How Travel Brands Can Optimise Their PR Strategy to Build Brand Awareness
While there are many PRs out there who will sing the praises of a press release, (and rightly so when used in the right way as part of a comprehensive PR strategy), it is important to note that it is a tool with a very specific purpose – ultimately it should only be used to relay newsworthy developments to the media.
It’s 2023 and it is time to get selective in the messaging travel brands are putting out there, and how your PR teams are getting that message across.
Now while every PRs dream is to have a consistent flow of news coming in from their clients, it is important to recognise that not all brand news is in fact newsworthy (at least in the media sense). But that doesn’t necessarily mean it is a non-starter altogether… and any PR worth their salt will die on the hill of not measuring the success of PR activity simply through the amount of media coverage attained. Oh no… there are many ways your PR team and elevate your brand without securing media coverage – and we’re going to outline below some strategic insights to get the cogs whirring on revamping your approach to measuring PR success.
So, what should the ultimate PR strategy include to help build brand awareness outside of the traditional direct-to-press mechanisms? And how can these approaches generate results for travel brands looking to amplify their PR impact?
First, a PR must set the scene and unpack expectations.
Before diving into their toolkit, it is a PRs job to get to the bottom of what their clients are actually hoping to achieve with a particular piece of activity.
If the answer is ‘media coverage’ – then a PR will need to dig a little deeper as to what this truly means.
Is it really just about the column inches, or is it connecting with a particular type of consumer to showcase a new development, or raising the profile of a spokesperson in a particular sector, or is it to inspire bookings from a target audience?
Each of these intended results has a different tool needed to achieve them. Sometimes this will be media outreach alone, but oftentimes it will be another tool altogether, complemented by media outreach.
Travel brands should use their PR teams as sounding boards to help determine the best strategy to showcase a particular piece of activity.
Here are some of the tools PR’s can use to maximise brand awareness and achieve results for their travel clients:
- Look Beyond the Traditional
Savvy PRs know that there is so much more to their remit that just sending out press releases and pitching direct to the media.
In the travel PR space, storytelling is essential, but this is no longer limited to the pitch.
There are potential PR tools all around us, and a good PR will stand their ground in foregoing the press release in lieu of another tool that may just achieve better results for their client in the long run.
- Embrace Social Media
Let’s just jump straight to it, a solid 60% of all press releases could be more effective LinkedIn posts.
Overlooking LinkedIn as a vehicle to reach both the consumer and the press is an oversight that many travel brands cannot afford to ignore much longer. Plus, be utilising LinkedIn to get your announcement out there, you’re speaking to an engaged audience of industry professionals – which may well inspire more immediate action than traditional media outreach (which you need to be in for the long term to reap real reward from).
While the likes of Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and TikTok may well be more geared towards facilitating a consumer experience, LinkedIn remains a powerful corporate tool that travel brands can utilise to get their news out there in an informative and authoritative way. And remember, professionals your audience may be, but they are also consumers… as well as decision makers in their business or media publication.
Where a story might not be strong enough to earn column inches on its own, as part of a LinkedIn content strategy it can instead be broken down into bite-sized pieces of content to build authority and awareness for your brand.
You might even pique the interest of a few journalists along the way who then may then be more receptive to your newsworthy pitches later down the line.
Remember, it’s all well and good your messaging coming from your brand page, but think about how you can use your internal networks and spokespersons to spread your content far and wide with relevant, relatable and authentic captions.
- Press and Influencer Visits
Earned editorial is the pot of gold at the end of the PR rainbow – it offers the potential for high ROI without additional budget or investment. But for travel brands, editorial inclusion can come in a myriad of ways – some offering more authenticity than others.
Oftentimes, these much-prized editorial slots are in high competition and sometimes budget speaks louder than your news – with many publications taking a pay-to-play approach, offering first dibs or inclusion in editorial slots to paying partners who buy advertising and advertorials on the regular.
While media outreach is an essential part of any PR strategy and should always remain so, keeping a constant stream of ideas flowing out to press and influencers via your PR to secure visits offers travel brands a way to secure more in-depth coverage, often solely dedicated to their brand, as opposed to the aforementioned inclusion in a round-ups or columns which may be diluted by the news of your competitors.
Travel brands looking to inspire their target audience should consider supporting first-person experiences for press and influencers to facilitate reviews and features that are both experiential and authentic.
- Thought Leadership
Curating an accessible panel of media-friendly spokespeople can make or break it for travel brands, especially those operating in drier or more corporate industries.
