Current events today are unprecedented. The coronavirus has caused chaos for many lives and businesses in ways that are nothing short of disruptive- for many, alarming or possibly even frightening.

If you are like us, you want to stay abreast of the latest and evolving news about COVID-19. Yet, the constant barrage of coronavirus information and updates is generating a level of stress some have never experienced.

Given your first priority is safeguarding your loved ones and home, and that you have created a safe and healthy environment for yourself and those in your care, perhaps your thoughts or worries are also wandering to business. If so, you are not alone. For businesses across most industries, pressing concerns include possible effects COVID-19 could have on first and second quarters’ revenue and profitability.

While the situation is undoubtedly serious, and it requires our full-and-upright attention, we would suggest that communication focus and ingenuity are two essential elements for keeping your business relevant in these distracting times.

Whether you are a business owner, member of an executive or leadership team or a communications professional, being proactive and strategic is imperative for unifying your messaging. In times of crises, internal and external communications for your business or brand need to convey clear and consistent information.

From a marketing communications perspective, being proactive is essential to cut through the noise and maintain open lines of communication to and with your target audiences.

Digital Dividends

For those of you who are facing canceled business events at venues, trade shows, design centers, or other onsite encounters, consider contrasting your marketing engagement strategies. Start by tackling the chasm in physical networking by implementing new digital marketing tactics. Whether you have an active digital marketing program or not, these times call for a vastly more robust approach to digital and viral connections.

Digital marketing has given rise to the restructured marketing of brands, products and services by implemented digital methods. Fueled through mobile phones, devices and desktops, a surge in screen-to-screen messaging, for now, can replace face-to-face networking. Best of all, when things calm – and they will – one result can be a stronger union of digital and in-person marketing for you or your sales and marketing teams.

For the foreseeable future, online display advertising, paid and unpaid social media, video series, Google Ad Campaigns, Search Engine Optimization, Search Engine Marketing, and, yes, sometimes Facebook Ads Manager can act as a foundation for business-to-business, business-to-consumer and business-to-community outreach.

If you’ve implemented these tools in the past, now is the time to revisit how, where and when to supplement your marketing plan with them. Increase their presence and frequency in your day-to-day promotions, or start by adding them to the marketing mix.

Then, there are automated marketing programs, inbound leads generators and thought-leadership webinars, along with other best-in-practice digital mediums. Productive marketing plans involve initiating these tactile virtual events and activities for branding, regardless of canceled onsite events and meetings. Stretch your marketing muscles with a host of highly creative digital connections, and harness the power of reaching more qualified and quantified targets. Not only will this advance your brands share of voice, you’ll gain new prospects for sales by reaching them for the first time or exponential ways.

The current necessity for increasing engagement with target audiences is also rife for developing a strategy with the newly popular social video marketing, which is a digital content and distribution method driven with the support of influencers. Influencer marketing offers one type of beneficial “halo effect,” which involves a positive perception of a product, service or brand by having relatable, similar experiences, or given the optimistic view or opinion of another. Influencer marketing serves real results for brands and businesses when deployed, monitored and managed across pertinent digital platforms and online channels.

Start by identifying top influencers in your area of marketing and business. Assess their online and digital presences, gauging which could act as trusted authorities or ambassadors of your brand. When you create your influencer program, the single-most critical factor is to stay focused on exactly how your carefully selected influencers will endorse the professional services you provide to your clients, or the products you sell to your customers. These digital communications can be utilized for blogs, social media, e-newsletters, infographics, images, photos, online testimonials, online reviews, and the list goes on.

Digital Dialogs

Having suddenly entered this era of critical mass-messaging to your important audiences, we recommend the best means of developing corporate or brand messages is to concentrate on being authentic, empathetic, professional, and clear. This is the time to follow your company’s brand and messaging standards like never before.

If you do not have brand or messaging standards, read the rest of this article and then schedule a meeting with your marketing and executive teams, or with your public relations agency. Conceptualize, draft, review, and refine a set of guidelines, copy and content for your business’ communications, spanning diverse segments within your internal and external contact databases.  

Choose prudently the ways in which to communicate online by generating an advanced schedule of timely and valuable insights your business has to offer. Information-packed e-newsletters, online educational sessions, virtual product displays, satisfied-client case study videos, and Facebook Live are only the cusp of many available digital platforms you can put to use to accomplish digital connectivity.

Your personnel can post and share the information with your customer groups, sales prospects, vendors, media members, and others. The result will yield digital engagement that replaces the in-person interactions that have been lost by canceled conferences, trade shows and networking events.

Digital Decisions: Where To Go From Here?

Digital marketing can be a persuasive instrument to expertly reach wide-ranging contacts from the comfort and safety of your desk or home office. Properly managed, it can be a marketing teams’ roadmap to incorporating digital platforms, strategies and messaging power that will maximize promotions and publicity.

