SKC Insights

 

 

6 PR & Marketing Trends to Embrace in 2022

2021 brought us lessons of growth, resilience, and transformation as we conquered the challenges of a disruptive year. Now, it’s time to turn the calendar to a fresh page and begin anew. While the future remains unclear, one thing we can predict is that public relations and marketing will continue to change. What will 2022 bring? Here are six trends to consider and potentially leverage for your company:

Read More »

8 Tips for Planning a Successful Virtual Press Event

“See you on Zoom!” How many times have you heard that since 2020? From work to school to social gatherings, our lives have shifted online ­– and so have many PR events. Zoom interviews, online webinars, virtual press conferences and more have largely replaced in-person activities, and this trend shows no sign of slowing down.

At SKC, we believe the advantages of going virtual outweigh the challenges. We’ve organized several online events over the last year, and now we’re letting you in on our secrets!

Here are 8 tips for planning a successful virtual press event:

Read More »

SKC's 10 Favorite Lead Generation Tips & Tricks

Generating leads - both high in quantity and quality - is a marketer’s most important objective. A successful lead generation engine is what keeps the funnel full of sales prospects while you sleep. Surprisingly, only 1 in ten marketers feel their lead generation campaigns are effective. What gives?

There can be a lot of moving parts in any lead generation campaign and often times it’s difficult to know which parts need fine-tuning. To break it down, the best lead generation campaigns contain most, if not all, of these four crucial elements: an offer, a call-to-action (CTA), a landing page, and a form.

Here are SKC's 10 favorite tips and tricks for lead generation:

Read More »

4 Reasons a PR-Digital Marketing Marriage is Good for Business

Public Relations and digital marketing have a common goal. Both want to increase visibility and awareness, but while one is about your relationships with customers and prospects, the other is more about your relationships with reporters and media outlets.

A healthy marriage of the two disciplines benefits each side — making each one stronger than it would be on its own. PR gets access to digital audiences beyond their traditional sphere, and digital marketing gets the experience of tried-and-true methods of communication. And you get a cross-channel strategy that can’t be matched that provides the following 5 key advantages to your business.

1. Amplifies Your PR Efforts

By incorporating digital marketing tactics into your PR activities, press releases, thought leadership articles, case studies, and press coverage can be spread and amplified through new channels. Reporters will be able to find information on your business through twitter or a google search. Backlinks and/or SEO key phrases in your press release can boost viewership of a piece of news to a whole new audience. Sharing contributed articles or coverage clippings on social media extends PR to your followers and beyond. PR materials are also a great source for content-hungry channels and for content marketing where you can chop up a release for a blog post or whitepaper.

Read More »

6 Reasons to Partner with a PR Agency in 2019

The beginning of the new year brims with possibilities. You have goals and grand plans for your company. You have a brand to build, products and services to launch, more customers to win over and an opportunity to scale. You have so much to do and so little time!

Yet you’re challenged. You’re dreaming up ways to stretch your 24 hour-days into 48-hour days, spitballing ideas on how to meet these goals without adding headcount. Well, you’re not alone. From brand building to media relations to digital marketing, there are plenty of reasons why so many companies have found their solution by partnering with PR/marketing firms. Here are 6 reasons why hiring a PR and marketing firm is smart business.

1. Frees Up Your Time to Focus on What You Do Best

You're building your company, designing, developing and selling products and services. That’s what you do best. The PR agency has clients and products to market. We write, message and position you, pitch media, create news stories, secure speaking opportunities and awards, execute digital marketing – that’s what we do best. When you find your trusted agency, take a sigh of relief as you can now free up your time to focus on what you do best, paving the way for you to build products that are PR-worthy.

Read More »

5 Tips to Create Media Buzz During the Holidays

Sometimes “bad timing” can be “good timing.”

Conventional wisdom dictates that companies should avoid media pitching and outreach during the holiday season. The belief is that everyone, including consumers, reporters, and editors, is too busy and distracted to hear our story pitches, look at press releases or read news articles. The truth is this is an ideal time. The news cycle is slower, creating content holes for reporters. For companies, the holidays are the perfect time to gift news outlets with story ideas.

Here are 5 tips for getting yourself some coveted coverage during the holiday season:

Read More »

6 Hard Truths About PR

We hear you. The marketplace is brutal. Customers are fickle. Competitors are breathing down your neck. And worse, some prospects have never even heard of you! You need positive press coverage and brand awareness yesterday — there’s simply no time to wait.

We wish we could come in and magically wave a wand to get you some visibility right now. But, unfortunately, public relations doesn’t work this way. PR, like so many other business processes, rewards the companies who approach it with preparation, commitment and time.

Getting rid of misconceptions and myths — and facing these 6 hard truths about PR — will help you gain traction and take advantage of all it has to offer.

