Building awareness is critical for business success. Since people can’t buy from companies they don’t know exist, business owners rely on marketing to promote their products.

However, public relations (PR) can be more effective than advertising. Ask any influencer or celebrity with a skincare, hair care, or clothing brand. They get free business publicity whenever they make headline news.

PR refers to activities that promote and nurture a positive brand identity among target audiences. It can be as simple as a witty response to a social media post. You don’t need deep pockets or connections to mainstream media. Businesses of any size can create press around their brands and influence how the public perceives them.

This article explores four simple business strategies to garner positive publicity for your business.

Why Does Your Business Need Publicity?

The PR field has changed over the years. Big brands dominated during the heyday of traditional media. They had the budget and connections to journalists and news outlets that shaped public opinion.

That’s not the case anymore. Thankfully.

Social media sites opened a direct and instant line of communication between companies and customers.

While the way businesses run publicity campaigns has changed, the reasons for PR haven’t. You still need to garner business publicity for the following reasons.

Build awareness among target audiences
Publicity introduces your brand to broader audiences. Partnering with a travel influencer for a food and drink PR campaign gives you access to their followers who might not have known about your brand.
That’s a nice example of using PR to build brand awareness. And the more people recognize your brand, the more they consider you when making buying decisions.
Create ongoing dialog and improve engagement
Publicity creates opportunities for engagement. For example, a new report about your charity event can drive conversations about your brand and values in digital and traditional media. The more people talk about your brand, the more they interact with it.
Increase sales and business prospects
Publicity does more than manage your brand image. It impacts your bottom line.
First, it puts newsworthy content in front of a target audience, generating quality leads.
Second, positive narratives around your business build trust, which increases sales. An Edelman Trust Barometer report shows that 88% of buyers consider trust an important purchasing factor.

4 Ways to Increase Positive Publicity for Your Business

Before you tackle publicity for business, I recommend having a public relations strategy in place. Publicity campaigns don’t work well without a well-crafted plan about what you hope to achieve and how you plan to achieve it.

A PR strategy defines your goals, identifies target audiences, guides content creation, and monitors campaign success. Once your plan is in place, you can build relationships with the following stakeholders.

1. Make Friends with the User
Your customer base is a great source of positive business publicity. When loyal customers advocate for your business, they improve your brand’s visibility and image among their peers.

Social proof is incredibly effective because customer stories add authenticity and trustworthiness to your brand. According to a much-referenced Nielsen report, 92% of customers trust recommendations from friends and family above all other forms of advertising.

You can harness social proof to generate publicity for your business in various ways.

Customer testimonials
Encourage customers to leave positive reviews and feature them on customer touchpoints like your Google Business profile, product pages, and social media channels.

Beauty brand COSRX uses Instagram’s highlights section to share video reviews, before and after pictures and users’ skincare routines with their products.

Customer reviews don’t always fall on your lap. You must collect reviews by adding feedback forms on your website, chatbots, social media, and email.

What about in-person interactions at trade fairs or community events? Carrying a digital business card can be handy. You can add a QR code or link to your preferred review platform along with the contact details. Explore Uniqode’s digital business cards to create these customizable cards. This makes it much easier for folks to rate and review your brand.

User-generated content

User-generated content is a free publicity goldmine. It helps you use authentic content that resonates with target audiences, build customer loyalty through engagement, and increase brand visibility.

Many viral trends involve user-generated content. For instance, Weetabix went viral in 2022 when social media users shared the breakfast recipes.

The hashtag #overnightweetabix generated thousands of posts with millions of views.

Similarly, you can create a social media campaign or challenge where users upload and tag a video using your product. Who knows? You might be the next viral trend.

Referral program

Creating a referral program with incentives is a low-cost way to boost business publicity. When target customers purchase products or services using the referrer’s unique code, the referrer receives a reward in discounts, cash, or access to premium features. Use A/B testing to experiment with different incentives, messaging, and referral structures to see what drives the most conversions.
Check out PayPal’s referral offer.

PayPal awards customers up to $100 in rewards for referring their friends. The best referral strategy offers incentives for existing and potential customers, PayPal offers both parties $10 when the referee signs up for an account and sends $5 within 30 days.

Note that these publicity strategies succeed when you give customers something good to promote. Offering high-quality products and services and a stellar customer experience is a good start.