But, many marketers have only yet to implement one or two facets of digital marketing, whereas the reality involves vast prospects to maximize the concept. If well planned and judiciously activated, your digital marketing communications will help you reach and win new customers or clients, as well as sell consumer products and professional services.

With the pressing current events of today, all of us are distracted and concerned. Though, most, if not all of us, are online throughout the day (and night). Connectivity and the chance to interact are just a click away.

We are rooting for you as you invoke focus and ingenuity for building and maintaining new or boosted digital connectivity with your target audiences today and in the weeks to follow. If you need professional consultation and public relations support, we are here for you. Connect with us about your digital marketing, crisis communications, publicity, or just to digitally say hello.

Be well,

The team at Eberly & Collard Public Relations

 

What is public relations? Why does my company need it? What does a publicist do?

These are a few of the most common questions publicists are asked. Though you can find answers to these questions and more on our FAQ page, we wanted to dig even deeper and take you on a journey through a day in the life of a publicist. If you’re looking for some insight into public relations and how it can benefit your business, take a look at these five things you might not know a publicist does – and can do for you – on a day-to-day basis.

1. Secure Media Coverage: As publicists, we are always strategizing how to develop compelling, newsworthy stories that will help garner positive media coverage for our clients. It is essential for publicists to establish relationships with key media members and know how to deliver a well-timed, targeted story, news or concept pitch as these factors directly impact the success of a press campaign.

Ultimately, an effective press campaign results in media coverage, which can build your brand’s reputation, generate credibility and attract new business. Take stock of the press coverage your business has had during the last year, two years, or longer. If you continue to watch your competitors take the stronger share of voice, it is time to explore new publicity opportunities.

Work with a public relations firm that has a proven track record of solid media coverage placements and creative media kits for its clients. A true publicist spends the better part of his or her day rolling out press campaigns and managing media relations on behalf of clients. Consider how much time and attention are needed to secure published and on-air publicity, and build an annual budget that maintains consistent media coverage for your company, corporate news, products, or professional services.

2. Integrated Marketing: In today’s PR world, publicists often manage integrated marketing campaigns in addition to traditional press campaigns. An integrated marketing strategy utilizes a customized recipe of public relations, marketing, digital marketing and advertising to promote and drive sales of a company’s products or services. On the other hand, a traditional press campaign is focused on managing the reputation, relationships and communication between a company and its customers, stakeholders or others.

Where integrated marketing is concerned, your publicist oversees a range of campaigns and projects across the marketing spectrum most or all days of the week, often adjusting goals and objectives for underperforming results.

As with any strategic plan that is put into place, someone should supervise and navigate the process daily to keep activities on track. This is where a professional publicist comes into play. Whether you are targeting businesses or consumers, turn to publicists to take your brand awareness, loyalty and conversions to the next level with integrated marketing.

3. Search Engine Optimization (SEO): As the digital landscape progresses, it is increasingly important to build your online presence. If you want your brand’s message, products and services to show up in search engine results, SEO can help. Publicists understand how to optimize content with keywords and phrases that are tailored to the intent of your target audiences.

If SEO is part of your overall PR strategy, your publicist will dedicate time each day monitoring your website’s position in Google and other key search engines; overseeing a robust Google Ads campaign for your business or brand; optimizing your social media channels; and tracking key metrics, such as organic traffic, bounce rate and click-through rate. By utilizing SEO, publicists can help increase your online visibility, reach your potential customers/clients and drive traffic to your website.

4. Establish Thought Leadership: PR is a powerful tool for developing a strong reputation as an industry-savvy thought leader. By engaging the media, publicists look to utilize press releases with true news about you and your personnel, brand or business to generate media coverage or publicity that positions you as an expert or analyst in your field of practice or expertise.

Then, there are articles publicists write that cover any number of expert topics within your knowledge base. These articles quote you across a range of professional and engaging subject matter you can share with your industry, clients or follower base. Publicists’ relationships with the media make publication of the articles not only possible, but strategically placed. Though, thought leadership does not stop there.

A combination of carefully orchestrated social media content, speaking engagements, blogs, bylined articles, Q&As, and white papers to create earned media opportunities give voice to and communicate credibility for your company’s leadership. Simply put, we leverage your knowledge and expertise to position you as a go-to authority within your business-to-business targets and industry or among applicable consumer markets.

5. Generate Leads: Is lead generation the job of the publicist? Some say yes, some say no. The way we look at it is, PR is a tool that can work in tandem with your marketing and business development efforts to support lead generation. We, as publicists, craft strategic content and messaging tactics for your brand and business during our day’s work to foster trust and integrity with your target audiences. This, in turn, generates leads and new business conversions for your business.

Talk to a publicist about your specific targets’ demographics, geographics and psychographics. Discuss what has worked and that which has not worked in terms of reaching and interfacing with your leads and prospects. From a viable publicist, you should expect a strategy that considers your past, existing and forecasted business development efforts.

