Mastering Public Relations: Strategies for Building Trust and Navigating Media Relations with Justin Goldstein

Unlock the secrets of trust and communication in the digital age with PR expert Justin Goldstein. Learn how cohesive brand messaging across channels breaks silos to enhance recruitment, public policy support, and sales. Justin emphasizes trust's critical role in marketing, advocating for clear communication and early collaboration between departments to create seamless PR and marketing strategies.

Discover how media relations align with business goals. Justin addresses challenges like inconsistent social media narratives and highlights building strong reporter relationships. He also explores leveraging LinkedIn and podcasts to amplify your brand, underscoring the patience required for effective PR.

In crisis scenarios, reputation management is vital. Justin discusses proactive vs. reactive strategies and using storytelling to shape a positive brand image. He shares how PR drives growth through persuasive messaging, strategic storytelling, and consistent client communication.

Maximize your media efforts with the right budget and infrastructure, ensuring your marketing assets deliver optimal results. Gain insights into boosting lead generation and client acquisition through strategic content distribution. This discussion reveals how PR can be a transformative tool for business success.

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Guest Contact Information: 

- https://www.linkedin.com/in/goldsteinjustin/

- https://www.pr73.com/ 

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The Unknown Secrets of Internet Marketing podcast is a podcast hosted by Internet marketing expert Matthew Bertram. The show provides insights and advice on digital marketing, SEO, and online business. 

Topics covered include keyword research, content optimization, link building, local SEO, and more. The show also features interviews with industry leaders and experts who share their experiences and tips. 

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Chapters

• 0:16 Building Trust and Communication Strategies
• 8:24 Developing Media Relations Strategy
• 17:26 Strategic Approach to Reputation Management
• 29:46 Leveraging PR for Business Growth

Transcript

Speaker 2: 0:16

Howdy. Welcome back to the Unknown Secrets of Internet Marketing. I am your host, matt Bertram. As some of you noticed, you're maybe looking for the podcast I have changed the podcast cover. I am working on the intro. For those of you that watch on YouTube but be looking for our new cover and just recognize that, I am going to try to push that out there and advertise it. But since Chris is no longer hosting the show, I thought it was time to put together a little bit of a brand refresh. So just please look for that, check that out. And today, as we've been talking about PR, I found another great guest that can talk really about comms and PR strategy and how it fits into the bigger picture. I know a lot of you know that I've written the Build your Brand Mania book. That was my first book about five years ago talking about how to build that know, like and trust online, and so I continued with that theme. I wanted to introduce y'all to Justin Goldstein.

Speaker 1: 1:22

How are you doing?

Speaker 2: 1:23

Justin, All right. So Justin, with PR 73, has worked with some awesome companies like Uber, ARP, General Motors. He's been mentioned in Ad Age Forbes PR Week. He's really an expert on PR strategy and also how that fits into the bigger flywheel mix, and so I wanted to bring Justin on to kind of talk through some of that and share some of his expertise. So, Justin, welcome to the show. Thanks so much for having me. Now, Justin, just to kind of credentialize yourself a little bit more. I think I did that, but if there's anything else you would like to add and kind of share with you in the audience your origin story, that would be. That would be awesome, just to kind of hear how you came to be where you're at.

Speaker 1: 2:10

Sure, yeah Well, thanks so much for having me, matthew, and you know I've been in the communication space I think PR and marketing for over 10 years now. You know I started at a small agency, went to a midsize firm and then I launched PR73, which formally is known as Press Record Communication. So if you Google my name, you'll probably see my name associated with the old firm name. But yeah, we've been at it for a little over five years now, as you mentioned, working with some really cool clients like ARP, the Consumer Product Safety Commission, the New York Public Library, american Bar Association some really big names and some smaller names too, but ultimately having a lot of fun doing it and looking forward to what the future holds too.

Speaker 2: 2:52

Well, awesome. Well, I think to like kind of kick off this conversation, whether you're a small business, owner, enterprise, startup, you know a lot of we're talking to a lot of PE companies or even venture capital. We're talking to a lot of PE companies or even venture capital when you're starting out and no one knows who you are or who your brand is, or maybe they do know who you are, but you're trying to change that messaging. Establishing trust is so important with your audience and your right target persona, and so I was hoping we could just kind of create some definitions around how to look at trust in general, how to establish trust in the online space today 100%, you know.

