By administrator | 25 February 2020 | Uncategorized

A PR campaign is typically made up of several key components (or ingredients). Thought leadership, press releases, executive profiling and media relations are all essential tactics to bring a campaign to life and help a business achieve its objectives.

To celebrate Pancake Day, the team at Jargon PR have been discussing our favourite PR ‘toppings’ – additional tactics that can enhance a campaign’s success such as research, social media and events.

 

Katie Ward, Account Executive

Favourite pancake topping: Lemon & sugar

Favourite PR topping: Social media

Social media is huge and is being used by everyone these days, both in the B2B and B2C sectors. It can be really beneficial for clients to directly reach their audience and share information. It is a great way to amplify content and interact with your audience. 

When businesses use social media right, it can build relationships with the press and journalists as well as help to see what is trending. Identifying key topics that are most relevant to comment on is also important.

 

Emily John, Account Manager

Favourite pancake topping: Nutella & banana

Favourite PR topping: Events

My favourite additional tactic in a PR campaign involves hosting an event to launch a client’s new product or service. This could involve taking our clients’ key spokespeople on a press tour to visit a selection of key journalists for product demonstrations and interviews, or hosting an event at a venue for journalists and key industry influencers to attend. A launch event is an excellent way to showcase a client’s latest product and build hype around it.

For the B2B industry, product launch events provide our clients with an opportunity to get in front of the right journalists and give insight on what their business vision is, educate them on the product or services they provide and give them valuable information about their brand. By inviting key industry journalists and influencers, clients will have ample opportunities to meet them face to face, discuss the new product features and establish relationships, which will ultimately help secure coverage further down the line. Events are also a great way to build brand awareness by promoting client’s social media handles or hosting social media competitions to generate online engagement. 

 

Dani White, Account Manager

Favourite pancake topping: Lemon & sugar

Favourite PR topping: Unique data

My favourite topping is not so much a tactic in itself, but something that can be a real asset to any type of PR activity or story: unique data. With so much noise in the technology sector, our role is to help our partners to be seen as driving conversations with new and original insight in their respective industries. Working with a host of great technology companies and talented field experts, we’re often able to tap into a wealth of data and insight to build stories with credibility and offer new perspectives on age-old conversations. 

Even a sprinkle of unique data can breathe new life into a technology story and bring old thinking into a new dimension. What’s more, strong data is a great way to drive creative PR assets – infographics, social content, videos – which can be used to engage audiences and fuel digital campaigns even further. 

 

Katherine Rabey, Senior Account Manager

Favourite pancake topping: Maple syrup

Favourite PR topping: Research

My favourite PR topping is definitely research – this is something that can really breathe new life into a PR campaign. Commissioning a bespoke research campaign will provide you with relevant facts and statistics, which will (hopefully!) back up your key messages and talking points, really driving them home and establishing your company and spokespeople as true thought leaders in your industry. Research can also be an impactful source of news, if you are struggling to come up with news for the press, as you can make an announcement about your unique findings. 

 

Lily Fox, Junior Account Executive

Favourite pancake topping: Lemon & sugar

Favourite PR topping: Working with influencers

My favourite PR additional tactic and one that seems to continue to grow is working with key influencers. By taking some time to do in-depth research and carefully selecting the correct influencers for a PR campaign, it can boost communication efforts towards a business’s target audience including those that are difficult to engage with via conventional means. Micro and nano influencers are hugely popular on many social media platforms due to their relatability and likability. By using these social media experts, they can build relationships and strengthen brand messaging with your followers. 

I believe working with influencers is a great additional tactic as it allows businesses to be creative with their content. To stand out from the crowd, companies need to come up with unique content and to constantly be aware of new trends. Influencers can also share their own advice from their experience, giving a fresh angle to ideas in the PR campaign.

 

Heather Guare, Junior Account Executive

Favourite pancake topping: Nutella

Favourite PR topping: Incorporating brand ambassadors into campaigns

Having a brand ambassador involved in a B2B PR campaign can also be a great addition. When a company has a brand ambassador that aligns with their key values and morals they can create strong partnerships and help them achieve many business objectives such as awareness, building trust within customers or just to simply create more content. Brand ambassadors are often well known people who can add an interesting alternative angle to a company. They can play many different roles in PR campaigns, from simply wearing a company’s logo to attending company events and activities and being more involved day to day. 