For our clients, we conduct assessments of these precise facets of sales prospecting to guide them toward unearthing more qualified and quantified leads. A formal research and discovery process reveals gaps and issues that have kept our clients from successfully achieving maximum marketability. From there, we brainstorm and create annual public relations program plans that act as the roadmaps for publicity and promotion, equating to converting leads into sales and revenue for them.

If your publicist isn’t focusing your public relations with a diverse approach or in ways that support your sales efforts, you may want to reboot.

Whether you’re looking to gain a better understanding of public relations or exploring the next step of retaining a firm, we hope this insight sheds some light upon the ways in which publicists provide brand benefits for their clients.

Our firm works with full fervor towards the realization of our clients’ branding, public relations and integrated marketing objectives. Contact us to learn more about our process and how we jump start our clients’ publicity.

We’re currently living in the era of convenience; everything we could ever want, or need is usually accessible through a one-stop-shop experience. Need a loaf of bread and a new pair of shoes? Why go through the inconvenience of finding a bakery and a footwear store, when you can get both in an expedited manner via Amazon?

In business terms, some marketers tend to seek the “quick-fix” solutions to address their brands’ needs. We have all seen them; there are near-countless marketing support offers found online and through consulting specialists who work in one capacity or another, some being legitimate and others gimmicks. However, most savvy marketing pros agree that while the “quick-fix” promotional tactics and one-time consultants satisfy short-term deadlines, they supply less benefit for the all-important long-term sales and marketing.

In this age of efficiency, and era of infinite lists of marketing action items, strategic marketers focus on both micro-marketing daily deadlines as well as macro-marketing extended views that keep brands on target for the long haul. This can require highly skilled and specialized marketers, unified as a talented marketing team; some would say, an army.

With constantly growing marketing “to do” lists needing accomplished each day – not to mention missed opportunities caused by the “just not enough time” challenge – corporate (or in-house) marketing personnel generate this kind of valuable support by retaining “full-service” agencies.

What is a full-service agency?

A full-service agency is an entirely client-centric concept, where an agency offers all forms of marketing, public relations, and advertising services under one roof. Although Eberly & Collard is a public relations agency at its roots, we also offer digital marketing, branding, advertising planning and creative, media relations, and more. As a client of a full-service agency, you can opt for the agency to handle every aspects of your integrated marketing, or just a few. The full-service agency is entirely flexible in catering to a business’ or brand’s marketing needs and can concentrate on both requirements and creative.

This, of course, is in opposition to the specialty agency, which is an agency that only offers a single marketing and / or advertising service. To draw from a previous example in explaining the specialty agency, imagine if Amazon exclusively sold footwear and nothing else.

Having a full-service agency is essential when executing a fully-integrated marketing strategy.

Many businesses now strive to have a fully-integrated marketing strategy, meaning that all facets of their marketing (advertising, digital, public relations, etc.), are nearly seamless. However, creating and cultivating a full-integrated communication strategy using only a single specialty agency, or multiple specialty agencies, can be nearly impossible. The difficulties of integrating multiple strategies, when each service is handled by a different agency, often creates gray areas that postpone any kind of marketing plan. While synergy among various agencies is indeed possible, a streamlined fully-service agency approach produces efficiencies and effectiveness in terms of output and results in addition to costs.

For example, let’s say you’re a business owner, and you have hired one agency to handle your social media, and another to manage advertising (both buying and creative planning). In this scenario, if you ever wanted to creatively concept, plan and purchase a sponsored (paid) Instagram campaign, who would hold the responsibility? After this is determined, it is likely both agencies would work together on this project, which could lead to additional costs for you.

At Eberly & Collard Public Relations, our advertising, social media and digital marketing departments, and others like the public / media relations team, already work with each other on a daily basis and are just down the hall from each other, making communication completely streamlined. And, not to mention, when working with a full-service agency, you can be certain that each department will be on the same page when planning multi-channel campaigns, which ultimately leads to a cohesive and consistent brand-voice across all media platforms being utilized.What if I’m only interested in public relations, or a single marketing service, for my business or brand?

A commonly held misconception surrounding full-service agencies is the higher cost that comes with agencies offering more than one service. However, one of the clear advantages of a full-service agency is its ability to conform to your business’ specific marketing and media needs which saves time, and time is money.

Are you only interested in one of a full-service agency’s services? In our book this is completely fine. By signing a contract for only one of an agency’s services, you are not simultaneously agreeing to pay for all its services; the true flexibility of the full-service agency is that it can essentially offer what a specialty agency can offer, which is expert guidance in only one area of marketing. Though, as your marketing plans evolve and expand, your full-service agency is at hand to provide additional services, teams and strategies; whereas, a specialty agency can only deliver on the one area of marketing upon which it focuses.

Although public relations has traditionally been the cornerstone of our agency, at Eberly & Collard Public Relations, we are full-service and integrated marketing agency, and are confident in our abilities to service any client-need using any form of marketing. If you would like to learn more about the outcomes a full-service agency can yield for your business or brand, let us know your thoughts in the comments section below, or contact us via the Contact page of our blog and website.

