Famous writer Oscar Wilde once remarked:
"There is only one thing in the world
worse than being talked about, and that is not being talked about."
How true.
Most of the startups or small entrepreneurs are so busy putting their
product or services in place, they often forget to communicate with the people
they should be talking to. At the pre-launch stage itself, the business plan
must also plug in a robust public relations strategy in order to build
relationship with diverse groups of people.
The challenge of course is from where to
begin. How does one put a public relations strategy for the best visibility in
the marketplace? How the company, or for
that matter, the organisation would get perceived?
Here are a five tips to make people talk
about you.
1. Begin with the end in mind. Answer the
'whys'
Why are you in a particular activity,
project, business idea? Why are you doing this?
Till the time, the why is explained, nothing can be achieved. Answers to
'why' bring in the sustainability of any product or service that you may be
building. The 'why' provides the key to
the vision of the enterprise, the ultimate goal and objective, and the human issues
that it intends to tackle. The 'why' helps an organisation build its purpose of
existence and the route it must take to achieve the goals.
2. Define your key stakeholders.
For any enterprise there are set or group of
people who are stakeholders... the people who matter. They can be customers,
prospects, business associates, collaborators, dealers and distributors, the
bankers or investors, etc. All these are
primarily your external audience, with whom you need to interact with
periodically; not essentially face to face, but through a structured periodical
communication using diverse tools that are available today.
The process begins by preparing a list of
such stakeholders. Create their profiles and contact details so that you can
network with them and benefit.
3. USP: What's so unique about you, your
product or service?
The USP emerges once you are able to answer
the 'whys' at the first instance about your organisation, your
product/service. why is your product
important for the users? What challenges it addresses for the people? And how your organisation helps?
4. Talk about it
Keep each stakeholder about the USPs, the
case studies or the success stories. If the story is really newsworthy, share
it with media. Identify the media outlets who would belong to your
product/service vertical and would be interested to carry your story.
5. Acquire Leadership Position:
You are the best person who knows about your
enterprise, your product or service. You
are an expert in your domain. But does
the world knows about it? Start sharing
your knowledge and expertise with the youngsters, students, and those who can
be considered later for working with you.
Network with professional organisations, and your peers, to continue to
train and mentor other professionals.
That would help you catapult into a position where you would be a true
brand ambassador of your domain.
Go ahead.
Just do it.
CJ www.corepr.com
