Pump up your PR savvy with these simple tips to get your business noticed.

By Chris Penttila

Back in 1997, entrepreneur Scott Testa was looking for ways to get attention for his young software company, Mindbridge Software in Morristown, Pennsylvania. Instead of running ads, however, Testa decided to invest $20,000 in a PR campaign where customers entered an essay contest and had the chance to win a free computer. The campaign generated local, trade and national coverage for the company, as well as coverage on a brand-new media outlet called the internet.

“We got some really good coverage,” says Testa, Mindbridge’s founder and COO. “And it was relatively inexpensive.” He’s been sold on the power of PR ever since. The company has been mentioned in publications including BusinessWeek, Entrepreneur, Fortune, The New York Times, and USA Today. Version 4.0 of the company’s software is generating buzz in trade publications even though it hasn’t been formally released yet. The attention hasn’t hurt the bottom line: Company sales have increased by 25 percent every year and are projected to reach $10 million in 2005.

Testa, 39, thinks PR beats advertising both in its effectiveness and efficiency in reaching people, especially for small businesses that don’t have a lot of money for advertising. “There’s so much advertising now that you almost become immune to it,” he says. “PR communicates in a way advertising can’t.” 

Studies have shown that well-planned PR execution can be extraordinarily effective in increasing a company’s credibility. PR “validates your company and makes it stand out,” says Vicki Torres, a former Los Angeles Times business reporter and now a
PR and communications consultant in Los Angeles.

Increasingly, young companies must stand out in order to generate revenue in a crowded, competitive marketplace. As any business owner knows, however, it’s tough to create a PR strategy that cuts through all the clutter. PR isn’t cheap, either: Small businesses can expect to spend anywhere between $1,000 and $8,000 per month to retain a PR agency, and at least $150 per hour to hire an outside PR consultant. On top of the upfront costs, it can take three to six months to see results from a PR campaign.

“The biggest misperception about PR is that it’s too expensive and too nebulous,” says Mary Schnack, a former newspaper journalist and founder of Communication Bridges, a Sedona, Arizona, PR firm. But getting more effectiveness out of your PR strategy is possible, and here’s how to do it.

The ROI of PR
PR is an afterthought for many small-business owners who often don’t see PR as something that requires much budet-ing or planning. These entrepreneurs become reactionary—starting a news-letter because a main competitor has one, for example—instead of thinking about what really works for the com-pany. It isn’t long before their PR efforts go off track and off budget.

Failing to view PR as a business process is “a huge mistake businesspeople make,” says Paige McMahon, a former newspaper reporter and president of McMahon Communications, a Bethesda, Maryland, PR consulting firm. “The costs add up, but you’re not getting any traction. You’re just willy-nilly kind of guessing.”

PR experts suggest creating a budget for PR based on a percentage of annual sales, then thinking about what you want most from your PR efforts. Do you want to raise awareness, increase sales, add credibility or something else? Planning ahead not only gives your company direction, but also lets you compare price and service based on a predetermined budget. “If you only have $500 a month, then you need to budget that out for the entire year, which is $6,000,” McMahon says. “Say [to the PR person], ‘I need to hear what you can do for me for $6,000.’” If you outsource, keep in mind that at least $1,000 will go toward the upfront planning process, with the rest going toward campaign execution.

Schnack requires her clients to develop communications plans that state their PR objectives, from building image and community awareness to increasing sales. The plan also defines how the company differs from competitors, its target audience, what the company sells and which media—from newspapers to trade shows—best fit the company’s message. “It’s really hard for [entrepreneurs] to take a step back and do creative thinking,” she says. “[But] it behooves people to take a day to go over this and dig deep.”

Along the way, you might find the PR function is better performed in-house. Testa used to outsource to a PR agency, but a cost analysis revealed it was more cost-effective to create a full-time, in-house PR position. Mind-bridge still uses PR agencies for side projects. “This is what works for us,” Testa says. “It’s a lot of work getting an agency up to speed on your product and your marketplace.”

Every quarter, Testa and the com-pany’s in-house PR team study clippings and scan the internet for stories mentioning Mindbridge. It’s a “cut and dry” measuring device, says Testa, who’s learned successful PR requires thinking long term, even on the smallest of budgets. Mindbridge budgets $300,000 per year toward PR. “[PR is] something you have to invest in,” he says. “You really have to look at return on investment over years, not months.”