Speaker 1: 3:32

I think trust is ultimately the critical component of what is going to allow any online practitioner to get customers and clients, because if people don't believe in the product that you're putting out and the person that you are as a professional, they're not going to choose you. And there's a lot of different aspects of trust. I mean we found in our own industry, in a research report that we launched earlier this year, that trust is actually a really big issue across the communication space right now, where you know teams don't necessarily it's of course, not for every organization, but teams don't necessarily, of course, not for every organization but teams don't necessarily trust each other internally as well as the message that's being sent out externally by the companies that they work for, and so I think that, in order to show success, not only from a business perspective, in terms of generating revenue, but also career trajectory, it's really important to have the trust of your colleagues, your key audiences, internally and externally, and looking to move the ball forward from there.

Speaker 2: 4:32

I was on a panel discussion last night and we were talking about the millennial generation and how to communicate those messages to the middle body of people that are looking for it and how to communicate it down on organization. And you're, you're absolutely right, Um, in in a number of previous discussions I've had, comms don't always talk to each other. And they're, they're, they're working, um, not in concert, but but in a silo, and it's really about breaking down those silos. Uh, and really what? What is the goal of the communications you're trying to do? Whether it be recruiting, whether it be internal communication to get everybody in a big organization on the same page, whether it be changing public policy or influencing public policy, as we're in an election cycle, or to sell, there's different goals of what these organizations or teams are doing. These organizations or teams are doing, and a lot of times they don't talk, but there's really a way to harmonize the brand message where it resonates across multiple channels.

Speaker 1: 5:34

Yeah, 100%, and I really like the point you made about silos. I think it speaks to a larger issue in organizations generally, when they do have a creative partner, whether it be PR marketing, is that the PR marketing work that's being done doesn't necessarily get transmitted to all stakeholders in the organization and different departments, especially at the beginning when the project starts. And so what often happens is the creative partner will bring a recommendation to the organization and their point person will understand it. Even their direct team or their boss might understand it, but other departments that have to enact the actual work don't necessarily trust it because they don't know who the outside entity is. They barely know who the internal person is as the point person for the organization, and so I think the more those silos are broken down, the more there's an opportunity for that communication and connectivity to happen and for that trust to be built up.

Speaker 2: 6:30

Yeah, so. So when you're you're seeing this in a lot of different organizations that that you're dealing with, I mean, when you're approaching organization and you're you're coming on, they've recognized they need a problem or there's a message out there that needs to be communicated a little bit differently or positioned, and you're looking at like, okay, what does this media landscape look like? I mean, are you doing like a industry, like surveying or audit of what's going on, or how is this message going to be received? Is there some testing that's maybe happening, sample testing, before you're pushing out messages globally in some cases, right, how does that when you're approaching a client, or how should a client, even internally, look at it if they're trying to address something like this?

Speaker 1: 7:24

Yeah. So I think there's a few steps to take. There's probably more that I can think of, but I think initially, some things that are pretty commonplace is to your point. One is to take a look at the landscape of your audiences, internal and external, depending on who you're looking to reach with your message, and getting an understanding of what those demographics want and need and who is involved in those demographics. So anything down to their age range, their education level, but then going to their expertise and buying habits, whatever it might be. So that's step one.

Speaker 2: 7:58

Step two is you definitely want to look at what your competitors are doing.

Speaker 1: 8:01

So getting an understanding of what their messaging is really helps to, I think you know, align with what you're doing as well. So that one you don't necessarily want to copy them, but you can at least let it influence the kind of messaging development that you yourself are doing internally. And then, three, I think it's also understanding what are the long-term objectives of the organization that you're working with. So you know, you might have a brilliant messaging or message point in mind and it might match what the audience wants, but if it's not satisfying the overall organizational goal, there's got to be a better match there.

Speaker 2: 8:37

Man, you know that makes me think back to, like, social media, content planning, Like, and I know that that's something part of the flywheel that we'll get into it. But a lot of times when we're first working with maybe some small business clients, they they'll just post random stuff on their on their business page, right. That is not tied into a broader message, right? And so there's a lot of education that comes in on how to approach communicating this message part of a broader story, helping people kind of get those insights and see what's happening. And so when you think about, like, content strategy or mastering media relations, how do you look at that? I mean, I know it's about feeding the algorithm and you got to warm up some of these accounts and these messages and topical authorities. And this also plays into SEO, which which I talk about a lot. I'm just curious, what is your angle when you, when you, come at that?

