Limitless
Limitless Public Relations

Creating powerful brand messages that matter: know your ABCs

Posted on by Michael Gregory

There are millions of ways to describe an approach to communications-thinking, but whether it’s a public health campaign or a drive to sell more of your products, your audiences need to understand your brand messages easily and quickly.

We have a simple but effective process to test brand or campaign messages in a three-stage filter:

Accuracy

It has to be accurate.  Just has to be. Your target audiences, whether in a B2C or B2B environment, want promises to match their expectations. And they have many ways to check what you say is accurate. And true.

Advice: Check, check and check again.

Brevity

Don’t overstay your welcome with a message. Make it brief. If you can’t make it succinct and reduce it to a few words, it’s likely that it’s too complex for your audience. You can expand later, but for getting attention, be brief.

Advice: Use the delete button wherever you can and don’t be too smart.

Clarity

Be clear. Use straightforward language, appropriate to the audience. If it’s red, say it’s red; not a delicious splash of vibrant crimson.

Advice: Test your message on a colleague. Is it clear first time?

Want to know how we can help develop your key messages? Feel free to drop us a line or sign up for regular informative tips and advice.

The wisdom of crowds and the power of ‘buzz’

Posted on by Michael Gregory

One thing that Greg Wilson learnt early in his career, even before he was in public relations, was that people follow the crowd…

As a graduate in the late 90s looking for my first marketing job, I naively came up with the idea that if I could get my mates’ band a record deal, it would look amazing on my CV. I dutifully got a whole load of CDs printed and developed a “promotional pack” to send out to record company A&Rs, inviting them to a “showcase gig” at a renowned A&R pub in Camden. I hammered the phones asking if my beautiful promo packs had been received, did they like the CD? Were they coming to the gig? Several said yes. But on the big day, to massive disappointment, all-round, not one record company showed.

When I called to ask why, I remember one particularly honest response. The promo pack was very nice, he said. He even really liked the CD, but he was only ever really interested in coming to see bands who already have some “buzz”. Put simply, “selling” a band to a record company doesn’t work. Not unless they’ve already heard that you’re one to watch.

When that happens, the direction of travel is reversed. Bands with “buzz” often ended up with record companies fighting to sign them up, to the utter dismay and disbelief of all the other bands who are pitching themselves so relentlessly.

This was an early lesson that the perceived “wisdom of crowds” trumps salesmanship and fantastic marketing every time, no matter how beautiful your sales pitch is.

But how exactly do you define “buzz”? Well following the music business example, it was hearing the band’s name from venue owners, promoters, sometimes rival artists – basically anybody who didn’t have a vested interest in the band’s success – before receiving the CD and gig date. It was about being seen to already have fans. A following, if you like.

After more than 20 years in the public relations profession, the same still goes. If your buyers can see evidence of your greatness, outside of what you are telling them directly, they will follow that crowd wisdom – and buy-in to all your empirical evidence that you are the right choice.

This is the lesson for sales and marketers who are unsure about the value of PR. Hone your marketing and your sales pitch all you like. But if you want to be a superstar, make sure you have the “buzz” to back it up. Be the one to watch before you try to sell, and selling will suddenly seem easy.

In fact, they may just come to you.

Limitless rebrands to support expansion plans

Posted on by Michael Gregory

Limitless has undergone rebrand of it’s visual identity to mark the start of a five-year growth plan for the agency.

The strategic public relations and brand communications agency is to expand nationally and internationally through organic growth, joint ventures and acquisitions. 

Michael Gregory, who joined Limitless alongside existing directors Greg Wilson and Richard Slater in November 2020, said: “The pandemic provided us with a chance to recalibrate the business, focus on what we do best and rebrand our identity. And that’s to help our clients be known for what they want to be known for.

“It’s a simple proposition and one that gets to the heart of the matter. It helps us to shape campaigns that achieve clients’ brand and communication objectives.

“The next five years are going to be exciting for us and all our partners. We’ve got realistic plans in place to grow the business domestically and internationally. We’re talking to like-minded partners in the UK and Europe, to collaborate or form structured partnerships that will benefit clients.

“Our growth will be fuelled by doing an excellent job for clients. That’s the sure-fire way of getting to where we want to be.”

Get in touch HERE to book an initial free of charge strategy session.

Are you making the most of LinkedIn?

