Public Relations
Tell Your Story.
I cut my teeth in PR with the North Carolina Department of Commerce promoting their strategic tourism, film and sports industries. I enjoyed it then and still enjoy working with media. In my last year with Visit NC, we hosted over 70 domestic and international journalists many I personally toured across the state from Biltmore Estate to Cape Hatteras. I learned quickly that outputs were all about the inputs: Build the relationships, do the work and deliver the results.
The media landscape has changed since my days at NC Commerce, but what makes your PR effort successful hasn’t changed. It all starts with strategy, understanding your differentiated point of view and defining what success looks like for your project. Media still need help to tell your brand story, and they need your input and support… now more than ever.
what are your tentpoles?
A great tool of the communications trade is the Big Top strategy. I named this one after the father of PR – PT Barnum. Do you think he’d still believe that there is no such thing as bad press?
The Big Top communications strategy is when you take one big idea and you stretch it out with communications tentpoles. We did this when Fifth Group turned 25. The 25th Anniversary Messaging is the Big Top and our openings, CSR initiatives and community engagement activities are the tent poles that you use to hold up a larger strategy. Then, use your key events and stakeholders to creatively deliver your brand messages.
Amplify your reach.
We leveraged Fifth Group’s 25th to punch above our weight for big wins like our founder partner being named one of Atlanta’s most admired CEOs by the Atlanta Business Chronicle and successfully drove a 362% YOY increase in a return on our PR investment.
Even at MBIKES, we knew that media partnerships and product placement would be key for positioning and worth the free product doled out for a Modern Luxury photoshoot. There is no one size fits all approach to getting the right coverage for your brand.
what are your tentpoles?
Get creative with partnerships like IHG’s work with the PGA TOUR to pull your brand in the right direction, or like Fifth Group Restaurants you can engaged with the right influencers to expand the reach of your message or consider experiential elements to help with social sharing and message absorption.
Openings and product launches are key moments in time that can bes used to craft a narrative that lives long beyond the event. Want to hear more? Ask me about the time I was leading guest experience for the InterContinental brand and we worked with our global agency, internal PR teams and hotels operations team to relaunch and reposition The Barclay our flagship property in Manhattan or when we rolled out the red carpet to Tishman at the IHG Americas HQ to convince them to build the InterContinental Times Square.