Speaker 1: 9:37

It's an interesting question. You know, I think content development and media relations can collaborate, but they could also be separate in terms of the masters that they're serving. So when you look at content development, that's a little bit more of an own channel, as you know, and I'm sure your listeners know as well where you're trying to drive engagement with the audience to say, simply visit your website, your social channels, whatever it might be, channels, whatever it might be, whereas media relations can certainly feed into that. But you're also trying to connect with a reporter and give them what they need for their story, which might not necessarily match what the content is looking to achieve in terms of the channel engagement. So it's kind of balancing the goals there and understanding that sometimes you have to sacrifice one for the other, especially, I would say, more so on the media relations front.

Speaker 1: 10:26

You know we've definitely had multiple instances with clients where they have a fantastic piece of content. It doesn't necessarily resonate with a reporter. The reporter wants to talk about something else and it definitely benefits their brand to do so and will help with their overall branding in the longterm. But sometimes they can't see past that initial content request and it not going anywhere and feeling a little bit rejected because of that. So you got to kind of coach them through it and show them you know the forest through the trees and what the value is in terms of again sacrificing one for the other.

Speaker 2: 10:58

So to just expand on that a little bit more, when you think about media relations, right, those reporters have a goal they're trying to hit, or a blogger's trying to hit a certain amount of numbers, or they have a story they're trying to reach. This is actually the same. When you think about different social media platforms A lot of people don't know this. Linkedin actually has a content calendar of things that they're trying to promote and things that they'll highlight and even boost in the algorithm. If you line up with that. That happens with podcasts too, like different seasonal things that come out. If you can align that, you can submit these things to get a greater visibility. And so, really, if you're like saying, hey, it's about establishing rapport, right, cause also people do business with people they know I can trust, and so if they know your company, they know what you do, you have this kind of working rapport with them, there's a greater chance that they'll think about you for a quote or picking something up. And so establishing media relations or like who you're going to be contacting, where it's just not a cold call, basically right, you're like sending a pitch and it's a cold call is really, I think, pretty important. And then also asking them what do they need? And then look at your broader strategy and figure out what content you have that fits in that right, and then if there's something you want to highlight as you build that relationship, they may say, hey, there might be an opportunity to highlight this down the road, right, and so, um, I think that like, okay, you can send a press release, of course, and you can get your message out there and you can see what pickups happen. And if you write a really uh, good, good article that helps them write their story, that that's helpful. But if you're really trying to get placements and move it forward, you can't look at it as, like this, one independent thing. You have to zoom out and look at it as a broader media relationship strategy as well as a content strategy, where you're planning it out for a long haul and maybe you try to insert those things.

Speaker 2: 12:56

I mean, can you tell me? Like, when I look at it, I think like, okay, if you want to get your message out there, okay, you're going to do advertising. You're going to advertise. You can say whatever you want to say to whoever you want to say it on whatever platform. But like social media as well as um like press or or, uh you know, media. It's more about getting that visibility on a third party platform or from a third party person to, to see it in a way, and and and that is not just your goals, right, that, that's your goals and their goals. And so how do you, how do you structure that, I like? I mean, when a company comes to you with like, hey, we want to do this, how do you like lay out that roadmap for them? Or? Or look at it in a broader context, cause sometimes you don't get that quick win immediately, right, you can't just run an ad and boom, you got it out there. It's a different-, yeah 100%, 100%.

Speaker 1: 13:50

So I think you brought up a really good point, a couple of really good points. One is which that you have to understand, going into it, that you're not necessarily going to get an immediate win tomorrow, and that also PR in general is there more so as a business support than a make or break. So you know. Again, when we're talking about media coverage, for example, media coverage is a fantastic piece of content for what I call the social proof flywheel. I don't know if that's trademarked or not, so don't quote me on it being mine, but just using it as an example.

Speaker 1: 14:21

Now you know it's a fantastic piece for that right, because ultimately you can use that in your outbound DM campaigns for LinkedIn, let's say your newsletters even your marketing, your paid marketing, and so it all builds up for the longer term objective of building your business. But it's not necessarily going to make or break it in 30 days, let's say so. That's part one, you know. Part two is also understanding that PR isn't just writing press releases. Some people have that misconception that if you write and distribute, say, five to 10 press releases, a year.

