The quickest answer is to send the media a continuous flow of material that is too well-prepared and too newsworthy to ignore. I had the unique opportunity to establish a public relations and advertising branch of a major insurance company's new regional headquarters. From a bare piece of land in a suburban industrial park, we built a chain of three large office buildings that housed 2,500 employees, most hired locally.
Part of my job as PR&A manager was to supervise corporate advertising in the media covering most of the U.S. northeast coast states. This was fairly routine, and I didn't have too many specific duties that required seeking free publicity for our company's corporate advertising on major TV networks and national publications.
However, another important duty in my regional public and community relations was to make regular contacts and maintain favorable relationships with city newspapers and television stations in our region. This included submitting news and feature articles concerning to our home office staff of 2,500, plus the 250 field office staffs, which included another 10,000 clerical and sales staff employees throughout our territory.
My basic marketing duty could be called PR101. My staff and I sent out dozens of daily news releases, photos, information on company products, regional activities and articles on individual employees and sales agents. We also reported on regional sales results, new hires, promotions, in/out management transfers, community honors and other items.
My division staff also created audio-visuals. In our early years as a new regional headquarters, we often sent out video cassettes relating to products changes and introductions, major executive speeches and employee accomplishments. Then, with the introduction of DVDs, we continually upgraded our equipment to create professional-quality disks to be sent out for broadcast on the regional TV stations.
If there's a secret to getting free exposure of our company's products and services from the media, it is that we sent out quality print and electronic materials. To strengthen our relationships with our media sources, we made personal visits to find out if our services were effective, and to ask for ways to improve them.
If it can be called PR202, or maybe PR501 grad school quality, we earned considerable respect and frequent cooperation from the media with our community relations efforts. One service we created was Operation L.O.V.E. (Lunchtime Outreach Visits to the Elderly). I liked to believe I could take full credit for this idea, but it took many company volunteers to make it work as successfully as it did.
The basis for the idea was that, due to transportation costs and that our company was 30 miles from a major city, we sent out 40 vans each morning at about 7 am to pick up 400 employees from the end of the subway line, and drove them to work. Then, at about 4 pm, the vans did the return trip. When I saw the vans sitting uselessy in the parking lot from 8 am to 4 pm, the idea struck me.
To make a long story short, we enlisted about 100 employees who'd ride the vans to spend a two-hour lunch period once a week visiting residents in nearby nursing homes. Several talented members of our troupe also sang, did stand-up comedy and played music during the visits. This got us considerable print publicity, as well as local and national TV news coverage and a wall full of community service awards. Not incidentally, our sales reps also told us the heavy media publicity helped them sell their products and services.
My point is that community service is one important way business organizations can get considerable free publicity for their products, services and employee recognition. Our primary marketing job was to make the buying public constantly aware of the quality of our sales staffs, products and services. Additionally, by putting forth creative and active volunteer efforts, we also took on our responsibilities as community neighbors and fellow citizens.