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Limitless Public Relations

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.