Reputation Management | Tigerfish PR- Logistics PR agency based in Preston, Manchester, Northwest UK

Archive for the ‘Reputation management’ Category

The most crucial question in PR

Saturday, January 28th, 2012

Do you ever misinterpret what is required? I wonder, if, like me, you sometimes get the wrong end of the stick?

Last week I was at a Women in Logistics event in Clitheroe. One of the speakers, a dynamic MD of a massive European freight company, was telling us, in no uncertain terms about her demand for remarkability. All her suppliers had to exceed her high targets.

In her presentation, she mentioned that she’d had real problems with her communications, and she was in the process of looking for a new supplier. “Aha!” I thought. “I’m in communications, I give a remarkable service. I’ll speak to her”.

What I should have asked, at the time of the presentation was “what do you mean by communications”? Because it turns out, she was having a problem with her telephones. Er, not my area of expertise at all.

Which reminds me of the story on the legendary John Peel’s BBC Radio 4 Saturday morning programme, many years ago, which had me in tucks. It went something like this:

Little boy: “Daddy, where did I come from?”

Dad (having prepared himself for this day): “Well… Mummy and Daddy love each other very much…” and he continued to explain the mechanics of making a baby.

Little boy: “Oh. I thought I came from Preston”.

So my top tip is this: Ask clarification questions at the time something is raised. It will save you time, energy and possibly embarrassment later.

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Why would anyone turn away business?

Wednesday, January 11th, 2012

I was invited to tender (ITT) for some business last week. Quite a big slug of business actually. Yet I declined.

As a business woman, it sounds counter productive to be turning away opportunities. After all, in this economic climate, every pound counts. But I’m a fervent believer in working with people who have a product or service which I feel comfortable promoting. PR is an odd sort of profession from that point of view. Although my clients’ businesses clearly aren’t mine, I feel very protective of them. I need to like the people I work with and the way they work. We need to have the same ethical stance, regardless of sector specialism.

In order to really get behind a business and make the client/agency relationship work, there has got to be that synergy. The way I work is more of a collaborative approach, which is a win-win way all round.

So, the fact is, this week I’m shorter on work, but longer on resolve – and it feels good.

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Pitching for business – 6 steps to success

Thursday, November 3rd, 2011

Pitching for business is a way of life for many businesses, and PR is no exception. I always liken it to finding a partner – there has to be an initial spark of ‘talking the same language’ and then discovering you have the same interests, ethics and goals is the next step.

Here are my 6 crucial areas to think about if you are pitching for business:

Make sure you have Smart objectives (ones which are specific, measurable, realistic and timely)
Do a comms audit beforehand, so you know the baseline you are working from
Discuss how exactly the business will be managed.. The day to day contact point, and the reporting process
Understand and manage client expectations
Explain how you measure success
Demonstrate your sector specific knowledge

And remember, pitching is a two way process.. Courtship needs both people involved, so be prepared to walk away if you think that spark is missing.

What aspects do you consider at a pitch?

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Six ways to control your message

Saturday, October 15th, 2011

Have you ever seen a bride and groom stand outside a registry office – and been so swept along by the joyous occasion that you can’t help smiling? Or have you ever walked into a room where there’s just been an argument – and you can feel the tension in the air?

Emotions are like that – they are contagious. It is important not to overlook this fact when conveying news of any sort.

This truism was particularly emphasised when my daughter’s school invited parents to a meeting about a significant change this week. The atmosphere in the hall was initially courteous, upbeat and the questions posed were non-controversial. The majority appeared accepting of the new situation and we could sense all was going well.

Until, that is, someone spoke out. They clearly articulated well thought-out objections. Tapped into concerns that hadn’t yet been thought about, let alone communicated.

And the mood in the room changed. The animosity was palpable. Now it was not 300 parents who were overall accepting of the plan, it was 300 parents with real worries.

Have you ever experienced that?

So I thought it would be timely to share some crisis PR tips regarding communicating to a group of people.

Take the advice of a PR professional to see if your message might in any way be controversial. They usually have enough distance from the issue to be able to see pro’s and con’s in an unbiased way.
Avoid public meetings – remember, mood is very contagious. It is far better to have an ‘open house’.
Brief people with your arguments in good time – so everyone feels they have an opportunity to think about things.
Encourage feedback – it’s a massive resource to be able to harness the ideas of all those extra brains! Public meetings are a daunting forum to voice an opinion, and many choose to leave their views unheard.
Arrange for a day/evening or two of ‘drop-in’ sessions. This gives everyone the chance of having their individual concerns addressed on a one-to-one basis. These allow people to express their concerns without necessarily recruiting others to their cause.
Acknowledge the feedback you have received, thank people for their time, and act on it where appropriate.

