What is the image of your your company in public? Do you know which tools you can use free to get your name out there?

How can you work with media people in a way beneficial to both sides?

To succeed in public relations and marketing, here are a few things you need to master:

• Know how to use press releases to tell the your world about your news
• Understand what to do when you get interviewed for TV or radio
• See how you could get more business by organizing seminars and other events
• Find out whether sponsoring is the right thing to do
• Know what to do when things go wrong and your public image is endangered

There are tons of news every day, reaching us from papers, radio, TV and whatever else. However, sometimes your own company becomes a part of this news world, and you will probably want to make it look as good as possible.

A press release is basically an article informing the public about particular events. These should be based on running open days, introducing special offers or new services, and most importantly offering these to new customers.

To get the maximum impact, you should aim for publishing one press release at least every two months. So how to do it?

Free press or print advertising is where you have been contacted by a paper or magazine to either give a comment on your, seek your advice or simply report on you and your business.  These are known as editorials or press releases and can be created by yourself or the media.  If you have something that you feel is of public interest, you might submit a written piece to the paper in which they could possibly use your story and print without any cost to you.

It may also be a possibility that you get to advertise for free in the print media.  For instance your local magazine or newsletter may offer you a position to put in an ad for your business at no charge.

Then you can always send the printed articles as mailers to your prospects – and link them on your website.

Always remember – focus on the media which are read by customers, and then make sure you align your website content with the press release.

Yes, exciting things sometimes do happen, and if you run your company successfully, a reporter might give you a call one day and invite you to their radio or TV show or just ask you a few questions.

Here are a few tips if you happen to get on air:

• Know your audience. Since both TV and radio are highly dependant on their audience, you have won if you know how to please their audience. It’s like with any marketing strategy – do a bit of research upfront, and find out who will be watching/listening to the show and what would be of interest to them.
• Listen. Since you are expected to provide expert answers to your related questions, first of all you need to listen and make sure you understand them well.
• Be up to the point. Give answers to the questions you have been asked. Don’t go too long about yourself and your company – offer value and interesting content for the audience.
• Relax & be yourself. In order to concentrate well enough, you need to be relaxed and take it as easy as possible. Breathe deeply and forget all the stage fright – be yourself.
• Look well for TV. If you got an invitation for a TV show, make sure you look your best – here you really represent your company in front of a huge audience.
• Be positive. If you speak positively, people will associate you with a positive image. If you complain, or even give it out to somebody, or make your competitors look bad, you will only endanger your own public image.

It is recommended to run at least one public seminar every year. An alternative to this could be an open day, a barbecue, a training day or any other social event, open to public, but primarily targeted at customers. Make sure you follow all steps necessary to have the event a success:

1. Create flyers & web page content to promote the seminar
2. Write a press release and send it to local newspapers
3. Distribute the flyers to your partners & all people who contacted you previously
4. Invite your customers and people from all your networks
5. Enjoy the day!
6. Ask for feedback – have evaluation forms ready, which you can easily turn into testimonials
7. Have a follow up in mind – “why” will you contact attendees after the seminar? (Email them the presentation, offer a free consultation/guide etc.)

Now it’s your turn to come up with an event that will be really interesting to customers so that they will get to know you and maybe become your customers. Sometimes, even a professional public speaker could help.

We all try to avoid it as much as possible, yet still, it happens from time to time. Some of your employees treated their customers badly. Or they were caught abusing customers. Or their training was not up to date…

However subtle the incident is, when it gets out in the news, you probably have an issue. Then you usually have only a few hours to react properly and protect the reputation of your company.

That’s why it’s essential that you have a simple crisis management plan prepared. It could be as simple as this:

• Who will speak for the media if things go wrong.
• What are the precautions you have been implementing in your company.
• What is the experience with other customers.

As part of your report for the media, you will probably also want to mention:

• Why did the incident happen.
• What you have done to the person who caused the incident.
• What you have done to prevent this from happening in future.

Whatever the issue is, try to communicate as soon as possible and answer all questions media might have for you. This will prove that you are not trying to hide anything and that it’s in your best interest to sort things out quickly.