Posted on by Michael Gregory

Launched in 2003, LinkedIn is the dominant social media for the business world. Now owned by Microsoft, as of December 2020, LinkedIn has 760 million registered members from over 150 countries.

In our digitally led-world, it’s the place to engage with likeminded professionals, build your network and establish commercial relationships.

Our social media strategists can help you use LinkedIn effectively with our bespoke training programmes. These workshops will help you make the most of this important business networking platform.

We also deliver LinkedIn training modules and cover the following:

  • LinkedIn Basics – how to get started
  • Creating a profile that works – making sure you stand out from the crowd
  • Using LinkedIn – mastering LinkedIn to build your networks
  • Company pages – how to set up a company profile and make it work for your organisation
  • LinkedIn content strategies – how to create a calendar of compelling content
  • LinkedIn advertising – how it works and measuring activity

If you’d like to know more, drop us a line at enquiries@limitlesspr.co.uk

Why a strong brand is crucial if you’re thinking of selling your business

Posted on by Michael Gregory

The joys about working in the public relations industry are that we often get involved with interesting projects and people. One of the projects we enjoy most is when a client is looking to sell their business.

It’s a bit like turkeys voting for Christmas. Once we know the client has reached an agreement to sell their business, we’ll undoubtedly lose them. However, we love these projects.

The work we do helps our clients increase the value of their business. A business with a strong brand, an excellent reputation and a high media profile will undoubtedly attract more buyers than a company that, while it is very good at what it does, has a low brand profile.  

Like most things, there is a flip side to this. There are very savvy investors looking for a great business with relatively low brand profile. They acquire it and then start building the brand to achieve a higher valuation when they come to sell. And nine times out of ten, they’ll succeed. The simplest way to put it, is polishing the business and making it shiny for sale.

Strong brands always have perceived value. Think of mega-brands such as Virgin, Nike, Rolls Royce or Tesla. These businesses are worth a lot of money not just because of their products but the brand and how it has been executed. However, many organisations are now realising it’s not just the preserve of those companies to have valuable brands. Smaller businesses are just as reliant on their brand, in fact, more so as they’ll want to attract new customers.

Investing in the brand from the outset is vital if you want to grow a sustainable and attractive business. If your business has a strong brand its more likely to help increase the price paid for a business.

We aren’t saying that having a decent brand is going to be the answer to generating an excellent company valuation; a strong brand comes into being if it has a brand purpose which feeds the culture of the business and is focussed on delivering a great product or service. It’s why major companies spend millions on developing their brands and building positive brand experiences.

When selling a business, there’ll always be several factors to take into consideration that will influence the value. Generally, a company is worth anywhere between one to potentially five times net profit. Fundamentally, it’s only worth what someone is willing to pay for it.

There are various of schools of thoughts on how to value a business, but it can be argued that a recognisable and valued brand will help to drive a value up. Why? Because it shows investors that they’ll be taking over a business already primed for success.

So, if you’re a business owner that’s thinking about building your brand, drop us a line to see if we can help you achieve an increase in your company’s brand value.  

For informal chat, email Michael Gregory.

Why public relations helps remove fear

Posted on by Michael Gregory

Listening to some words of wisdom from wonderful award-winning sales training firm Sales Geek, I learnt a simple equation for sales. 

Need + Value – Fear = Sales

When you see it laid out like that, it seems so simple, like one of those things that is so obviously true when you see it, you can’t believe you’ve never heard it before.

To achieve sales, you need to establish who has a need, demonstrate the value you can provide in meeting that need, and take away the fear of going ahead.

While the beautiful logic of it looks so simple, there is, of course, a huge amount of process that goes into achieving success with those three factors. Need, as identified in the equation, can basically be translated as lead generation. Whatever you do for lead generation, be it SEO, networking, mailshotting, you’re basically establishing who has a need for what you do or sell.

Value is easily translated as sales conversion. Whatever you do to convert those leads into sales, be it your website UX, or your hotshot in a Mondeo with the awesome literature, you’re demonstrating your value and the specifics of why you are better than your competitor.

But how do you take away the fear?

You can build a process for lead generation and a follow-up process for sales conversion. But take away the fear? Where is the process for that? How can you have a process for something so ethereal?