So next time you want to communicate a big change to a group of people – think twice before holding a meeting on it.

If you want more PR tips, sign up for the Tigerfish PR newsletter.

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Five ways to maximise exhibition PR

Monday, April 18th, 2011

Over the last few weeks I’ve been to Multimodal at NEC and FPS Expo (Federation of Petroleum Suppliers) at Harrogate, and I thought I would share some examples of good practise. Everything you do on a stand divulges a message to customers – make sure it’s one you intend to communicate.

1. Promote promote BEFORE the show

I always recommend customers modify their email signatures, 3 months before a show, to flag up the fact that they will be attending. And make sure the signature is consistent for all employees. That way, every time an email is sent, the recipient will be reminded of your exhibition.

2.Don’t forget press information

A preview release on what you are exhibiting should be sent to your key press 3 months before the show. (I speak from experience here… please don’t tell your press officer just one week before the show, and expect her to work her usual wonders!) Try to include something which will make your stand more attractive – a product launch, a key announcement are good news hooks, if relevant. At the show, bring along 20 press packs for the press office (unless of course there is a press office memory stick being issued). Afterwards… well, a review release is sometimes useful – but only if you have something interesting to say. (like £xK business done at show/booked again etc)

3. Make your stand attractive and professional

This is your shop window, make it count. I’ve seen massive companies with DIY stands – and small organisations with bespoke graphics and exhibition boards. We all know which look more professional. Exhibitions ARE costly, and particularly in terms of time for employees to organise and attend. You do no-one any favours by skimping on the stand image. If you can’t afford a properly designed stand, you might be better to just ‘walk’ the show.

4. Capture details of everyone who visits your stand

I visited any number of stands these two shows, totally incognito. Few asked who I was. Yet it’s so easy to get peoples’ details. Some shows will rent out a ‘badge scanner’, but plain old paper does the trick just as well. Your team just need to be disciplined to fill the details in – AND FOLLOW THEM UP AFTERWARDS. One of the simplest ways to get details is to collect cards, in return for a prize draw. I’m delighted to say that the lovely people at Franceline did just that, and more to the point, phoned me up last week with those wonderful words “Amanda, do you like champagne?” Hurray, my name had been pulled out of the bowl and I had won a bottle of bubbly. However, Franceline Transport are the real winners, as cleverly, they have a record of everyone who visited their stand.

5. Do something to encourage people onto your stand

Just having your team, lovely though they are, on the stand is rarely enough these days. As I walked the shows, I was variously drawnto the wifi zones, the fabulous old motorbike, the working machines, the massive tankers.

They made me stop – and chat. The chocolate just made me guiltily rush in, and out again. One of the best examples of something good for the stand was the cartoonist on the Reynolds Logisticsstand. Unlike the various pens I’ve snaffled, this ‘give away’ I’ve kept. And will probably frame! (see below) Thanks Reynolds – and I’ll probably hang onto your details on my cartoon longer than a branded pen or mug too.

Exhibitions are costly affairs – make sure that you use their PR potential to the max.

Amanda at FPS Expo

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Essential ways to approach a PR strategy

Saturday, April 2nd, 2011

Generating caravan sales was an unexpected, ongoing theme in the March PR Strategy workshop in Manchester. But feature it did, and workshop leader Dennis Kelly FCIPR from Teesside University successfully used this real live example to guide us through the creation of a PR strategy, bringing the whole process to life.

We seven delegates ranged in experience from sole practitioner of B2B PR to corporate comms managers for NHS, banks and retail complexes. Pooling our resources, we spent a very enjoyable day looking at why PR strategy is so important, via the trusty ‘plan-do-review’ model, right through to evaluating the PR process, which involved inputs, outputs, outcomes and outflows.

With humour and sound practical knowledge, Dennis looked at various ways to generate a PR strategy, including a Weihrichs 4 strategic options and De Bono’s ‘segment and challenge’ techniques.

