Advertising or PR?

Clients often ask whether advertising or PR is best for their business.

The answer is, ‘it depends’ on what you’re trying to achieve, whether ‘coverage’ needs to be guaranteed and the size of your budget.

There are many benefits of advertising, the main one is ‘control’. If you’re paying for a printed advert, you’re guaranteed (within reason) that the advert you submit will appear where and when was agreed. You’re typically able to use the space you’ve bought as you wish, e.g. as an advert or advertorial (a paid-for article). You can use it to promote your preferred topic and it can be as salesy as you like! It can raise awareness of a particular product or service. It can provide reassurance to existing clients or simply encourage new business.

Online advertising has similar benefits, although the guarantees about where and when your ad will appear are often more general.

With PR, there are a lot more ifs and buts. If an article written about your firm appears in a publication, it is – arguably – more powerful and more beneficial than an advert, as it will be perceived as being more independent. As PR space is usually free, it often provides a more cost-effective means of getting your brand out there. Often, articles are based on press releases written and distributed by your PR team (in house or external). They are generally sent to more than one publication, if more than one of them decides to cover the story, you benefit from more coverage.

But, as editors decide which stories they publish, there’s no guarantee your story will be covered, or if it is, how much or what they write. The good news is that, generally, a press release is relatively inexpensive to draft and distribute. If your story is covered by any reputable publications, it will raise and enhance your brand awareness, which will obviously be beneficial to your business.

What constitutes a good story? We encourage clients to put themselves in journalists’ shoes and consider whether their story is of interest to the publication’s readership. Many businesses want to shout from the rooftops about their recent achievements and developments, which is great, but is anyone else really interested? Journalists won’t cover stories which are ‘trumpet-blowing’.

It’s important to remember that neither PR or advertising guarantee any new business or generate any leads, and success is hard to measure too, with the exception of digital marketing.

We usually recommend engaging in a mixture of advertising and PR. This ensures that you promote your business, communicate your key messages, raise brand awareness and reach all your different audiences.

By Rachael Haley