You could argue that that’s the stuff of magic. And it is, and I do. It’s the magic of brand awareness, or to use another term, PR. Good old-fashioned PR. Being famous, sometimes seemingly for being famous’ sake. Therein lies the magic. It’s what great brands and great companies are built on. Brand awareness is about taking way the fear.

It’s about being the salesperson from the famous brand against the salesperson from the unknown quantity. It’s about being the website you’ve already heard of, not the sidebar scrabbler. It’s about being the obvious choice from the outset. It’s why big brands do it, and why they are big brands. Say hello to public relations and goodbye to buyer fear.

If you’d like to know more about how public relations can help build your brand, drop us a line

Why you should create a powerful brand purpose

Posted on by Claire Stephenson

The days of telling your audiences your organisation, product or service is the best thing since sliced bread are well and truly over. In fact, that concept probably ended when Apple famously launched its ‘Think Different’ campaign in 1997. You’ll still find that campaign message on some Apple products demonstrating its power.

As consumers, we’re continually bombarded with brand messages and not all of them well thought out. Plus, we’re much savvier about who we want to engage with. We’re just not that easily won over anymore.

We want to know what a brand stands for and if it resonates with our individual values and needs. It’s vital when looking to engage with your audiences, your brand messages are authentic and born from a profound purpose.   

Brands communicating their purpose are arguably more successful in engaging with their audiences, and it’s not just the preserve of big brands. Organisations realising that defining a purpose helps cultivate a point of difference. A brand purpose has to be genuine though because consumers can see through the hasty box ticked brand message.

It’s not new thinking. If you want to know more about this, then read of Simon Sinek’s book, Start With Why, which he wrote 11 years ago. In it, he says people are more likely to buy into a product, service, cause or movement when they understand the ‘why’ behind it.

It’s a powerful concept, but it doesn’t stop there. Once you’ve defined your ‘why’ , it’ll need to play a central function in shaping brand messages and what you want to be known for.  

At Limitless, we’re big on this. Before devising a brand communications strategy, we help clients define their purpose pinpointing what they want to be known for. Based on research and audience profiling, we design and deliver strategies that help clients achieve their communication objectives.  

The key is to focus on marketing tactics after you’ve defined your purpose and what you want people to know. Campaigns that have a purpose are more meaningful and have greater impact in building brand value.

 Think about it. What’s your purpose? What do you want to be known for? If you’d like to know more, contact Michael Gregory to see how we can help your organisation.

Michael Gregory Joins Limitless

Posted on by Claire Stephenson

Michael Gregory has joined Limitless PR as a director bringing with him 22 years’ experience in public relations and brand communications.

The appointment sees him join the Blackburn-based PR agency’s board alongside existing directors Greg Wilson and Richard Slater.

Limitless public relations has grown rapidly since its launch in 2015 working for clients including Warrington and Halton Teaching Hospitals NHS Trust, Northern Industrial, Kay Group, British Gynaecological Cancer Society, BAKO North West, and Sales Geek, and is now on a five-year plan that will see the agency grow its brand across the UK.

Michael Gregory added: “After speaking with Greg and Richard and learning about the vision for Limitless, I knew we could grow the business together.

“We gelled instantly, sharing the same values and collective goals. More importantly, there’s a uniform passion for what we can achieve for Limitless’ clients. I was also impressed by Greg’s and Richard’s desire to collaborate with other creative agencies to share best practice, foster creativity, and deliver outstanding client campaigns.”

Over the course of his career Michael has advised on more than £1.7bn worth of property and regeneration schemes, and has worked with brands including BM Trada, Bolton at Home, Clevr Money, European Freeze Dry, Exova Group Plc, Fish Insurance, Yorkshire Bank, and Roundhouse Properties. He also worked with the University of Central Lancashire to devise and deliver a communications strategy for its £200 million Masterplan campus redevelopment.

Joining Richard Salter and Greg Wilson as a co-director Michael will be responsible for increasing Limitless’ brand awareness and market share.

Co-director, Greg Wilson said: “We’re incredibly proud and excited to welcome Michael as a director and look forward to working with him in delivering our growth strategy. We see his appointment very much as a catalyst for change in how we develop the agency as we embark on a programme of national expansion.

“He brings with him such a vast amount of experience across several sectors which include property, education, professional and financial services. He’ll play an integral part in communicating our competitive edge and working with Limitless’ public relations team in delivering campaigns that help clients achieve their communication goals.”