Which form of marketing is best to create awareness for your brand? Advertising or publicity?
You may be asking...there's a difference?
Big difference...one that could make your business explode with committed followers excited to build it for you.
Simplified, advertising is a form of mass communication efforts designed to create awareness for your product or service in an effort to convince the consumer to purchase said product or service. It says "this is what we do and here's how it will benefit your life" all in 30 seconds on TV/radio or less as you're paging through a magazine. In a sense, it's throwing your service out there to as many people as possible and hoping there's some stickiness to it. In my opinion, a rather outside-in approach...fairly random, usually very expensive with returns that are hit or miss.
Publicity, on the other hand, is usually more focused, more inside out...targeted messages that are usually inexpensive, stickier and are farther reaching in establishing your brand identity. Publicity usually shows up as TV news interviews, op-ed pieces in the newspaper, articles done on your business for magazines and newspapers, testimonials given on your facebook, website, in public gatherings, in house and external presentations, etc.
Big businesses have been built by focusing almost exclusively on publicity over advertising. Starbucks, especially during its massive phase of growth, spent very little on advertising (only about $10M over 10 years) and The Body Shop, started by Anita Roddick, who spent years criss-crossing the country, promoting her natural products through TV interviews and newspaper articles. Wal-Mart and Sam's Club devote very little of their expenses to advertising, yet may be the first company to reach over a trillion dollars in revenues.
To me, publicity is more of a call to action, it's the story behind the service you're providing. It establishes you as the leader of a revolution in health. It's intriguing, and if done right, downright captivating.
And who has a better story for humanity than we do?
Go out and tell it.
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Anita Roddick once said, "If you think you are too small to make an impact, try going to bed with a mosquito."
ReplyDeleteThey key to getting publicity is knowing how to get it. It's not as simple as sending a press release to your local newspaper reporter and hoping to land an interview. Your efforts must incorporate multiple media outlets if it is to have any major impact and staying power. This should include newspaper, radio, tv and internet media.
ReplyDeleteThere's an art to creating a press release that gets attention. There are specific steps in the formula that must be followed or else your efforts will go unnoticed.
My members are taught the formula that gets them a ton of free publicity. Then there shown how using free publicity even outside of there local market can be used in many different ways to get you in front of more new prospective patients.
Who'd a thought that getting a story written about you in a newspaper that's out of the state you practice could help to bring you more new prospective patients.
Brian,
ReplyDeleteAgain good thoughts...As a student I have yet to give consideration as to the art of issuing press releases... I would be interested in hearing more from Dr. Beckner regarding that...
Maybe a thought for a future article could be things we should change in the branding of our profession..re: your last article..
For instance is it a good approach to have patients call us Dr. First Name... Do we lose a level of proffessionalism that other physicians have bc we utilize certain tactics?
Dear Anonymous:(,
ReplyDeletePublicity should not be the main stay of your marketing efforts. It can be a part of your marketing plan that should be incorporating marketing that can be accurately tracked and held accountable. Topic for another time. As it relates specifically to your question about the art of issuing press releases:
Biggest Mistake chiropractors make is issuing press releases that no one cares about. Anytime I write a press release I spend 90% of my time on the headline. The headline is what grabs the attention of the person reading it. Good test is the "Who Cares Test". After coming up with the headline if you can't answer the question "Who Cares" then it is a very weak topic.
How to issue the press release should use fax, mail and email distribution and online services. I even teach my members to rely on what's called "lumpy mailer" approach. Read more about lumpy mail at lumpymail.com. This is designed to get your press release to stand out from the thousands of releases that come across the desk of reporters daily by using lumpy mail pieces.
As for using out of area papers I recommend this for those new to the press release game. This gives you the experience of how to go about getting free publicity before you roll out your efforts on your local market. When you land a story in an out of area magazine or paper you can use those stories for internal marketing campaigns, patient newsletters, automated email sequences with a link to the online article etc.
I highly recommend you visit Paul Hartunians free publicity site specifically:
http://www.hartunian.com/mistake.html
Hope this gets the wheels turning for ya!