Speaker 1: 14:53

You're going to get a ton of SEO, you're going to get all these new business inquiries, and ultimately it doesn't work that way. A lot of times press releases are hit or miss, especially on the wire services. You might get a reporter request, you might get a new business lead from it, but ultimately it's there is more of a proof document that you know what you're saying is official, and and so I look at the press release as more of a supporting asset. Right? So when you go to reporters, when you go to prospects, you can share it as a proof point, but it's not meant to solicit or generate inbound leads of any kind, in my opinion.

Speaker 2: 15:28

So just random question is all good press, is all press, good press? Like if you get bad press, is all good press? Bad press because you have the attention and you can spin it or how you how do? You approach that.

Speaker 1: 15:41

Two pronged answer to that, um, I would say one is it's how good you are at PR on your own, um, and also if you have an agency helping you. I personally don't believe that all good, all press, is good press. Um, you know, there are some people where bad press fits into the brand that they're trying to build, in a sense, because they're trying to be like an anti hero or something like that, but for most people I wouldn't advise it.

Speaker 1: 16:06

You know you really want to try to generate press that's, of course, productive and positive and, you know, try to avoid the negative press situations and not get into a situation where mentally, you know, you feel like you have free freedom to do whatever you want, especially if you work for another organization right, or even your family right, like you're always representing somebody else unless you're truly, you know, out of your own, single no kids, no significant other, no family whatsoever, which you know, hopefully, is not the case for most people. You're always representing somebody else and so, yes, perhaps there are instances where the negative press doesn't impact you personally in terms of your day to day, for you but it can impact your loved ones and those around you, and so, yeah, I would say, stay away from that.

Speaker 2: 16:52

Good point, so okay. So say you're in a crisis management situation. How do you know that you're in a crisis management situation, right, if someone's thinking out there like something bad's going on right now?

Speaker 2: 17:02

I don't really know what to do about it. Tell me about, like, what that situation might look like where you're saying, hey, I might need to get in touch with a representative and then, two, how should you approach it? Or, like, how do you start the process of saying, okay, we got a bunch of bad press, we need to do something about it. What are those steps? To start kind of putting out the fire, if you will.

Speaker 1: 17:25

Yeah, absolutely so. I think there's two ways to measure that One is getting an understanding of is the press damaging your brand for the longterm and how big of a deal is this, knowing your business and your internal team? So it's funny because I had a family friend that called up asking for help for something crisis related earlier this week, or maybe it was last week. I was tracking the time these days and after talking through it with him, we kind of realized that in the moment it feels like something really bad, but in a week from now, if it's not appearing on Google, let's say if it's not easily findable, is it something that's really going to impact you? Where you have to spend the money on crisis PR, because crisis PR is expensive, you know, because the crisis PR teams that are out there are working long hours, they're putting a lot of man and woman power into the work that's being done, and so it's a lot of money and a lot of budget. So you have to really assess whether this is something that's going to be a long term problem or just stings for the day and then it goes away.

Speaker 1: 18:40

You know, I think it's always suggested that if you feel an inkling of there being a potential situation. It's always good to talk to a crisis expert just to make sure that you're on the same page and like, pay that fee to. You know, have that 30 to 60 minute conversation just to make sure and if both parties feel like there's something worth activating on, then make a decision. But yeah, I would say, at the very least, if there's even a chance that it might be something bigger, you definitely want to try to speak to an expert to make sure that it isn't or it is and you have to do something about it.

Speaker 2: 19:01

And that leads into the conversation about maybe reputation management right, so like maybe put in money in the social bank and having your brand represented a certain way before you need it to be. And also, really, when I look at reputation management, I'm looking at gaining reviews, making sure that when people search for you, when they're kind of peeling the onion back, like looking into your brand, they see good things. Right, and that takes a little bit of crafting as far as getting getting out the good stories early, because many times people only share the negative and so sometimes you have to draw out that positive. How would you approach reputation management from a PR standpoint?

