When Your Publicity Campaign Requires an Assistant
Good PR Begins Online
by Assistant on January 19, 2010
Right now, more than ever, it is an overwhelming necessity for businesses to be technologically savvy. In just about every aspect of business, there are advantages to be gained from technology – such as speed and efficiency – especially with recent advances in computers. Public relations is no exception to this rule.
According to the United States Small Business Administration (SBA), in excess of 75% of small businesses owned computers by the year 2003. Seven years later, the fact of the matter is that almost all businesses operate with computers. Whether you use Dell or HP laptops, computers have become an essential thread in the fabric of a competitive business. Mastercard, a large multinational financial corporation, stated that “67% of small business owners believe technology can give them a competitive edge.”
For PR professionals, this need for good technology is exceedingly great. Public relations is all about building a good reputation, impressing clientele – a company that is not up to the latest standards of technology is not going to achieve this. For one, clients are likely to be impressed by a company whose PR efforts are clearly outdated; this reflects poorly on the company as a whole.In addition, you won’t be nearly as successful at reaching out to the your entire market, particularly your online market, as those companies who are current in technological efforts.
The following are FOUR important reasons why your PR MUST be up-to-date with technology:
Web Sites and Search Engines. Web sites and Search Engine Optimization (SEO) are the new yellow pages. These days, much like the yellow pages years ago, a company is found by clients on the internet, through search engines and backlinks. Clients look to the company’s website to develop their first impressions, which matters greatly to the company’s reputation. As a result, companies must understand how websites work before they can hope to establish good public relations. SEO is also significant; how a client reaches a company can also affect its reputation. For instance, a company with spammy backlinks to its website is likely to offend potential clients. Companies pursuing great PR must have attractive, informational (including press kits), compatible, searchable, and user-friendly websites to attain attention from the public and media.
Press Release Distribution. News technology is changing. Long gone are the days of only the biggest and best companies mailing press releases to newspapers. Nowadays, press releases are available for everyone, and the means of distribution are changing as well. To begin with, news consumption is now increasingly more common online. It’s much easier for a company to send a press release (and other promotional material) and have it reach dozens or hundreds of strong information sources. In many ways, this is a great advancement, opening up the door for better promotion and larger audiences. The bad news is, it also means more competition – thus companies who either don’t understand the technology or are not properly equipped might find themselves falling short of the mark.
Communication. Even apart from websites, the communication benefits offered by technology still run very deep. First there’s email, an efficient, instantaneous, and flexible method of communication. Email’s also great for mass communication, allowing messages to be sent to hundreds or even millions of recipients at a time. Furthermore, computers allows for several forms of versatile content, including surveys and Flash media and digital video.
Social Networking. PR professionals should certainly pay close attention to social media: websites such as Facebook.com and Twitter.com are presently making enormous waves. Social networks expand across a company’s entire market, and across the entire world. They also allow companies to actually interact one-to-one with their clients, to become a part of their own market. Social networking also takes advantage of the age-old viral marketing concept of word of mouth. Once a company does something noteworthy with a few people in a community, it’s likely for the thing they did to spread across the entire community, along with a newfound reputation.
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