 

 

As marketers, we are working with more and more data each day. I would never have guessed seventeen years ago when we started our firm that data and the science and analysis of data would be such a large part of marketing. I find, as a lover of all things technology and as a science major that I really do love the aspects of data and being able to dig into the granular world of marketing analytics. A market analysis studies the attractiveness and the dynamics of a specified marketing area or discipline. This combined with the initial findings uncovered from a brands S.W.O.T (Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats) can yield the effectiveness of your marketing or public relations efforts.

Yes, there are many, many ways to measure the effectiveness of your campaigns and this is a topic that would take several in-depth blog posts to fully cover but I recently read an article in Inc. magazine and it reminded me that many businesses may not have time to read through an in-depth article and could benefit from having a few quick tips to use as a general guideline. So here are four easy and quick ways to do it your self. If you find yourself searching for more and would like a deeper investigation into what is needed to take your brand awareness to the next level, please give us a call or contact us to get started.

Bounce Rate – the definition of bounce rate at defined by Google is “the percentage of visitors who enter the site and then leave rather than continuing to view other pages within the same site”. If your bounce rate is under 40% then you are in good shape.  If not, then this is an indicator that once they get to your website they thought it was going to be something different or the content and user website experience (UX) needs to be improved. This cold be improved with different forms of messaging, updated site copy or even a website navigation update. Again, these are just quick simple ideas for improvement and may not always be applicable or could be entirely different based on your own brands’s marketing needs.

Organic Traffic from Search – Well, like I said, I could say enough about this specific topic alone long enough that your coffee would get cold. In short, the ultimate goal here is to develop engaging content for your targeted audience. When they are searching for topics and keyword phrases that match your brands product or service offerings you want them to find your website.  You’ll also want to see a steady increase over time when viewing this metric in your analytics dashboard.

Click Through Rate – I bet you have heard of the term “sales funnel” or “customer journey”. These terms were originally derived to explain the process a lead goes through when interacting with a brand from initial inception to actual purchase. It visually can be thought of as a funnel. We often use the term “from consideration to conversion” to describe the process. The strategy is to guide them toward that conversion. Today’s consumer wants help and guidance through this process and will go elsewhere if we do not support them in this capacity. You can set up segments in your analytics program to monitor the flow-through behavior throughout the stage.

E-Commerce Conversions – Today, you can employ marketing automation software to use cookies and track the “journey” your site visitor takes. Where do they go after they leave your site, what are their purchasing habits. Mapping this unique path across every touchpoint can hep you better understand the unique needs of your customers as well as use built-in triggers or automation to direct them along the patch and to take desired actions. Just because a blog reader or site visitor did not purchase something today does not mean that they should or did not have a good brand experience. They may return again at a later date and purchase based on the experience they had today.

I hope these quick tips were useful for you and a means to at least get you started asking yourself the right questions. You should always be thinking of ways to benchmark your success and be flexible enough to challenge the way you are currently marketing. Our firm enjoys the challenge of creating new opportunities and successes for our clients’. Call us to learn more about our process and how we get started working with new clients.

Branding can be defined in a few ways across marketing disciplines, but our firm describes branding as the touch-points through which your company is seen from your customers’ or clients’ perspectives. At Eberly & Collard, we work with brands to help define a set of brand standards for our clients, so they, and, us, on their behalf, can use those standards as a baseline guide for marketing communication.

The purpose of branding is to simply and easily help your customers understand what you have to offer and how your specific product or service is different. But this is not only a USP (unique selling proposition); it is the combination of all the ways your brand can communicate what it stands for and provides. A case study that showcases our branding work can be found here.

We take the responsibility of branding for clients seriously, and this is why we are honored to be recognized as a top Branding Agency on DesignRush.

Thank you, DesignRush, for including our firm in the list this year!

One of our industry colleagues and good friend Julia Molloy, who founded the BOLD Summit (Business of Luxury Design) event is taking her master class training and intensive courses with 18 CEU’s to a region near you. Are you running a small interior design firm and having a difficult time keeping up with the work load in your firm? Need to make key decisions on how and when to grow your team? Are you ready to polish up your client experience and attract more of your sweet spot clientele? Well then, this is what you’ve been waiting for! BOLD Logistics is an extension of the BOLD Summit and essentially picks up where the BOLD Summit left off.

Registration is now open and full details of the event can be found here.

Eberly & Collard was lucky enough to be able to take part in the launch of this inaugural event in Las Vegas in 2014 and it was a huge success. We have enjoyed seeing the BOLD Summit grow and are now looking forward to the new BOLD Logistics series.

The newest trend sweeping the internet: Podcasting, a revitalization of talk radio that is both entertaining and informative.

