How To PR Like A Pro: Writing for PR
Hire Space has partnered with davies tanner to bring practical advice and takeaways on brand communications and PR (public relations) to its venue members.
With each newsletter, the ‘How to PR Like a Pro’ series will give our member venues the opportunity to get personalised advice on topics covered in the series of insightful articles by emailing your questions to hirespace@daviestanner.com. The articles will cover a range of useful topics, from how to write impactful PR content, to maximising the chances of getting media coverage, to manage your brand’s reputation and crisis communications.
Our last article focussed on the power of PR and its ability to set a business apart from competitors. This article will take it one step further as it delves into the strategic planning behind writing strong, compelling PR content, which can land media coverage for your venue in key publications, and help you reach target audiences.
How to write like a PR pro
Writing is still the most important skill in today’s digital world. Many industries rely on strong writing. Within the PR and communications industry, writing responsibilities can vary. We may be writing a news release, a newsletter article or a blog. Or we may be scripting video content, writing speeches, drafting social media content or writing biographies for key spokespeople. Here are some of our tips to give you an insight into writing effective and purposeful PR content:
Associated Press style
Most journalists and PRs use this style, based on the Associated Press Stylebook. As the foundation for journalistic writing, this style focuses on achieving the best possible accuracy and consistency to make content easily read and understood by readers. This translates to the PR arena because a consistent style improves readability, but also drives brand recognition, and it gives us a common language with journalists.
Find your “Ws”
Our role as professional communicators is to consider strategy before execution, so every piece of written, audio or video content must start with “why?” it’s relevant; “what?” it’s trying to achieve; and “who?” your audience is. PR focuses on building relationships between organisations and people, so it’s difficult to forge or grow a relationship without knowing who these people are.
For larger initiatives or campaigns, more in-depth research is needed to explore other information relevant to development of a strong strategy, such as new leadership, a major rebrand, a merger or another significant milestone for your venue. This information will support development of messaging, visuals, platforms and channels tailored to your target audience.
Understand your brand
All PR content should be based on a clear and unified understanding of your organisation’s brand. Consider iconic and established brands like Coca Cola or Apple. Emotions and images come to mind immediately as you mention them. A firm understanding of your brand translates into greater consistency with messaging, images and style that build trust and relatability with customers.
Strategic messaging
We live in a world of message overload, constantly being ‘bombarded’ with new emails, social media posts and app notifications. With so many messages coming at us all the time, it takes serious strategy and creativity to cut through the clutter. In order to deliver successful PR content, you need to plug into what your audience really wants, cares about or needs, while staying true to your brand and keeping your goals the priority.
As venue directors or managers, you may have many other urgent tasks to handle, and spending three hours on a blog post seems like a luxury no one can afford. However, if you want PR writing that conveys brand loyalty and increases awareness, you need to give content the attention and time it deserves.
If it sounds impossible, go for quality over quantity. Post less often, but make sure when you do post, it’s something that is worthwhile. Each post you publish needs to provide answers to people, food for thought, or an interesting video to share with friends. Quality will never let you down, so devote ample time to your PR writing or have PR experts do the work for you.
What's coming next?
In our next newsletter article, we’ll focus on “How to maximise media coverage for your venue – media relations”. We invite you to submit your questions at hirespace@daviestanner.com by 1st November. For privacy purposes, we will name organisations when providing answers.
About davies tanner
davies tanner is an independent specialist PR agency dedicated to delivering tailor made, engaging and powerful brand communication strategies and campaigns for the travel, tourism and hospitality industry. As specialists in launching and repositioning venues, hotels and destinations, we have strong media contacts and extensive influencer relationships, and are proud to work with some of the most respected, trusted and recognised hotel, venue, restaurant, destination, spa and golf brands across the UK, Europe and Asia Pacific regions. To find out more, visit daviestanner.com or call Andra Miclaus on 01892 619 100.