B – T – B Copy Clinic

Public relations as a direct response tool

MANY companies that routinely spend thousands to generate inquiries through paid advertising and direct mail ignore one of the most cost-effective lead-generation tools available to the business-to-business marketer: public relations.

Sure, a lot of companies send out press releases by the carload. But they don't think of public relations as a direct response tool — which it is. As a result, they settle for "ink," when they could have something much, much better:

Response.

Okay, Let's say you want to use public relations to generate response, not just get your name before the buying public. Here are some tricks of the trade.

Always have an offer — Like a good direct mail package, every press release should have an offer: something the publication's readers can send for, either for free or for money.

Even if the press release is not primarily a direct marketing tool, the closing paragraphs should contain an offer of some kind. For example, the closing paragraphs of a press release announcing the delivery of your 1,000th TPS-43 Radar System should say: "For a free 16-page bulletin on the TPS-43 Radar System, write to Anderson Defense Industries, Anytown USA. Request Bulletin ADI-20." I find that editors will frequently publish a short blurb describing your free offer even if they ignore the rest or your release.

One step further — Taking this idea one step further, you can profitably generate a high volume of response by building an entire press release around your offer.

Gary Blake, director of The Communication Workshop (New York, NY), took this approach with a press release offering a poster showing examples of poor business writing, which he terms "instit-utionitis." The release begins:

SPECIALISTS URGE BYPASS,

EDUCATION, AND EARLY DETECTION IN TREATING CORPORATE AMERICA'S #1 COMMUNICATION

PROBLEM: INSTITUTIONITIS

NEW YORK; NY — "Institutionitis" — the use of overly formal, pompous, and antiquated phrases in business communications — is now at "epidemic proportions." That's the opinion of writing specialists at the Center for Diseased Language Control who are urging managers to treat hedgy, pompous and antiquated phrases with methods of early detection, education, and "word bypass" surgery.

The closing paragraph read:

Since prevention is the ultimate cure of Institutionitis, The Communication Workshop has produced a poster showing dozens of examples of the disease. To receive a poster, send your name, title, organization, and address to The Communication Workshop, 217 East 85th St., New York, NY 10028. Please enclose $1.50 per poster to cover postage and handling.

A few weeks after it was mailed, the release was picked up as a one-paragraph item in USA TODAY. It mentioned the poster offer. Within a week, Gary received more than 300 orders from that one pick-up alone.

Do you offer a free or low-cost booklet, report, article reprint, or other useful material to potential prospects and clients? Send out a release on your material and watch the replies come pouring in!

Be creative One reason so many releases fail to gain even a single pick-up is that they contain no news. Mass-produced by bored public relations writers who have no enthusiasm for the marketing of the product they are writing about, the majority of press releases smack of the routine and offer nothing of interest to editors or their readers.

The solution? Create your own news. In direct mail, the best copy in the world will fail if there isn't a well thought-out offer behind it. In the same way, brilliant public relations writing only works if it's built around a news peg or feature-worthy idea.

Consider Alan Caruba's problem: How could he distinguish himself from the many independent consultants offering public relations advice and services. The solution? Create the PR Hot line (201/763-6392), a nationwide hot line people can call to get consultation on their PR problems over the telephone.

By sending out a release on the PR hot line (rather than one that merely described his PR firm), Alan says he has generated "strong initial interest" and many hot line calls. Instead of waiting for something newsworthy to come across his path, Alan has created his own news.

Alan's release begins:

PR BY THE NUMBERS

Mike Wallace of 60 Minutes is at the door with a camera crew! What do you do now?

The "interactive" article — Writing and publishing articles in the trade press has long been recognized as an excellent way of building your reputation and establishing credibility for your firm.

But now, smart marketers like Dr. Jeffrey Lant are taking this one step further, turning their published articles into response-builders as well as image-builders.

How does he do it? First, Lant says he ends each article with a paragraph telling readers what action to take to solve their business problems (especially those discussed in the article).

Next, in the author's biography traditionally published at the bottom of articles, Lant suggests that you write a brief but complete description of your product or service, and how the reader can get in touch with you — including your company name, address, and phone number.

"Sure, it's longer than the usual blurb. Sure, some publications won't give it to you. But fight for it," advises Lain in his new book, Money Making Marketing (Cambridge, MA: JLA Publications, 617 547-6372. “The essence of marketing is getting the prospect to trust you and to make it easy for him to take action when he does.”

As Lant points out, the best way to get this kind of response information published with your articles is simply to ask for it. Write your own capsule biography, complete with address and phone number, and append it to every article you submit for publication. Don’t worry about the magazine’s policy or turning off editors. After all, the worst they can do is say no.