Leveraging PR
To Build Your Brand
Presented by
Lou Hoffman
The Hoffman Agency
June 9, 2010
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Defining the Word “Brand”
What your target stakeholders
think about you at the gut level
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Defining the Word “Brand”
Tough to Differentiate in a Sea of Sameness
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Three Fundamentals
For Differentiating Your Brand
Public relations
Capitalize on “owned” media
Storytelling
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Generating Media Coverage
Through Public Relations
Stakeholder Perception
Winning organization
Expertise
Cachet
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Generating Media Coverage
Through Public Relations
The News Release
Journalists Possible
Offline
Press Online
Press
Release Press
Coverage
Editors Coverage
Syndication
Online
Google/Yahoo! News Press
Coverage
Social Bookmarking
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Generating Media Coverage
Through Public Relations
The News Release: Distribution Services
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Generating Media Coverage
Through Public Relations
The News Release: Distribution Services
The News Release: Content
– Strive to align announcement
with a business issue
– Apply journalistic style to copy
– Headline + first paragraph
– Hyperlink category (not name) to your website
• Wrong: … Smith Advisors, an independent financial
advisor based in Monterey, CA
• Right: … Smith Advisors, an independent financial
advisor based in Monterey, CA
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How Do Your Potential Prospects
Search on the Category?
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Generating Media Coverage
Through Public Relations
Relationship-building: Target Media
Local
Publications
Prospect Reach
National
Financial Financial
Planner Publications
Publications
Circulation
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Generating Media Coverage
Through Public Relations
Relationship-building: Target Media
Recognize how reporters are measured
– Cover markets and issues
– Differentiate stories through information
not in the public domain
– “Disc jockey” metric
Your assets (from a reporter’s perspective)
– Expertise in financial investments/planning
– Opinions with street cred
– Access the average Joe/Joanne
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Generating Media Coverage
Through Public Relations
Sample Outreach: Fox Business News
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THE HOFFMAN AGENCY
Generating Media Coverage
Through Public Relations
Sample Outreach: Fox Business News
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THE HOFFMAN AGENCY
Generating Media Coverage
Through Public Relations
Sample Outreach: Fox Business News
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Generating Media Coverage
Through Public Relations
Sample Outreach: U.S. News and World Report
Joni Clark, chief investment strategist for Loring Ward,
says bond investors need to think about the long term.
“If you’re a shareholder in a bond fund, you actually want
interest rates to rise because you’re effectively a lender
and you want higher yields,” she says. “When an interest
rate rises, after the initial price shock, it will benefit bond
investors in the long term.”
Clark generally recommends that investors stick to short-
term bond funds. “If you’re investing in a short-term bond
fund, there’s a lot more turnover in that bond fund because
you’ve got short-term maturity bonds, and they’re
continuously maturing and the principal is being taken
and reinvested,” Clark says. Long-term funds are more
vulnerable because of the time it takes for the bonds
to mature.
Those who are investing without a specific time horizon are
the ones who are most likely to be hurt by a rise in rates.
For instance, if you need money in two years, Clark says
you shouldn’t invest in funds that have longer than a
two-year duration. “The only person it’s really going to hurt
is that person that’s going to need the money in two years
and maybe they were invested in a five-year duration
BOND FUND,” she says. “It could hurt them, but as long as
an investor is in there for a longer period of time, and the
time horizon is greater than the duration of their bond
fund, they’re going to be fine and their income will offset
[price declines] over time.”
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Generating Media Coverage
Through Public Relations
Contributed Articles: Tie to Macro Issue
Number of Articles Incorporating “Retirement Planning” (Factiva)
3,444
3,500 3,256 3,299
3,019
3,000 2,705
2,500 2,303 2,260
1,931
2,000
1,500
1,065 979
1,000
500
0
2000 2001 2002 2003 2004 2005 2006 2007 2008 2009
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Generating Media Coverage
Through Public Relations
Contributed Articles:
Tie to Timely Issue
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Generating Media Coverage
Through Public Relations
Contributed Articles:
Tie to Timely Issue
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Capitalize on “Owned” Media
Consider the “Media” Under Your Control
Website Sales literature
E-mails Advertisements
Blogs News releases
Presentations Etc.
Letters
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Capitalize on “Owned” Media
Revisiting the Quality of “Trust”
Website
– “About” section
– Content that helps your clients make better
decisions (as opposed to content that sells your
services)
– Blogging
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Capitalize on “Owned” Media
Website “About” Section
XXXX is an independent XXXX is your professional XXXX is an independent,
wealth management firm partner for managing your fee-only financial advisory
based in XXXX that serves financial affairs. Because firm based in XXXX.
select clients throughout we are totally independent We help individuals and
the country. We offer – not affiliated with any families develop an
objective, fee-only other firm and therefore inspiring vision of their
investment counsel and not receiving compensation financial future and a
financial planning, using from the sale of any realistic strategy to achieve
the resources found in a financial products – it. Combining investment
large firm, while giving you you get unbiased, management with broad
the personal attention customized financial financial planning, we
expected from a smaller blueprints specifically simplify our clients’ lives,
one. Our goal is simple: designed to turn your protect their resources, and
To make sure our clients dreams into reality. Since help them stay on track to
feel confident and risk is an unavoidable realize their most important
comfortable where their element of any investment, personal goals.
financial future is risk management is at the
concerned. core of the firm’s values
and investment approach.
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Capitalize on “Owned” Media
Website “About” Section
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Capitalize on “Owned” Media
Buffett’s Shareholder Letters
Showcase Gift for Storytelling
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The Power of Storytelling
Storytelling Gets a Bad Wrap in Business
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The Power of Storytelling
Techniques
Conversational language
Anecdotes
Context
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The Power of Storytelling
A Few Closing Thoughts
“Everyone has a natural detector
for psychological realism.”
Raymond A. Mar
Assistant Professor of Psychology
York University in Toronto.
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The End
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