Just as some people think radio is a relic of the past, podcasting has reached a surge in listenership. Fifty-seven million Americans tune into podcasts monthly, according to Edison research. If that number doesn’t overwhelm you, Forbes estimates that a single episode of a popular podcast like John Lee Dumas’ “Entrepreneur on Fire” can reach more viewers than an episode of television, especially since podcasts are easily accessible to anyone with a smartphone or computer.

Podcasts supply a remarkable platform to business owners and leadership teams, since their audiences tend to be readily connected and highly applicable. Many listen at their desks and on their way to and from work (Edison). With reach like this, it is no wonder that entrepreneurs like Chalene Johnson, “Build Your Tribe,” and Gary Vaynerchuk, “Ask Gary Vee,” have jumped on the trend and further cemented their places as business experts by fast-becoming popular podcasters.

Unlike costly TV subscriptions, podcasts are easily accessible. Once they are posted online, they remain there for an extended period, as opposed to select television news segments that can be difficult to find after their original airings. Podcast episodes can be found on Stitcher, Apple Podcasts, iTunes, and Spotify, and they are frequently posted on a designated website for each podcast.

Knowing the massive influence of podcasts should make most any business professional want to become a guest on a relevant podcast, or even become a host of his or her own business-related podcast. For commercial or professional purposes, a podcast is an authentic way to communicate directly to your audience. The expressed ideas and discussed insights come straight from the expert or thought-leader, and they are conveyed firsthand to the specific audience- unfiltered and often live.

The authenticity of this method of message delivery can greatly strengthen your brand and how it is perceived by your customers, clients or others. We, at Eberly & Collard Public Relations, refer to this as “brand personification.”

However, like any communicative business or public relations activity, there are critical factors that need to be considered before joining the podcast trend.

Becoming a Host

If you would like to become a host, you will need to invest more time, energy and budget than if you are simply appearing as a guest on another podcast. While there is a nearly limitless set of tactics to use to create a successful podcast, we detail below several components you will want to consider as a host. In a competitive and impatient climate, it is wise to carve out a niche, so listeners know what to expect before pressing play.

Like with any services or product, your audience needs to see your podcast’s relevance in their lives and work, so keeping it based around pertinent business material and current events will cause your podcast to be relatable. Preplanning podcast topics and insights affords opportunities to connect on deeper levels with your target listeners.

Try to think of what might be missing from your chosen podcast category and how your topics can provide professionally beneficial content that other podcasts do not offer your audience. Predetermine a calendar of subject-matter about which you have experience and valuable awareness to share with others. Divide your upcoming podcast topics into individualized information specific to your intended audience, defining what and how your listeners should gain in terms of value.

While it may seem obvious, remember that your podcast topics should correspond with your professional background and be poised to grow your reputation as a thought-leader or trusted source of information.

Once you captivate your audience, you’ll want to keep them coming back for more, and creating a list of episode ideas and preparing ahead of time can help you with the consistency and growth of your podcast.

Ideally, unless your podcast is being developed just because you like to talk, the concept of each session should be subtly focused upon building a following of loyal listeners who have the potential of purchasing your business’s products or services, or at least supporting your brand in some fashion.

You will also need to invest in quality recording and sound editing equipment. Some podcasts are recorded in professional studios, while others are produced with basic sound equipment in the hosts’ offices. Regardless, your audience is going to expect more than a simple iPhone recording. Quality microphones, headsets, and sound proofing equipment to minimize echo and background noise can be found online.

When larger budgets are feasible, consider the services of professional production company or a public relations firm with podcast, video and digital marketing capabilities.

Becoming a Guest  

If creating and maintaining your own podcast seems like too ambitious an endeavor, you can serve as a guest (one-time or recurring) on a podcast relevant to your profession and areas of expertise. Picking the right podcast is just as important as presenting yourself on air, so you should conduct due diligence to understand any podcast on which you would like to be considered as a viable guest. Study its themes, subjects, tone, host, and audience to uncover if it is a good fit for you and your business.

To study a podcast, standard research is necessary: Listening to several episodes, studying the website, and scrolling through the host’s social media channels, in order to gain a solid grasp on the essence of the podcast’s content. Consider how other guests are introduced and interviewed to learn if the style is aligned with your brand standards and the thematic information you have to share.

After researching a podcast in which you have interest being a guest, the next step involves pitching the host or producer to attempt to persuade him or her you would offer real benefit to the listeners. This is typically done through email or a form to complete on the podcast’s website.

Pitching involves emailing and calling the podcast host or owner to clearly explain and outline reasons why you would serve as an informed and well-prepared guest. Your pitch should include your detailed professional bio, past speaking or podcast history, and two to three topic angles you could cover as a specific subject-matter expert. It is also wise to encourage some other form of interaction with the host through social media commenting, following and sharing.

Once you land a spot on a podcast, you may need to go through a bit of media training before you sit down with the host. If you have never had media training, our Eberly & Collard team of experts can prepare you for your interview and any subsequent media inquiries you may receive. While you probably know your area of business so well that you could talk about it in your sleep, it is still smart to consider media training. It provides an opportunity to develop messaging strategies, so your verbal presence on the podcast actually benefits your business and its brand. In short, it can also help you practice how not to inadvertently put your foot in your mouth- so to speak.