As a hands-on PR practitioner, what I found particularly useful were his 15 top tips on getting time with busy managers to encourage them to focus on PR and strategy in particular. And here they are:

Identify common objectives
Be seen, be accessible, be visible
Say … ‘we have problem [x] and this will solve it’
Something which is new/leading edge
Say “This is something which will work for us..”
“Have you seen…” ie. topicality
“I think I know how we can save some money…”
Appeal to vanity..
When you achieve something, have some celebration – share the credit
Try the ‘reverse seminar’ technique. “… I know you’re really busy, but can you give me just half an hour to explain to me what’s happening in [your world]“
Find advocates for PR in the organisation
Demonstrate how something will work to get buy in
Set up focus groups
Gather insights from experts
Just pop in!

At the end of the session, we left armed with some great notes, more PR contacts, and a headful of ideas to implement back at the office. Which is my definition of a successful workshop.

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Get the porch light working

Tuesday, February 15th, 2011

From time to time I get asked to pitch to companies who see PR or indeed social media in general, as the answer to ALL their problems.

Sometimes it is because they have a problem communicating to staff

Sometimes it is because they aren’t converting sales

Sometimes it is because they aren’t selling anything.

But can PR cure this? Well, yes and no.

I would, of course, say PR is fabulous. It is a powerful way to communicate with your customers, potential customers, neighbours, employees and potential employees. It IS an extremely useful marketing tool and it can:

• Help build reputations

• Increase awareness of products and services

• Enhance the credibility (and hence the worth) of a company

• Makes people think more highly of you.

• Help in opening new markets

• Protect business in times of crisis.

• Attract the best recruits and business partners

• Enhance access to funding and investors

• Create a premium value for products and services

• Generate interest from new customers

We all see what happens to firms that don’t handle their PR well.

But strangely enough, it can’t work miracles. If your product is the wrong product. If it’s at the wrong price for the market. If your staff feel undervalued. If your sales team can’t convert… well, that all goes to a deeper level than PR.

Let’s get this in perspective. PR is an effective and persuasive way to reach out with your message. But the actions behind the words have just got to be there. There’s no hiding behind a miasma of spin.

To put it bluntly, if your house is in the dark, fix the porch light before installing the spotlights.

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Spam – do want spam with that?

Thursday, February 10th, 2011

I’ve been blogging for about 6 months now – usually when I come across something which I think would be good to share. And whilst I hope for the occasional comment, what I truly hadn’t anticipated was the deluge of spam.

Mostly sycophantic, occasionally downright vulgar, I am astonished at their persistence. In the last 10 days alone I’ve had 556 comments, absolutely none of which have any bearing on my blog.

The comments, happily, are swished aside by a very efficient Rottweiler of a programme called Akismet. But as I was sorting through my website today, I thought I’d take a look at just what I was missing. Very little it turned out, but it reinforced an interesting lesson.

In fairness, breadth of the unwanted blurb was astonishing. From lists in Russian, to comments extolling various …er… body enhancing treatments. There were ‘must buy’ acai berry muscle building products, warnings of fatty liver symptoms and free dating sites. Some were random drivel, some blatantly plugging their product with no preamble, but most were rather polite. Clearly insincere, but aimed at flattering a blog owner. Along the lines of “this is the most awesome blog I’ve ever read, man” or “I have looked everywhere for a website which knows everything, and you have written it very clearly” and “wow this is really cool“. I was not fooled.

But it did occur to me that spammers, like all tricksters I guess, think that casing their pitch in gloopy sycophancy will lead to more results. So reader beware. If someone approaches you with praise, offers and products which seem to be too good to be true, you can bet your bottom dollar that they probably are.

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Choosing a PR agency

Saturday, January 15th, 2011

Traditionally, economically challenging times sees a decline in marketing spend. But does this make sense? Of course, I can see that its easier to sack consultants rather than staff… but it does seem counter-intuitive stop telling your audience what you have to offer. Especially during a recession.

Indeed, here at Tigerfish Towers, I’m delighted to say, we have recently had more requests to quote for new business than ever .

Which led me to think about how tough it must be to recruit a PR agency. It’s all very well knowing you need PR, but taking on an agency is a different matter. It’s not that we make it intentionally difficult, it’s just that, well, we’re all going to say that we can do the job.

And frankly, it IS fair to say that most PR agencies can do PR, because if not, they’d rapidly fold. But the big question is… are they the right ones for your business?

