PR activity must include blog monitoring


You will find many blogs and forums out there, some of which are dedicated to sharing experiences of dealing with local businesses. For instance, TripAdvisor carries customer reviews of hotels throughout the world.

The problem for the businesses is that the comments have a tendency to be derogatory. People are much more likely to vent their spleen on a website than they're to be complimentary, although sometimes individuals feel moved to be nice about somewhere. Monitoring the blogs is therefore an important PR activity-as is ensuring that individuals say nice things about you.

Check the blogs regularly. Most of them provide the businesses a right to reply-and you need to seize the opportunity. Often you will be able to identify the person making the complaint, and can contact them to make amends-if you make this provide on the blog itself, it will go a long way toward repairing the damage.

Straight refutation of the complaint, or (worse) self-justification, can be seriously counterproductive. You need to state your situation, sure, but you can be a small humble about it!

Do not be tempted to get a friend to post a glowing recommendation on the blog. They rarely read true, and also the blog master will take exception to it if you are discovered out.

Many businesses carry out charitable works or make charitable contributions, sponsoring this and that, but relatively few will go the step additional and establish a longer-term relationship using the charity. Becoming involved long-term can be of real benefit to businesses: apart from ongoing PR value in terms of making the company look great, there's value in shared promotions.

Find a charity (maybe a local one) that is prepared to partner with you. You need to try to find one that fits with your business, of course, but that shouldn't be too hard. In exchange for supporting the charity in terms of hosting activities, helping with fundraising, contributing time, expertise, or goods and services, you should be able to arrange for joint promotions.

This could be very important, since most charities have mailing lists. They won't give you the list (the Data Protection Act would preclude this) but they might well be prepared to let you send out a joint mailing, particularly if you pay for the mail shot. Forming a long-term relationship like this is bound to generate many opportunities to promote your business alongside the charity.

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Note: This article was sent to us by: Serena Greane at 01242011

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