4 PR Tactics for Accelerating Sales

Public Relations (PR) can be a powerful enabler to support your marketing plan in accelerating sales and driving revenue growth.

PR adds a robust layer of credibility for your brand in the minds of the decision makers. Strong coverage in the media creates interest. Coupled with your demand generation initiatives, increase in visibility cultivates purchase preference.

Here are 4 tactics to turbocharge your PR for filling up your sales pipeline:

Provide what the Journalists Need: In this age of content clutter and 24x7 connectivity, information is freely available. So when journalists approach you for quotes, don’t just stop at providing information. Instead, provide opinions and insights based on data and analyses so that they develop topical and relevant stories. Help them build context by creating meaning. A well-articulated ‘point of view’ gets your quote published and helps you stand out. In my experience, this often gets you the ‘box treatment’ in stories prompting prospective clients to seek you out to do business with you.

Invite Journalists to Attend Your Events: Maximize the impact of your client events by inviting journalists. Your participants’ engagement levels present social proof about the relevance of a particular topic. This increases the credibility of your message for the journalists. Facilitate one to one discussions for the journalists with your speakers in the sidelines of the event. Also, offer to facilitate interviews with your clients who are attending the event. The scribes will thank you for it since this will help them to file comprehensive stories covering all angles (both from the supplier and buyer), making it easier to get them published.

Produce Bylined Articles: A bylined article rich with commercial insights can increase credibility of your subject matter experts. A commercial insight is a compelling perspective that directly impacts a company’s performance and helps them to make or save money. A well written bylined article can get you the coveted Op-Ed position. Savvy marketers develop a strong understanding of their target audience’s businesses and produce bylined articles addressing their pain points.

Connect to Earn Trust: According to 2014 Edelman Trust Barometer, trust in corporate leaders is at an all-time low. CEOs are at the bottom of the list with extremely low trust levels. You can use PR to earn trust by humanizing your leadership team. Collaborate with editors to feature them in personality based profile stories. Readers love authentic stories where they get to know the personal side of a leader. Anecdotes about their early career struggles, how they overcame them and their likes and dislikes can build a bond with your audiences. Connection with your leaders will increase trust and differentiate your brand. Columns related to Leadership, Travel, Food and Health are ideal platforms for these.

What has been your experience with using PR in accelerating sales and growth?

Please share your learnings in the comments section below.

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Maneesh Sah is a Marketing Leader who helps multinational B2B companies expand in Asia. He partners with executive leadership to engage customers with commercial insights influencing sustained revenue growth. Maneesh builds and nurtures a high performing marketing function focused on accelerating sales. He is excited to be part marketer, part journalist and part publisher.