Do they have the right contacts? The right ethos? The right knowledge?

I’m a member of the Chartered Institute of Public Relations (CIPR), who run a great PR ‘matchmaker‘ service, to help you to find a suitable consultant or consultancy from their membership database. This link also flags up some great questions to pose to any prospective agency.

But over the 25 years I’ve been in PR, and with the last decade of running my own consultancy, here’s my very top tip for choosing a PR agency…

Choose an agency where you get on with the person who will be working on your account.

Not the person who does the pitch (who you might never see again), but the actual person you will be having day to day dealings with.

Because PR is all about communication. So if you can’t communicate with your PR consultant, how on earth can they communicate well with your publics?

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Are you making the most of radio?

Tuesday, November 9th, 2010

I’ve always been a huge fan of radio. The breadth of news, opinions and entertainment which come through the airways, pretty much for free, wherever you want, are fantastic. Whilst I’m working, or particularly on car journeys, I have a talk-radio station keeping me company.

But what many overlook, is the wonderful PR opportunity that radio offers. In terms of audience reach and credibility, it is a great tool. And lets face it, on the BBC, it’s coverage that no amount of money can buy. Broadcasters are always looking for people who are authoritative on their subject, to have an opinion, to be entertaining, to give listeners something worth hearing. And that person might well be YOU.

So if you are lucky enough to be invited onto the radio, (and I’m assuming it’s not fielding an ‘issues management’ piece ) here are some things to help you prepare for your ‘fifteen minutes of fame‘.

When you know about the interview:

First of all – don’t panic! The presenters want to create good radio, and so it’s just not in their interest (unless on the Today programme!) to reduce you to a stuttering wreck. They are adept at making their interviewees feel at ease.
LISTEN to the programme you’re going to be on, so you know the format and style.
Think of what you might be asked; what your audience would want to hear.
Jot down the top 3 things you want to mention – in the heat of the moment, things can go clear out of your head
Email the show producers some blurb about you – so they have a couple of sentences which will accurately introduce you. (We’ve all heard the sort of format: “….and next is [you], a [your generic job title] from [company] in [place], who will be sharing her experiences of [your area of expertise/hobby/trip etc] with us after this next track…”)
It might be appropriate to send over some background into your experience, or anything which you feel the presenter should know about you, or flag up if something relevant has just cropped up in the news.
Make sure they have your mobile number in case of emergencies/changes of plan
Share the news of your forthcoming interview on LInked In, Twitter, Facebook, on your website – put a link to the ‘listen live’ page if appropriate
Plan your route to the radio station – aim to arrive 30 minutes before your ‘on air’ time, even though you’ll only be invited into the studio 5-10 minutes before (it would be a hideous pressure knowing you were late for something like this!)
If you’re a guest on a chat-style show (along with other guests at the same time) you might want to take in something which would be a talking point – ie. if you make candles, take those in; if you’re talking about an African charity, take some pictures of it in – so the other guests can get more of an idea of your world.
Ask if there will be the opportunity to use photos or links from the programme’s website page afterwards.

10 minutes before you go into the studio:

TURN OFF YOUR MOBILE PHONE
Go to the toilet!
Take some deep breaths to relax your voice

Whilst you’re on air:

Remember, you’re the ‘expert’, so give your opinion
Try to use examples when you explain your field of expertise – it’s much easier for listeners to relate to
I know this sounds basic, but remember, you can’t be seen smiling or just nodding in agreement – make it audible
Don’t ’sell’ your product/service, don’t plug your charity initiative, call for donations etc. Would you want to have that pushed to you if you were the listener? Talk about your cause by all means, talk about your customers, talk about how you developed your business.. .but radio is after the personal angles, not the selling ones.
If you’re asked a question you don’t know the answer to, don’t blag it, or make it up on the spot… admit that you need to get more info – and do.
Take in your ‘top 3 things’ notes – but make sure they’re on a single sheet of paper which you can leave in front of you. It’s not good to be rustling!

Afterwards

A thank you note/email wouldn’t go amiss – there maybe another opportunity and you want to maximise your chances of being asked.
Make some quick notes on what you would improve for next time (whilst it’s still fresh in your mind)
Put out another social media message if appropriate

I believe that, for a good communicator, radio coverage can brilliant PR. In terms of reach, audience and credibility, it’s well worth doing.

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