It is important to have a message in mind to avoid getting sidetracked on air, but it is also imperative to promote your message without sounding like an advertisement. You can do this by layering your promotion in interesting anecdotes and explaining your brand in a way that adds value to the conversation between you, the host, and, of course, the audience. These are also strategic tactics about which your public relations practitioner or publicist can advise you.

Getting Started

With its unbreakable tie to smartphones, tablets and computers, the podcast trend looks as if it is here to stay. As the market becomes increasingly saturated with niche podcasts, there is something out there for every business and industry. However, as a result, hosts and their guests will have to perform at higher levels to garner business-to-business or business-to-consumer listeners’ attention.

Harnessing the power of sound through podcasts can generate more authentic connections for your brand. If this form of marketing communications, and solidifying your place as a thought-leader sounds appealing, you may need a public relations firm to help with the logistics and promotion of the venture.

Starting your podcast endeavors can be streamlined when you have guidance and practice. Eberly & Collard Public Relations’ 15-plus years of experience in media relations and digital marketing equates to an informed approach to podcast acquisition and planning.

We can assist by drafting Q&A-style narratives to prepare you for podcasts or by helping create soundbites of the most important parts of your message. Or, if an entire media kit and vitae to showcase your area of industry or business acumen is in order to kick-off your podcast guest pitching efforts, our team can guide you through the process.

Growing what it is referred to as “share of voice” for your business and brand begins with vetting, creating and engaging with an audience to positively affect how you shine among the competition. Unified with a clever public relations program, podcasts are one of the surest means to being heard.

Have you ventured into professional podcasting, or is this on your business horizon? Tell us your thoughts and share questions with us below.

With the New Year holiday already a distant memory, it is time to ask what has been accomplished in terms of marketing for your business and brand.

Before you utter, “Whoa, it is only February,” think about this: According to the American Marketing Association of America, “Calendar year marketing plans that are in full execution mode by February 1^st tend to yield 84 percent stronger [branding and sales] results than calendar-year plans that have delayed starts.”

If that isn’t enough motivation to play a little marketing catch-up, we don’t know what is. With innovative planning based upon known trends in marketing, with an added measure of new and advance strategy planning, you can go from contemplatively hoping your annual promotions produce sales to confidently safeguarding they will.

Simply put, if you and your marketing staff (or your PR and advertising agency) have not yet honed your 2019 marketing plan’s strategies and deployment schedule, stemming from lessons learned during the past year, take the plunge into the promotions and publicity pool- feet first.

Assessing what was accomplished in 2018 as well as that which can be improved in the new year is an indispensable exercise. Doing so can yield a marketing roadmap to avoid potholes and roadblocks, with the goal of generating new forms of reach and marketability “on brand” and “on budget.”

Some questions to ask include:

• How does the public – or our industry sector(s) – perceive our business, and how can we gain higher levels of our targets’ trust?
• Was our brand visibility strong enough in 2018?
• Did our 2018 marketing campaigns vigorously communicate exactly how our business addresses the “needs” and “wants” of our customers, clients and prospects?
• Did we reach our sales goals last year?
• Did we track our marketing campaigns to know what worked best, and what didn’t work well enough, or at all?

If you are a business owner or marketing manager, and while reading this blog, you answered “no” to any of these questions, 2019 is the year to begin setting and implementing new strategic marketing goals to make your business’ voice heard through stronger, clearer methods.

As a national public relations, integrated marketing and advertising agency, our primary goal is to walk our clients into the new year feeling confident and informed about their presences in their business-to-business and / or business-to-consumer marketplaces. This is helped by reviewing where their businesses and brands stand in the media landscape and among competitive brands.

In order to realize this level of information and forecast success for the coming year, it is essential to develop traditional and digital marketing, publicity, advertising, and social media plans to make 2019 your business’ best year on record.

Where to Begin?

We’ve been thinking a lot about what we can expect to see in all areas of marketing, public relations, media relations, social media, and advertising in 2019; and, because of this, we have compiled a few predictions and points of advice for improving your strategic communications plan in the new year.

While there are near-countless ways to find the light at the end of the proverbial marketing tunnel this year, understanding these four, cornerstone questions and answers can benefit you with a vigorous start.

1. What will be the key marketing trends to keep an eye out for in 2019, and how can my business use the trends to our advantage?

For our agency and its clients, we don’t plan on 2019 being a year of complacency. In order to jump ahead of competitors, it is essential to begin exploring the trends and benefits of digital marketing in the new year. The explanation for using digital marketing in 2019 is simple: Your competitors are likely using Search Engine Optimization (SEO), Search Engine Marketing (SEM) or social media marketing to positively position their brands, products or services in the online marketplaces in which they conduct business.