2. Make Friends with the Media
Just because social media allows you to bypass journalists doesn’t mean you should. Statistics show that press releases rank higher than company websites, social media, and spokespeople in trustworthiness.

Building strong relationships with the press secures media coverage for your brand and increases the likelihood that they will speak (or write) favorably.

Let’s say a negative comment about your brand goes viral. Journalists with whom you have good relationships may write sympathetically about you. Or, at the very least, give you a chance to comment about the issue before they publish their story.

The first step in building relationships with the media is identifying which publications your target audience reads. Your best bets are local media and publications that cover your industry. Once you’ve shortlisted relevant outlets, contact individual reporters and editors directly to pitch a story or share a press release.

Reaching out to journalists is easier than ever because many have social media profiles. I don’t recommend sending cold pitches.

Reporters receive hundreds of leads for newsworthy events. Your story will be buried if you don’t take strategic action. That includes following their social accounts and engaging with their content.

54% of PR professionals follow journalists on social media platforms before pitching to them. It allows them to understand the reporter’s interest, gauge their writing style, tailor pitches, and build rapport.

Another way to build relationships with the press is by helping them. Platforms like Qwoted connect brands with journalists looking for industry experts. You can also search #journorequests on X.

See the example below.

The tag is general. So, you have to combine the hashtag with industry-specific terms to find posts relevant to your niche industry.

Making yourself available keeps you top-of-mind when they need expert quotes or news stories.

3. Make Friends with Influencers

Partnering with influencers can do wonders for business publicity. In addition to access to thousands of targeted customers, they lend you the trust and credibility they’ve built with audiences.

The key to successful influencer marketing is relevance. Check out the example below.

Bombas is an apparel brand on a mission to help homeless people. For every item purchased, they donate a similar item to community organizations like shelters and transitional living facilities. They partner with content creators who share their values of community outreach. The above creator cleans and restores neglected properties for free.

Another factor is resonance.

Resonance refers to the influencer’s engagement rate. There’s no point partnering with mega influences if they’re not active. You won’t get the engagement you want. Moreover, influencer fraud is growing, and you risk wasting your efforts on creators with inflated follower counts. Instead, consider micro-influencers with small but highly engaged followings.

So, how do you make friends with influencers?

It helps if they’re already your customers. But don’t worry if that’s not your situation. Content creators are always looking for partnerships.

Like media relationship building, you want to follow and engage with the influencer’s content before pitching a collaboration. That shows them you’re interested in their brand, and you can see how they can potentially promote your products.

The nature of the partnership will vary. Some influencers accept free samples, while others prefer a percentage of the sales they drive.

4. Make Friends with Other Businesses
The benefits of creating business alliances are access to larger audiences and borrowed credibility.
You can collaborate with other businesses in various ways, including:

Cross-promote each other’s products
Co-host events
Co-create content or products

Doritos and Taco Bell took the third approach with the creation of Locos Tacos.

Other famous co-branding partnerships include Starbucks & Spotify, GoPro & Red Bull, and Crocs & Balenciaga.

The brand you choose doesn’t have to be in the same industry. However, they should complement your business, align with your values, and have a similar target market. Even local service brands—like those exploring small business partnership opportunities in home improvement industries—can benefit from co-branded marketing to boost exposure and credibility.

For instance, an appliance company and Farmer’s Market could co-host a community cooking class to generate positive publicity for both businesses.

Conclusion
If you’re not using PR to increase brand visibility, you’re missing out on an effective way to reach customers. Today’s customers are wise to traditional marketing games, so businesses must pivot to deliver authentic messages about their brand.

That’s where PR comes in. PR is more than press releases. Your interactions with your customers, the media, influencers, and other businesses impact how the public perceives your brand.

You can generate positive business publicity by sharing customer reviews, providing expert commentary in articles, partnering with the right influencer, and co-hosting an event with another business.

Nothing is stopping you from using PR for business. With the right strategies, you can spread the good word about your brand, reach your target audience, and increase revenue. Be patient and consistent. PR is a long game that centers around building relationships.

Written by Chris Norton, host of Embracing Marketing Mistakes, a UK Top 10 marketing podcast that celebrates marketing fails, and Founder of award-winning B2C specialist PR agency Prohibition. His social media training blog is listed in the UK's top 10 PR blogs. For tons of digital PR tips, you can follow Chris here @chris_norton.