quality and relevance of the site where your business contents will appear.

So, you already know the proposition that there is such an existence of bad publicity. And worse, there are other ambiguous media outlets which will just produce and publicize anything creating a scramble of ideas headed toward nothing. It devalues your business and reputation hence driving your potential consumers away and navigating you towards no accomplishment. Bad publicity or good publicity, you are always prompted with a choice.

Publicity could really make an impact in marketing your business, but sometimes it is overlooked for some reasons. But no matter what, experience shows that publicity works, and it works really great.

Anatomy of PR

PR is an effective tool of marketing your business through a handful of its various components, the reasons of which are converged into a single goal, to create an image that is strong and successful. PR is a combination of strategies in channelling your message about your products and services, and publicity is just one of its many components. Publicity is created through using the powerful influence of the media.

What does a PR do?

PR introduces great opportunities for a business to grow in great proportions. That is the reason why various companies make good use of its power for marketing. The following are a few of its many uses:

• It generates a number of customers
• It increases the business’ capacity
• It is a great tool to shave off competition
• It builds your profile to make it  stronger;
• It gets the works done in half the cost, or no cost at all.

How does free publicity work

Free publicity definitely holds a lot greater credibility than paid advertisements, but you will have no assurance that your piece of work will even get noticed. When you submit an article, there is no way of telling whether it gets to be published or not because it is the editor’s call whose and what articles are newsworthy to be posted or printed.

You may hire a PR consultant to do your job for you in this stage. You may outsource the task of building your profile to ensure regular admission and approval of your marketing materials.

Making your media release work

• Think of a significant thing about you and your business, and turn that into a statement as your standard slogan
• Use impressive and unique titles
• Make a one liner selling statement
• Create a relevant and comprehensive content
• Place nice-sounding quotes
• Include important details in your media release
• Do not be lengthy in your approach, keep your release in not more than one page
• Create your data base
• Suggest a photo session

Synchronised techniques

A successful marketing could be the result of your comprehensive marketing efforts. It is not a direct result of a single method, but rather a collaborative effect of all the other essential techniques. If everything is done according to the planned scheme, then public relations will most likely produce great results for the business. Publicity may not necessarily produce dramatic increase in sales, but it helps build the profile of a business which could be beneficial in achieving a long term goal.

Media release is a very powerful tool that you could utilise to enhance the performance and the standing of your business. It positions your business for greater attention and publicity without any required cost. Make good use of its benefits.

As long as you can provide an interesting content, one that captures the interests of the masses, the media might chase after your story for publication. The media people are always on the run looking for great story, and your job is to provide that story. When your story runs, it affords you to gain the much needed recognition to build your business name or brand until you build upon yourself a solid reputation. The following are some of the various benefits of sending media releases:

1. Recognition

When you send a media release to any media outfit and then it hits the airwaves, it will definitely enhance your chances of being recognized. It lets people know the nature of your business and how it works which in the long run will be beneficial to your business

2. Unquestionable credibility

Your story gets a greater credibility when it is embedded in both TV and print news. It makes people view it as an objective story, thus, affording it with much credibility than usual.

3. Financially viable and rewarding

It does not cost much, or it does not even cost at all. You get your publicity by capitalizing on the worth and the credibility of your story. It is very feasible indeed. In fact, in could even be financially rewarding to some.

4. Consistency and constancy

Through your media releases, you keep your clients and customers informed of your relevant activities. It sends them a message of deep connection thus gaining their loyalty in the process. You could even go a mile farther by personally letting them know about your media releases.

5. Brevity and clarity

Every time you write a media release, it helps you improve on crafting your message with the required brevity but with much needed clarity. A brief and clear message is better understood by the clients and customers which is supposedly the goal of every media release.

6. Image projection

A media release is a great avenue for you to form your image that you want to project to your clients and your customers. You should be able to communicate your vision and goals, and as to how you could impact their lives in various relevant ways.

7. Profile building

Once you start getting the right amount of attention, you also start getting recognized for your capacity and capability. You get to establish your expertise in certain fields thus giving a boost to your profile.

One of the challenges of running a business is how to project your image to your target audience. Take advantage of the various benefits of public relations.

You must have felt the same way other people feel about their business: the real nature of their businesses are still not being understood by most of the customers.  You must have wondered how come your business is still not getting the well deserved attention despite the efforts you put into it. It must have felt tiring to try to project the kind of image for your business, and yet being received in an entirely different light by the audience. Every business has gone through this phase; every businessman went through the same moment of frustration. For micro businesses, it is a little bit more manageable simply because of its manoeuvrability. Small businesses have the luxury of having complete control of their public relations, thus they could easily implement their plans for their image projection without much delay. As long as you execute your public relations marketing with great care and planning, you could greatly impact your business in establishing a healthy image to the public.

Basically, it is a two way strategy of executing goodwill and making it known. Most businesses make it a point to contribute to the advancement of corporate social responsibility; giving back to community by doing any particular good deeds. The thing is most of those businesses fail to tell people exactly the good things that they have just accomplished.

It is never late to start though; you may begin listing down every entity, individual or business, and include them in your prospects of letting your business be understood in its entirety. Include everyone you could ever think of that has been a part of your business. Make a comprehensive collection of things that are mostly misunderstood or not known about your business. And then start crafting your methods of rectifying the image of your business or introducing an unknown feature that has great relevance to your business. Make a careful plan. And then execute them gradually and surely. There may be various ways of approaching your subjects, and you will have to choose which ones fit appropriately to each of them. You could very well customise your approach to whichever you are comfortable with but without also compromising the preference of your subjects. No need to make your words fancy and verbose. Make it plain and simple and then deliver it with utmost sincerity.