Speaker 1: 19:45

It's a very detailed process so it's kind of hard to, you know, boil it down into a 30, 60 second response. But what I would say is that the first thing we want to do and I mentioned this just a minute ago is to have that initial call to really go through what the situation is, what the potential impact of the business is, who are the audiences that are going in the real estate sector? And she had a couple of teams leave her and we went through that whole process of what does that mean for your business that the teams are leaving. Was there any bad blood? What are the factors that we need to know in terms of the brand impact and the business impact?

Speaker 1: 20:36

And so, going through those questions, it's really important to do that and also understanding again this goes back to what I was saying earlier about how big of a deal this is, how proactive and reactive you want to be about this, right? So an example of being proactive is do you want to go to the press and say something, or is it better not to do that because you might shine a light on something you don't necessarily want to shine that light on, so reactive would be. Let's prepare a couple of statements one for the founders or founder of a company to have, and then the other statement for the broader team to have to answer any questions for clients, prospects, press, whatever it might be. So this way you're ready to go but you're reacting to it versus proactively bringing attention to it. So it all kind of depends on the situation, but I think the key there is being prepared and having you know reference documents ready to go in case something does pop up, and that's the very least that you should probably do.

Speaker 2: 21:32

I love that. I think that that's a great actionable step having a preparation document of what to say if you are contacted or if the word gets out there. Because social media is so powerful today and it shapes a lot of people's perceptions and the algorithm just wants engagement right. So you know, things can get carried away pretty quickly online and can kind of take it in a direction, and you should be prepared in case those sort of things happen. So I want to switch gears a little bit because I think that something that would be really valuable for a lot of people that listen are probably thinking okay, I have a business and this is all good, and maybe this doesn't affect me. Maybe some people are like this is affecting me, this is really helpful. But a lot of people are like, okay, I want to win new business, I want to manage my clients in a one-to-many situation. How can PR help me do that if I'm trying to decide where all my resources are going to go?

Speaker 2: 22:33

How should I be doing PR and what are some like maybe proven steps to win those long-term clients or to get that social proof that you need that sort of thing?

Speaker 1: 22:42

Yeah, there are a couple of quick ways that I would recommend. So one is definitely hiring a team or expert to help craft your messaging, because that messaging can bleed into the sales messaging that you're actually using to generate leads. The second I would say is media coverage is a fan and I think I mentioned this earlier in the interview is a fantastic asset for not only top of funnel but middle of funnel, meaning that you know, oftentimes when we're trying to generate business, we have some somewhat bland messages because we're strapped for time. We don't have a lot of time to put into, like writing a really unique message, which everyone, including myself, always tries to do better about. But, like, once you have a piece of media coverage, it makes your life so much easier because then you can go to that prospect and say hey, so-and-so great to connect on LinkedIn. Wanted to flag this piece of coverage. I got in the Wall Street Journal talking about XYZ, which I know relates to what you're doing, thought you'd enjoy it.

Speaker 1: 23:35

Let's connect. So, right there you're having, you're providing social proof and you're also um showcasing that you have expertise in the space and that helps to start the conversation. The middle of the conversation or middle of the funnel part of it is okay. You've had a couple of conversations. Now you need something back to engage the prospect with, to keep them in your funnel and keep them engaged. And that's where media coverage comes in. You share that piece of media coverage in an email and say hey, so-and-so, hope all's well. Since we last chatted, I actually got featured in the Wall Street Journal since then talking about this. Thought you'd enjoy it, wanted to send it over in case it's helpful. Can we connect next week and I can walk you through how I got this piece of coverage and what it means for you. That's a way to keep them engaged. So those are two really quick ways to do it. There's definitely more, but I think in the short term, when you're first getting started, those are probably the easiest ways that you can do it.

Speaker 2: 24:25

Yeah, I think that when you're well, when you have that piece of content, it becomes a sales so okay. So going back to Google, right, so Google, how they look at everything is through a framework called EAT expertise, authority and trust right. And so anytime that you can get that authority from a third party to give you kind of that interview that I did about for the media, when you're connecting with the media, if there's experiential knowledge or statistics or anything that is not publicly available that you can share in that press release or share with the media related to whatever they're trying to do, is really quite powerful. And so you got to get that media coverage right to be able to use the media coverage. So it's like a little bit of a I guess, a chicken and the egg, but really hitting on that authority. If other people can say it Again, I think awards, winning awards, are part of like a PR opportunity, like I don't think a lot of people think about that, you know, I mean the BBB is a local award or like for us, american Marketing Association.

