3 ways to turn PR coverage into customer attention
By Paul Green
The great thing about getting free publicity in the mainstream media is that it’s like rolling a stone down a hill.
Once it’s going it gets faster and faster, giving you more and more coverage.
I actually met a business owner recently who had to “switch off” his publicity machine, because it was generating TOO MUCH PR coverage for him.
His business was being affected by the amount of time he was spending doing interviews with journalists! A nice position to be in.
When you’re getting this kind of regular publicity, you should focus on making sure this PR coverage is turning into customer attention, and ultimately sales leads.
A lot of PR people believe that publicity can’t generate leads. They’re wrong. I regularly teach business owners how to turn publicity into leads, by focusing their attention on treating PR attention as they would any customer attention.
Here are 3 ways to turn your PR coverage into sales leads:
1) Re-use the content on your website: Every press release and piece of coverage you get should go online in some way. This is good for boosting the credibility of your business in the eyes of your potential customers, and gives Google some extra relevant content to get its teeth into (that’s good for making your website perform better in searches).
2) Make copies of articles: Photocopy media coverage to put in your brochure or send out with sales pitches. It can give your business a significant competitive advantage to be perceived as the business that the media is talking about. Be aware, you may need to purchase a copyright licence from the Newspaper Licensing Agency.
3) Use publicity to generate more publicity: If you appear in a prestigious publication, put that fact on your website and in your email footer: “As featured in the June 2009 edition of the XYZ Times”. Some journalists like to tread a well-worn path, and a business that gets plenty of media coverage elsewhere may be more reassuring to them than a business that no other journalist has touched. No-one wants to make a mistake, and journalists are exactly the same. You could even send copies of coverage you’ve had in non-competing titles to new media titles, to demonstrate that other journalists believe your business is newsworthy.
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