One of the questions I get asked the most as a PR consultant is “Where on earth should I start when doing my own PR?”
Public relations as a discipline covers a wide range of activities and most people are not sure what is included in ‘PR’ and what PR really means. Could it be media coverage, networking, winning awards, collaborations? It can be quite daunting and overwhelming!
But it doesn’t have to be……
Basically what it comes down to is encouraging other people to talk about you positively on their channels and to their audience, rather than you just saying it yourself (which you should still do!)
But how do you do that?
Over the next few weeks I am going to cover the main areas of what you need to know about doing your own PR for your business.
The first and most important step and today’s topic, is knowing who your ideal client is.
Let’s face it, if you don’t know who they are, you will be wasting your time.
You need to really get clear on who you are trying to reach. Have you heard of the phrase ‘if you talk to everyone, you talk to no one’? Unless you know who you audience is and where you can find them, then this is exactly what you will be doing!
Here are my top 3 questions to really nail your ideal client so you know them inside out! And it helps you to prioritise where to focus your attentions and efforts
- Who are they? What are their demographics?
Are they male or female? Age range? Parents of young children? Young couples? Business owners? Are they working? Are they retired?
Think about who you serve, who do you sell to, who do you provide a service for? Really drill down and think about who these people are that you either work with currently or who you WANT to work with.
- Where are they?
Are they local to you? Or are they more regional, national or international? Do you have limits on your location and the types of services you offer? Or can you ship globally?
This dictates where you need to be in order to reach them. As an example, if you are a therapist who works with women within a one-hour drive time, focusing your efforts on building your local audience will reap rewards. Whereas if you can ship products worldwide, or deliver your services online via Zoom then national and international media are an option for you.
- Where are they hanging out? What media do they consume?
Media as a whole is huge! You have national media and regional media (print, broadcast and online), blogs, podcasts, websites, YouTube channels and more. It can be quite overwhelming and this is why it is important to try and narrow down where your ideal client will hang out.
You need to be in the right places, so the people that are there will care about what you are sharing and will be interested in what you are trying to sell – it needs to be relevant.
As a journalist, they are always going to be asking themselves “will my readers be interested in this”, so you need to already know that it is something they would be interested in and be one step ahead.
Really dive into their network of influence – both traditional media and online.
Think about what they read, what podcasts do they listen to, what radio stations do they listen to, what TV do they watch? Where do they go? Any events, conferences? What other brands do they like? (thinking about collaborations) Where do they hang out online? What social media channels are they on? What social media do they consume? Are they in any particular groups on these channels?
Once you get these questions nailed, you start to build a picture of this person. This then helps you decide where to focus your efforts and promoting yourself becomes a lot easier!
Ultimately that is what I am here to help you with, to help you see through the overwhelm and work out where your people are and what they consume so that you can start to find them and meet them in the right places!
Now over to you!
Grab a big piece of paper and start brainstorming your ideal client – start with your existing clients if you have them and write down all their attributes and where they found you. This is a great place to start! (And your existing customers and clients are your number one advocates, so make the most of them).
If you need to work on your ideal client, here’s where you can catch the replay now: https://www.facebook.com/CheerleaderPR/videos/542941039723181/
Let me know what you find out – share in the comments below….
I’m offering some FREE 30-minute PR Breakthrough sessions via Zoom to help you to get clear on where you focus your PR efforts going forwards. To book your FREE 30-minute call click here.
Keep an eye out for future blog posts on how to do your own PR in the coming weeks.