We’re sure that at some point in time, you’ve heard from a friend or colleague the difficulties in utilizing digital marketing tools, and how convoluted SEO and SEM can be. While not an easy task, we feel that businesses with an agency who understands the inner-workings of these digital marketing tools are bound for success in 2019. At ECPR, we spend many hours a week formulating key search terms, writing and re-writing our client’s website or blog copy to conform with key words, and then finally analyzing the results- all so our clients are competitively positioned to their competitors through search engines and social media.

Ultimately, your digital marketing program should boost the frequency and quality of Search Engine Results Pages (SERP) for your business and brands. SERP involves web pages being displayed by Google and other search engines in response to search queries. When someone searches online information (say, about products or services), they search by using certain words and phrases. The most relevant and content-rich website pages are “served” or show up as a result of the user’s search. Obviously, the linked website pages that are served closest to the top of all SERP are the ones your potential customers or clients are most likely to click.

Engaging, informative and keyword-focused content written and posted in rife fashion on your website, blog and social media channels should be the name of the game for your marketing team (or agency) in 2019. Endemic, fresh content about your brand that is posted on your owned media channels, not to mention external channels and websites, should harmonize with your active Google Ad Words campaign.

Writer’s note: Keep our blog in your RSS feed for an upcoming “Google Ad Words 101” article.

The second key marketing tool, which is also trending these days, you should not only pay attention to, but seriously consider for your business. It is influencer marketing. Through the rise of various free-media platforms, influencer marketing has seen a large spike in the last five years. In a recent study conducted by Linqia, an influencer-marketing research firm, marketers across the country are increasing their influencer marketing budget as much as 39 percent in 2019.

With a general rise in consumer distrust, many brands are looking to influencer marketing to help drive sales by gaining or regaining customer confidence in their brands. In 2019, we recommend targeting influencers who aren’t necessarily the most popular, obvious or mainstream in your respective industry. Rather, align your brand with the individuals and media outlets with the highest engagement and influencer rates among your target audience.

By using this ECPR approach to influencer marketing, you’ll be creating a more focused message to interact with your target audience, albeit indirectly through the influencers your customers or clients already know and trust. This breeds new connections and forms of engagement, which can ultimately lead to brand trust that equates to sales in increased numbers.

2. How will people consume media in 2019, and how do I make this to my brand’s advantage?

The key to finding publicity success in 2019 is understanding the media platforms in which your target audiences are most likely to receive their information. Through our research, we’ve learned consumer media is making a strong, swift and rather obvious, shift to digital, whereas trade media is taking a slower, more calculated approach towards digital and online media.

In the numerous industries in which we represent clients, we have noticed multiple, well-received trade publications making these digital-friendly efforts. As a trade professional, you often need as much information as possible to stay afloat and informed in your industry. And sometimes, all that needed information cannot fit within the pages of a print magazine.

This points to the fact your B-to-C and B-to-B targets are consuming both print and digital / online media like never before. The growing or evolving inclusion of digital and online content means your customers or potential customers now have more ways to learn about your business and its unique selling propositions.

For example, the former design-trade publication Editor at Large has shifted to a much more digital-friendly approach, dropping their original print namesake and becoming a multi-platformed, digital-friendly entity, entitled Business of Home. Although still producing a quarterly print magazine filled with great content, they have ventured towards other mediums of communication, and have fully taken advantage of the podcast-craze that has become extremely prevalent across consumer and trade media alike.

In addition to the podcasts that feature well-to-do design professionals on a weekly basis, their online platform is jam-packed with audio and video features, lookbooks, extensive event recaps, and other content that you simply can’t fit into a print magazine.

Because of this digital and online growth, as well as the lack of word counts and space constraints on digital and online platforms, the need for content production becomes that much more a priority for your business when looking to score publicity. In order to consistently secure quality media placements, you will want to consistently produce quality press releases, social media and business, product or professional service announcements.

We, at ECPR, call this demand for creative media the “content monster,” and the monster is always hungry for news and information because people cannot seem to get enough. How do we know? The average person reads or views information about more than 3,000 brands a day. That is a lot of content, and you should have ever-growing new content about your business, products or services online and in the news at all times.

In 2019, make it a top task on your list to feed the content monster with a schedule of press and digital marketing campaigns, or seek a PR firm like ECPR to take care of the need for you, because the desire among people for new content is not slowing down any time soon.

3. How can my business utilize social media most effectively in 2019?

As a full-service creative agency, we’ve witnessed the role of social media and the time spent creating unique social media campaigns increase in the past five years. In order to keep up with the trend and its demands, we make sure to constantly stay on the beat of all-things social media. Through our experience and research, we believe the social media platforms with the largest impact in 2019 will easily be Instagram and YouTube.

It’s no secret that humans are visual creatures. So, when trying to market your product or service, what better way to show potential clients and consumers what you can provide them by literally showing them via photos and / or videos? Our clients and friends in the interior design, architecture and real estate development industries have taken note of this trend and are beginning to focus primarily on photo-sharing platforms, such as Instagram, while sometimes balancing their LinkedIn and Facebook accounts.