Speaker 2: 25:49

There's a lot of different organizations that do it, but but being involved in those organizations and winning those awards give you that kind of credibility Right, just like you can say, hey, check out this article, you can say, hey, check out this award I won. Right Now I think that certain organizations and sometimes I've heard back from people, well, they just give that award to everyone Well, that organization might need some PR to credentialize a little bit better the stringency of how they're offering it. Or like I'm on the subcommittee for the BBB, like you know, how is the BBB different as all the rise of these online review sites come into place and and and how do they work with different organizations and companies? So I think a lot of it's about positioning yourself. I mean, can you tell me maybe an example for a client of something you did where it turned into closing a deal so people could maybe relate it back to their business of like, hey, I could do that similar kind of thing it's not just in the ether, yeah, yeah.

Speaker 1: 26:49

So we've had clients where they're on the hook and they've gone a little silent, either because they're trying to figure out whether what we're proposing is doable, if they have the budget for it, whatever might be. And so I there's definitely been instances where I've even shared podcast interviews, whether it be the full interview or a clip, and said you know, or have my team say hey, so, and so you know, justin was just on this podcast talking about again this topic that um involves, you know, marketing development and where marketing's headed in the next five years. Thought you'd find it of interest, would love to connect, and that person might respond and say thanks so much for sending this. I've been meaning to reach back out. Can we schedule a time and then you carry it forward from there? So I don't think there's ever been a piece of media coverage that's like sealed the deal and brought it over the finish line. It's more so propelled it, in the sense that it's propelled the actual conversations to actually happen, to get it over the finish line, which is still really valuable.

Speaker 2: 27:48

Yeah, you need to help salespeople along the way, kind of move it forward.

Speaker 2: 27:52

I can tell you, the biggest win that I've had that I can most recently think about and this is really when you think about like funding rounds and stuff like that for startups had a client that was actually going into another round and they didn't want to have a down round. They weren't showing like material progress of what they were doing. And they came to me and we were like what are some ideas that we can do to generate some value for the brand, to show some real progress? And I actually knew some people over at the Dynamos, which is a soccer team here in Houston that actually went over to the Texans and so we were able to get some conversations going with the Texans to establish ourselves as an official going with the Texans, to establish ourself as a official partner with the Texans for kind of a, a three year period that we were able to do some press and and push some stuff out there and we generated I think it was like a little bit under a million dollars in press value right Within three weeks.

Speaker 2: 28:55

And so that was like it was a really fun project and it was exciting, but it was almost kind of in that crisis state of like we need to do something. What can we do? What have we built? What assets do we have available? So I would encourage everyone out there Everybody has a unique selling proposition and has something that they've done that's unique from other people and figuring out and working with the strategist to figure out what that might look like is is super powerful. I think I mean, tell me a little bit about, like, client relationship management. Like I mean, certainly you know it helps you close the deal. It continues to kind of check the box. There's no red flags. They find good stuff about you. But, like, how do you specifically use it to manage, maybe, client relations for what may with the bigger organization?

Speaker 1: 29:44

Yeah, I don't.

Speaker 1: 29:46

I don't think the media coverage helps with client management as much as just having an understanding of messaging to make the client feel confident in the work that you're doing and also be able to have tougher conversations with clients, right.

Speaker 1: 30:04

And so having that expertise and how to craft a message, how to make it persuasive while being ethical, of course, how to have that message in form, really helps to build the relationships. I mean the media coverage certainly helps, but I think it's more about that. Plus, you know, as PR practitioners most PR practitioners, I find, are working with the media and so by having conversations daily, it just warms you up to be able to talk more and feel more comfortable having conversations in the first place, especially when you're new to the business. So, yeah, I think it's just a natural skill set of building messages and having conversations that helps, more so than the media coverage itself that you could share as a sort of win for the firm. I mean it definitely helps the client to feel like they're working with a cool firm. That's legit, that's getting a lot of press, that's always great, but ultimately it comes down to the messaging around the results that you're providing.

Speaker 2: 31:00

So it's like a culture to decide whether or not you should be doing it, like internally, you've got to decide do we want to have a media relation component or not? So if you're a business and you don't, or a nonprofit, or your startup or whatever, how do you make that decision on whether or not you should engage somebody or you should develop relationships on the media front? And and maybe people are thinking, well, you know, I don't need that right now, or whatever you know, how are you making that decision-making process? Or how should people look at?