 

Truth #1: PR Takes Time

Effective PR takes time. Like the sales process and growing a pipeline, PR is something we can’t do one day and walk away from the next. Companies in the know start by building a solid messaging and story foundation, creating quality content and relevant news angles, and cultivating the right audiences. This takes ongoing commitment and a regular sharing of your story in a variety of interesting ways to achieve PR success. The best results come to the companies who stick with it.

 

Read More »

14 Reasons Why Companies Embrace PR

When Steve Jobs received his first big investment for Apple – $250,000 from angel investor Mark Markkula — it was meant for the development of the new Apple II product, the first major Apple product to hit the masses. However, before he started investing in new hardware, Jobs hired the best PR professional in Silicon Valley, Regis McKenna. Jobs knew before he could focus on building the products that would launch his company that he needed to have a PR plan in place.

Jobs embraced PR, and so do Richard Branson and Bill Gates. How about you? In fact, Gates once said, “If I was down to my last dollar, I’d spend it on public relations.” And these business titans aren’t alone in their fervent faith in PR. Many executives from companies feel the same.

Here are 14 reasons why:

 

1. Master Your Message

If you don't tell your story, others will tell it for you. Avoid negative or misleading press by presenting the best version of yourself with public relations.

2. Differentiate Yourself

With so many products and services out there now, it is far too easy for customers to get overwhelmed. Good PR programs can make you stand out from the pack. As Seth Godin says, “People do not buy goods and services. They buy relations, stories and magic.”

3. Create Buzz (and Adoration)

Do you have a product coming out? Start building that fan and customer base by influencing the influencers. Stoke that excitement with social media, bloggers, journalists, grant interviews, offer reviews and you’ll see awareness evolve to adoration.

Read More »

4 Reasons for Becoming a Thought Leader

Before the internet was everywhere, Amazon founder Jeff Bezos had a vision of selling books, then everything, online. While people were happy with cell phones that were only used to make calls, Apple Founder Steve Jobs had a vision of a phone that was much smarter. And Facebook COO Sheryl Sandberg had a vision for women in the workplace to “lean in” and take charge of their careers.

Bezos, Jobs and Sandberg…not only did they forge new paths, they were inspiring teachers and extraordinary thinkers. And they’ve made an imprint. They’re leaders that others most want to meet, learn from and emulate.

They are thought leaders.

Just telling people you are a thought leader doesn’t make you one. Thought leaders are people who have visions and strong degrees of expertise in particular subjects, topics, or issues. But more than that, they have publicly and relentlessly demonstrated their bona-fides over time by taking a stance, having a perspective, and voicing their views and opinions.

Being a thought leader takes time and effort. But by embarking on a strategic thought leadership program that integrates public relations and digital marketing, all the time and effort will be worth it, and here are 4 reasons why:

1) Become Well-Known by Those Who Matter

Imagine you are a startup and you’re trying to sell a new type of software that you believe will change how people interact with computers. Now imagine you’re the CEO well-known in this industry, speaking at events, being sought out by reporters and those seeking to learn more from you. How much easier will it be to have business opportunities come your way? Peer recommendations are still the most trusted across ages and countries, so having a foot in the door with your thought leadership is a great way to take advantage of that.

Read More »

5 Tips for Getting into Holiday Gift Guides

It's summer! While some of us are dipping our toes into warm sand on a sunny beach, did you know that magazine editors are already thinking of gifts under a Christmas tree? While it feels like the holidays are coming sooner every year, companies know that an early start to marketing their products is crucial for holiday sales. The National Retail Federation reported that winter holiday sales topped almost $700 billion in 2017, and a good chunk of that money was spent on products recommended in holiday gift guides - targeted lists of top products curated by journalists.

For companies looking to sell toy robots, fun gadgets, and Barbie drones, inclusion in gift guides is likely some of the most valuable coverage you can get. Many major magazines, like Wired and Entrepreneur, are already mapping out their guides, with blogs and news websites following in their wake. You could wait until holiday carols are playing non-stop on the radio to pitch, (last-minute gift guides accept until the week before), but then you might miss out on some great opportunities.

To prepare for the 2018 winter holiday season, here are five tips for getting into holiday gift guides:

1. Sniff Out Who to Contact

Finding the exact editor in charge of holiday gift guides can be a bit tricky, as they change all the time. A few of the largest daily newspapers and many smaller blogs will have the same person reviewing products for gift guides, but for many editors, it’s a one-time job. Your PR partner and tools like Cision have updated databases and lists of potential contacts so when you're building out your media list be sure to reach out so you know that you're contacting the right person. Sending your pitch and product to an editor who no longer in charge means you could miss your shot as your pitch gets lost in the shuffle.

Read More »

Subscribe to SKC Blog/Newsletter

Recent Posts

Posts by Topic

see all