Video has also drastically expanded its role in the social media realm. A publication staff with whom we have a great relationship, Architectural Digest, is one of the media companies at the forefront of this newer form of content creation. Through their video-tour series, where they profile showrooms, hospitality settings and homes, AD is able to extend its reach beyond the pages of the magazine and onto YouTube, where video can then be shared across Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn. Just think about the impressions!

Social media, an arm of digital marketing, has given rise to the restructured marketing of brands, products and services by implemented digital technologies of a socially conscience nature. If your social media program did not lead to realized connections with your existing and potential customer bases last year, initiate a more authentic approach to your posting strategies. For every one-way social media dialog you had on your Facebook, LinkedIn or other channel in 2019, change the focus from telling your fans and followers what you want them to know. Initiate new two-way conversations by asking them what they would like to gain from your business and how they’d prefer to engage with your brand.

Putting the internet to work and fueled through mobile phones, handhelds, online videos, and other digital mediums, marketing teams can incorporate digital platforms and strategies to maximize their promotions. But, many marketers have only yet to implement one or two facets of digital and social media marketing, whereas the reality involves vast prospects to maximize the concept to help reach and win new customers or clients.

4. In the upcoming year, what kinds of advertising will draw the interest of potential consumers and clients for my business?

Traditional forms of advertising, when used alone or as a singular focus for a period of time, is proving to be less and less successful in spreading messages from business to consumer, and from business to business. Similar to the direction social media is heading, digital advertising is likely to remain the most impactful and engaging advertising platform heading into 2019. Of course, the trend of digital advertising is most successfully executed when combined with other forms of marketing in a fully integrated program plan.

For example, companies across most industries are ramping up their digital video advertising budgets to adjust to competitors’ spending habits; and, according to a recent eMarketer report, digital video ad buys will account for 50 percent of total video ad budgets in 2019, with mobile and social video ads appearing as the top forms. Though, in the truly results-oriented case studies, we see the convergence of digital video advertising with one or more forms of print or traditional marketing.

So, what does this mean for your business? Once again, studies like these show the importance of understanding how your clients and customers are consuming all forms of media. Without understanding this rather basic idea, finding ways to connect to your target audience can be nearly impossible.

Our trained media professionals at ECPR have been closely monitoring this ongoing trend and believe the best way to utilize digital video advertising is through creative content building and advertorials. Consumers and trade professionals alike are looking for highly-relevant, engaging video content that offers them more than a product or slogan. This remains especially important when delivering digital video ads through mobile and social, as these two platforms travel with a consumer or client wherever they go, by way of smartphone or tablet.

Still, if this were enough, no roadmap would be needed. It is the integral combination of a well research and meticulously developed integrated marketing plan, that gives rise to the union of multi-faceted advertising and publicity that produces an overall brand story.

What will you decide to improve in 2019?

If your improvement strategy focuses on any of the above ideas, they are not easy challenges to tackle by yourself, while also trying to run a business or manage sales and marketing at large. By working with a full-service integrated communications agency such as ourselves, you can make certain your 2019 will be filled with marketing and media victories, ones that will improve upon the past and track quickly toward a productive and prosperous future.

We’d enjoy hearing from you. Share your questions and thoughts with us in the comments section, or reach out to us directly through the “Contact” page of our website above.

Here are Some Quick Tips to Guide you for Getting Started with Public Relations

Like most businesses, the days turn into weeks and the weeks turn into months. It’s already almost November, and many of you are probably still shaking your heads wondering when and how best to enact those 2019 marketing plans you and your team put into place.

As new products or services are introduced or projects are completed, often the primary challenge is to tell the brand’s story, so it reaches the maximum targeted audience- all while working with specific budgets to achieve strategic sales results.

It can be daunting if you do not know where to start; but, by following the simple steps below, you can be well on your way to achieving well-qualified leads and quantified sales.

We hope you have found these tips to be helpful. The next step is implementation while there is time remaining before year end results reports are up for review.

Eberly & Collard Public Relations believes how you are perceived by your clients, customers, investors, subsidiaries, stakeholders, peers, the media, and other integral groups is what makes them purchase your products or services, offer their partisanship support, and, ultimately, helps fulfill your budget and revenue objectives.

Our service model begins with a constituency-based approach to all aspects of public relations and integrated marketing. This is accomplished by thoroughly examining our clients’ target audiences’ decision-making processes, purchasing behaviors, product / service opinions, and brand awareness levels.

This is the premise upon which we enact comprehensive integrated marketing programs for our clients, complete with quick-acting, creative and strategic campaigns to communicate product or service and business stories.

If you or your company leaders seek to be regularly quoted as through-leaders and experts in the publications and websites your customers, clients or prospects read…or your products or design projects are missing out on promotion or publicity, contact us for an assessment of your integrated public and media relations needs.