Using public relations is more often about making an
emotional appeal to your audience rather than addressing
only logic.
The use of hybrid cars, better health care, more medical
research, more accountability in government, and safe
playgrounds are all issues that have benefited from an
emotional appeal using public relations.
Does your product or service hit them right in the heart
when it counts? During a natural disaster, for example, can
you provide help? Are you a radio station with information,
a facility with shelter and food, or a company that offers
medical assistance or transportation? (Think of snow days
in which people with SUVs race to hospitals, shuttling
doctors and nurses to work.)
Whatever you are promoting, you need to explain to your
audiences on an emotional level how it benefits them or
others they care about. Every good product, every good
service is, at its heart, a means by which to help people
live, work, or play better. As retailers know, what they
sell are benefits, not features.
Travel agents sell adventure, discovery, education, and
relaxation (not trips); movie theaters sell escape,
romance, and excitement; software makers sell efficiency
and convenience; jewelers sell glamour and love; home
builders sell the concept of togetherness, shared lives,
and community; luxury carmakers sell power and status;
restaurants sell taste experiences and camaraderie; and
fashion designers sell style, beauty, and sex. If you sell
office supplies, you are really selling efficiency.
Violins? A lifetime of musical enjoyment. Hybrid cars? Good
environmental practices, cost savings, and trendiness.
Has anyone ever bought a top-of-the-line Harley- Davidson
motorcycle just for sheer transportation, or a $20,000
Rolex just to tell time? People trust brands, and brand
building comes about as the result of marketing and public
relations, supported by advertising and word of mouth.
A good brand provides buyers with predictable quality and
appeals to their emotions. And, in the war for attention,
brands win. You can be the top brand, even if it is only
within your industry or among your target audiences.
Help people understand clearly on an emotional and rational
level the benefits you can provide. Generally, people
respond to an appeal because it addresses one or more of
the following needs:
- Business/mission: Can you help them meet their goals,
make more money, save time, make them look better to their
superiors, get a promotion, or beat their competitors?
- Social life/lifestyle: Can you make their lives more
enjoyable, provide more leisure time, make them more
attractive, help them find romance, make them healthier,
make their friends and coworkers envious, or help them
further their hobbies or other avocations?
- Beliefs: Can you provide a "place," physical or virtual,
where they can feel comfortable expressing their political
opinions, religious beliefs, or other personal feelings?
Can you provide information that will help them make up
their minds on important issues? Does your organization
support a cause in which they strongly believe?
- Reputation: Can you further enhance or protect their
professional or personal reputations?
- Ethnic/religious/national identity: Can you help them
connect with others who share similar ethnic, racial,
religious, geographic, or other traits? Or give them a
place where they can experience diversity and meet people
who are unlike themselves?
- Philanthropic: Can you help them to help others and also
feel good about themselves?
- Fantasy/Escape: Can you help them get away from the
mundane and routine, at least temporarily?
If you can address one or more of these needs on an
emotional level, you have a much better chance of having
people understand what you can provide and respond
favorably to it. They will be more willing to take an
action you would like them to take.
----------------------------------------------------
Robert Deigh is president of RDC Communication/PR and
author of the upcoming PR book "How Come No One Knows About
Us?"(WBusinessBooks, May '08). For a free full chapter, "16
Ways to Come Up With Story Ideas That Will Attract Press,"
contact rdeigh1@aol.com http://www.rdccommunication.com
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