Using a brand ambassador is one of my favourite ‘toppings’ as it allows you to create interesting content that is not solely based on what a client’s business does. No one wants to read the same content where a brand is consistently telling them what they do and how great they are. Brand ambassadors allow you to tell stories that people find interesting and want to invest their time and also can attract new people who may have not heard of your company before. Although this kind of story may not relate directly to the company, they will still be aligning with the same morals and values, strengthening the company’s brand image.

 

Emma Sausman, Junior Account Executive

Favourite pancake topping: Melted chocolate, strawberries and banana

Favourite PR topping: Event briefings 

Many clients will attend yearly conferences and events which are relevant to their particular industries. However, with thousands of attendees in one place, it can be hard to maximise your presence in a matter of days. So, an additional tactic we like to offer is organising on-site press briefings for a client. To achieve this, we will reach out to relevant press a month or so before the event to ensure the meeting is as productive and organised as possible.

I would say it is one of my favourite toppings in a PR campaign because it truly benefits all parties involved. The client is able to shout about the company’s latest achievements and plans going forward, whilst the journalist is getting the industry insight that they came for. And it really enables us to strengthen relationships with the press, whilst pushing our client’s brand. 

 

Emma Walkom, Account Executive

Favourite pancake topping: Classic lemon and sugar

Favourite PR topping: Podcasts

Podcasts have become a great ‘topping’ for a PR campaign. They are a more personal way for a business to communicate its key messages and a perfect tactic to showcase the expertise of your staff.

Companies can have complete control of each episode subject, which provides a perfect opportunity to tie in key themes or trends that they have recently been focusing on.

What’s more, podcasting on the B2B side is a relatively new tactic for a PR campaign, so it’s the ideal time to be an early adopter and get ahead of your competition.

 

Luke Smith, Junior Account Executive

Favourite pancake topping: Maple syrup

Favourite PR topping: Social media

My favourite additional tactic would be the use of social media. This is such a growing market and a hugely lucrative PR ‘topping’. Many businesses didn’t view social media as a key tactic in the past, but now it’s beginning to get the recognition it deserves.

Social media has become such an important part of PR for the B2B industry now because of the extra reach you can achieve, as well as the guaranteed publication. Instead of being reliant on other agendas or publications to get your message out there, you can in essence become your own publisher, spreading your own messages to a specific audience who you already know are interested in your work.

 

Kevin Winfield, Senior Account Manager

Favourite pancake topping: Marks & Spencer’s Lemon, Gin and Tonic Sauce

Favourite PR topping: Podcasts

Podcasts have become an increasingly popular tactic within the PR industry and for good reason. With over 7 million people in the UK listening to their favourite digital shows, businesses can’t deny that podcasts are a credible, platform to showcase their expertise and thought leadership within their sector. 

Perhaps the best thing about podcasts is that they are relatively easy to set up. The key to creating an engaging podcast is to have a steady pipeline of content already planned in advance of releasing it. You also need to consider the frequency you publish and how you are going to promote your podcast – the most important thing is to remain consistent.

 

Ben Davies, Account Executive

Favourite pancake topping: Lemon & sugar

Favourite PR topping: Breakfast/lunch briefings

When a client has significant news to announce, it’s really good to make a big deal of it, and there are some great additional actions you can take other than just announcing the news with a press release. Setting up press breakfasts/lunches around the news is a great way to not only drum up interest around the news, but to secure some really strong coverage for your client.

Provided the news is worthy and you have a spokesperson who is able to set a day aside for press activity, you can really take advantage of it. Alongside the release, you can offer exclusive interviews to journalists, take them out for a fancy meal at a posh restaurant and make them feel really special. 

While the news alone should be enough to entice them, offering a full briefing with a significant brand spokesperson with breakfast or lunch included is the recipe for a great interview. Invite some key journalists from tier one media that are your preferred targets and you can host four or five really in-depth briefings – depending on how much your client can eat of course, you may have to fit in a few meetings over coffee to give them a bit of a rest from the food. 

As a result, you get a string of exclusive interviews in some top publications, all peddling this fantastic news that you want to share with the world. The client is happy, the journalist is happy, and you’ve secured some really strong coverage for the brand. There are no losers in an ideal world… but this is PR and there’s bound to be a couple of complications along the way. Any added stress is all worth it in the end, though!

 

As well as all the traditional PR tactics, Jargon PR offers lots of additional toppings to enhance a PR campaign including research, social media, podcasts and more. If you’re interested in implementing a PR campaign or would like to hear more about how the tactics mentioned in this blog would fit into your business, email us on hello@jargonpr.com.