Getting Media Attention
Creating a PR plan is one thing; executing it is another. With advertising, companies are able to control what is said and when it’s said. But the opposite is usually true in PR, where the media control the placement, tone and timing of a company’s message. It may take a reporter nine months to respond to a press release, Schnack says. The loss of control is a hard pill for small-business owners to swallow.

Journalists may seem hard to reach, but they’re all looking for the same thing: A timely, different and trendy story that serves their readership. Is what you have to say really newsworthy? “As I like to say, ‘They don’t call them newspapers for nothing,’” Torres says.
Deborah Davis knows it’s not enough to tout the business of her business to get the attention of journalists. Davis, 42, is founder and president of Cleaner by Nature Inc., a nine-year-old eco-friendly dry cleaning company in Los Angeles. “People tend to think of [PR] as ‘I need a reporter to write about my business.’ Well, not necessarily,” she says. The real story, she says, might be something unrelated, like something unique you or one of your employees has done. Whatever the angle, the company still gets mentioned in the story, which is what you’re after.

Early on, Davis focused on generating coverage in a local newspaper. At the same time, she positioned her 15-employee company in newsletters. The local newspaper wrote about the company, and eventually the coverage snowballed: A Los Angeles Times re-
porter called her, followed by an Associated Press reporter. “I was thrilled. I was getting calls from all over the country [from] people asking me about my business,” she says.

But it didn’t happen overnight. Don’t get hung up on big, national media, Davis says. Instead, start locally, and wait for things to build. “When you launch a PR campaign, you have to be patient,” she says. “PR is about your public. You have to define what your public is according to the scale and type of business that you’re in.”

Make a short list of local and regional reporters who write stories that dovetail with your industry and business. Under-stand the medium you’re targeting, whether it’s radio, TV, daily newspaper or magazine, because they all work on different deadlines and focus on different things. A TV reporter, for example, is interested in stories that have interesting video. To a newspaper reporter, the
visual angle isn’t as important.

Another way to interest journalists is by positioning yourself as an expert source on specific topics. “Let reporters know they can contact you for reactions,” Torres says. “And be OK with being a mention in—and not the focus of—the story.” Starting a brief weekly or monthly newsletter that’s e-mailed to a list of media contacts, or sending a press release that highlights your areas of expertise, are both good ways get on journalists’ radar.

Davis expanded her PR efforts through trade groups she’s joined, including the Dry Cleaners Association, the National Association of Women Business Owners, the Santa Monica Chamber of Commerce, and the Sierra Club. “They have people on staff who can help you develop your press releases and press contacts,” she says, adding that trade associations give out various awards that are a source of free PR for entrepreneurs. “Those organizations will work for you to promote the fact that you won their awards,” says Davis, who has created a link to awards on the company’s website, www.cleanerbynature.biz. “The best way to get attention from a reporter is if somebody else is touting you.”

If you have a talent for writing, consider writing articles for trade publications and local business journals, which often accept articles written from different areas of business expertise. It’s good exposure,  says Torres, and “you’re hitting the folks who might call you up and use your services or products.”

Dealing With Journalists
What should you do when a journalist contacts you? Unfortunately, every journalist has stories about small-business owners who suddenly disappeared when it was time to do the interview. These entrepreneurs quickly end up on a journalist’s “do not call” list.
Savvy entrepreneurs make return calls to reporters a same-day priority—even if it’s to schedule another time to speak—because they know journalists can’t wait for long. Employees should know where to route a journalist’s call, too.

Schnack suggests having up to five “teaching points” about your business that you want journalists to take away from an interview. This could be outlining the broad trends affecting your industry or profiling your average customer. “Have more of a teaching attitude than a selling attitude,” Schnack says. If there’s time, follow interviews with a brief e-mail that re-iterates your main thoughts from the conversation. Make yourself available to answer follow-up questions, and provide the journalist with contact information.

At this point, you’ll have to let the journalist do his or her job. “A journalist isn’t beholden to the business owner,” Torres says. “And the business owner needs to understand that’s a basic difference between journalistic efforts and publications that are industry-related.” The story might not portray your company in ex-actly the way you had hoped, but you got press attention that will lead to more press attention down the line.

Davis has been happy with the payoff from her PR efforts. Company sales are now $1 million per year. “Cus tomers will say, ‘I don’t know how I heard about you. I just did,’” Davis says. “That’s how I know my efforts are working.”

Chris Penttila is a freelance journalist in the Chapel Hill, North Carolina, area. She can be contacted at chris@sitting-duck.com.