PR Campaigns to demonstrate value

Showcasing the value of your products and services is a critical aspect of PR campaign planning.

PR campaigns that demonstrate value help your prospects stay engaged as they move down your sales funnel, closer to making a purchase.

The campaigns that do this most effectively, draw attention to both emotional and rational benefits – demonstrating the tangible results of your product or service with data, alongside the emotional wins.

Data-driven thought leadership

Thought leadership content typically either answers questions commonly asked by the target audience, or gives opinions on industry trends.

This type of campaign is a powerful tool to elevate your brand’s reputation as an industry authority. And when it is driven by data, it underpins your authority with a rock solid foundation.

Unique and specific data not only makes for some hard-hitting editorial coverage, but also, creates credible pitches to journalists – helping your campaign stand out amongst the flood of vague articles and ‘fake news’ that currently inundate the media.

Very often, the data underpinning your content can be repurposed from existing business intelligence. For example, instead of investing in new data collection with labour-intensive surveys, mine your existing research for relevant stories, or transform it into unique whitepapers, blog posts, and webinars.

With the dab hand of a designer, your data can add a visual dimension to your content, to enhance its credibility, with charts and infographics.

If possible, consider integrating your data into your own content – as a key part of your marketing. For example, cybersecurity software firm Kaspersky feeds data from its operations to the website—creating an eye-popping interactive visual that brings the virtual battlefield of cybersecurity to life by showing each attack the company detects with brightly coloured beams.

Promote your PR Case Studies

Case studies offer the clearest demonstration of value by proving that your product does what it claims to.

This single, yet very effective,  marketing tool can fulfil multiple objectives—answering questions about the product to address hesitation, demonstrating use to alleviate concerns that the solution might not work, and delivering social proof by associating the brand with reputable customers.

Case studies that are effective in Illustrating both the emotional and tangible benefits often employ storytelling techniques to frame the customer journey.

In PR case studies, this narrative arc can be used to show the struggles and the problem that your customer is experiencing, and then how your product or service helped the customer overcome it.

Because stories are more memorable than pure data, your stories will remain lodged in the mind of prospects for longer, and have a more powerful impact on the perception of your brand.

Editorial PR case studies

Case studies sharing the positive impact that your company has had on clients are more hard-hitting when placed in trusted publications. Earned media is widely considered to be the most trusted form of advertising, with 92% of consumers trusting editorial articles, while only 50% trust paid ads.

Editorial case studies are typically less data-driven and more focused on sharing experiences than sales case studies, but play a key role in keeping your brand or product top of mind during the consideration phase with placements in trusted publications.

PR Referrals and endorsements

Referrals are some of the most valuable leads that it is possible to acquire, and the right PR campaign can play a key role in maximising the chances of referrals by publicly demonstrating the value of your brand.

Social media has hugely amplified the ability to win reputation-based referrals. Previously, a pleased customer might have mentioned your brand in conversation for a couple of weeks after buying.  Now, they can post online where it can have a bigger, more immediate ripple effect and remain in place for months  .

Placing content on social media is a critical part of generating a broader, positive consideration about the brand, and nurturing the goodwill that will eventually create referrals to boost your bottom line.