Speaker 1: 31:35

that the first thing that comes to mind is, of course, budget, and I hate to say it because I want people to spend money with us, but it is true that you want to make sure you have budget, of course, to spend, because if you feel like you're always stretched too thin on that end, it's never going to be a pleasurable experience and I think it puts more pressure on the campaign than, honestly, is warranted. So if you have the budget, that's definitely a great checkmark there, you know. I think the second thing too, which is probably more critical, is to make sure you have the infrastructure to put everything to use, and I've talked about this before, where it's like you know you could have a PR firm, you could have an internal PR person, whatever it might be, that's doing the work. But if you don't have an infrastructure and process in place to make use of the work, to build the business and generate engagement, it can almost be pointless. You know, we had a client, a very good client of ours, come to us the other day and basically say you guys do an amazing work, but I'm just not seeing organic business from it, not seeing organic business from it, and we had to have that conversation which we honestly had before, which is media coverage, is not a silver bullet to generate business. It's to support your efforts to get the business.

Speaker 1: 32:49

And so, understanding that media PR well, I would say more so. Media, specifically is thinking past the placement itself and how you can make use of it proactively is where, if you can do that, that's where you're going to see success. And if you're a founder, that could mean doing it yourself, or it can mean having a small team internally, whether it's a marketing team or even just you know those that don't have any marketing experience just you know coming up with social posts that are better than nothing, but at least you're posting the media coverage, you're sending it on your, in your newsletters, whatever it is just at least having a small team that can help with that. Or, if you're capable of doing it on your own, doing it yourself, if you can do that, then I would definitely consider hiring a team, because then you'll feel more like you're using what they're doing.

Speaker 2: 33:36

I think that that brings up a good point that kind of brings this full circle in my head of repurposing content and and having the infrastructure that, once you uh get the press coverage or or you get the placements that you're looking for, how to reuse those in the sales process with the client process communicating that information. Uh, I was actually on a call today, okay, uh, with a client that's trying to promote, uh, a certain um uh event that they have and they had a videographer create a bunch of short videos for them. Then they turn that short videos into a long video, okay, and then they had hired us to do some paid ads and they had not even posted any of those shorts or that video on their social media yet at all. So, like you can create a bunch of assets but if you don't use them and if the teams are not talking and this is a lot of organizations there and it's a waste.

Speaker 2: 34:38

And if you think about even on social media, uh, each post is roughly four hours, like you guys got about a four hour life, unless you're doing something else with it. If you're spending a lot of money to create that content, you want to be able to reuse that content and repurpose that content and find, find a place for it and, and I think a lot of times, um, people are not thinking through that, right? And I think hiring a organization to help you with that strategy and have that infrastructure in place to syndicate it out, to get the word out there across the different channels, is really quite important. I mean, justin, tell me, like in your mind what would be like a unknown secret of internet marketing as it relates to PR.

Speaker 1: 35:27

That's a good question. Can we skip that one?

Speaker 2: 35:32

We can totally skip that one.

Speaker 1: 35:33

Okay, I'm not sure I have an answer on that yet.

Speaker 2: 35:36

Okay, well, justin, if someone is thinking that they need to be getting in touch with you, and they're trying to find someone to talk to. That's done it. Done it for a long time, worked with some big companies. They know they'll be in good hands. To make sure their message is well, justin, how is the best way for people to kind of reach out to you or to find out more about PR73?

Speaker 1: 36:02

Yeah, no, absolutely. Um, so first I would say, visit wwwpr73.com. That's our website. You can also reach me directly at Justin J U S T I N at PR 73.com. We also have our main email info at PR 73.com and, um, yeah, or me an email info at PR73.com, and yeah you can catch us there and we'd love to chat.

Speaker 2: 36:26

Awesome. Is there anything else that we haven't talked about that you think might be a good thing to share, or to leave somebody with actionable steps or takeaways as it relates to PR?

Speaker 1: 36:36

No, I think you covered it.

Speaker 2: 36:37

Awesome. Well, everybody, thanks so much for hanging out. Until the next time. My name is Matt Bertram. Bye, bye for now.