Brands who empower their spokespeople to be quick-off-the-mark with opinions (and can back them up with stats at the drop of the hat) allow PRs to pip competitors to the post when it comes to trending news stories. But speed is the name of the game. It’s called breaking news for a reason!
Building recognition for a spokesperson takes as much time and attention as it does for PRs and Marketers to build brands, and the more forthcoming brands are with insights and opinions, the more opportunities for comment that will come their way.
PRs can leverage tactful and timely comments and insights to drive thought leadership opportunities for travel brands. Thought leadership is a way for PRs to establish a brand and its spokesperson as the expert in their field, and assert influence in a particular niche or sector tied to the current news agenda.
Incorporate thought leadership into your PR strategy by identifying your experts and getting their ideas out there with your target media. This might not always be the national newspapers, with more gains to be made from being targeted with your thought leadership pitches.
You can approach thought leadership in many ways, from comments and by-lines, to speaker events, guest blogs and by harnessing the spokespersons own social media platforms.
- Digital PR
A brand’s digital footprint has never been more important and joined-up-thinking between your SEO strategy and PR approach will in time have a positive impact on your SERPs (that’s search engine results pages to the uninitiated).
It is important for travel brands to have their SEO and PR teams working towards the same end goals to build authority in their own niches.
Where traditional PR is geared on brand recognition, visibility, loyalty and awareness, digital PR is all about online visibility and authority – it can be used tactically to harness a bigger digital market share for keywords and phrases that your potential audience are searching for.
But, as with all good things, digital PR results also come to those who wait… unite the goals of your SEO and PR teams and buckle in for the long ride.
So what is digital PR? And how can travel brands build it into their strategies? Well this could be a whole other blog, but the short version – it combines tactical outreach to digital titles with high relevancy to your niche and sector with the intent to build links that improve your searchability, rather than to gain coverage.
But don’t the links come with the coverage? you might ask.
Yes, but it is in driving users to high value links that transport them to key category pages that this approach differs from your typical catch-all homepage call-to-action. Yes… sending users to your homepage might actually not always be the best tactic from a digital PR perspective.
Still in the dark? Get in touch to speak to our digital PR experts on what tactics might work for you.
- An Integrated Marketing Approach
While PR activity is much more geared towards the long-game, marketing will have a more immediate impact on your consumer engagement.
Much like PR and SEO, PR and Marketing should also work hand-in-hand to achieve a truly integrated approach. It all comes down to creating a narrative for your brand, and ensuring a consistency of messaging is achieved across the b2c disciplines.
Travel brands should not overlook their PR pros as sounding boards for joining up PR and Marketing activity. PRs may be able to put a new spin on internal comms, suggest coverage-driving activation ideas or support on partnerships, charity affiliations, awards and external comms.
- Revisit Your Website & Content Marketing Approach
It is good practice to assess if your brand’s news would be more suited to a piece of content.
This could sit within your company newsroom or be developed as part of a key category page on your website that could well be used as linkable content.
Your website is the ultimate PR tool. It is your shop window and should showcase the very best of your brand experience to consumer and media alike – after all, it’ll be a main source of research and inspiration for those looking to book with you AND write about you too.
Communication is a central element of PR, and if nothing else, this is what your website should be used for – defining its purpose as not only a vehicle to conversion but a valuable PR tool could do wonders to support a more holistic PR strategy.
Think about how your website showcases your brand identity, your values, your news as well as your product or service. What makes your brand different to the hundreds of others offering the same end experience? And how can you harness your on-site content to convert leads to customers, and journalists to engaged advocates? Just some food for thought…
- Internal Comms
A travel brand’s own employees are often overlooked when it comes to PR and Marketing – but within your staff are ready-made advocates who can inspire action. Therefore ‘internal PR’ should be seen as important as ‘external PR’.
Travel brands can harness internal comms to showcase their latest news and developments to an already engaged audience who will in turn be able to enthuse with your established community of customers as well as help to sway the opinion of new potential leads by word-of-mouth.
Whether this be achieved through sharing news on the intranet or within a newsletter, holding staff events, and training or establishing incentives – staff who love where they work, and can sing the praises of the brand will ultimately lead to a more favourable external persona for your brand which in time, could generate media results.
In Summary
A PRs toolkit is vast, and their influence even more so when a brand looks at its overall goals and objectives intrinsically. A holistic approach to PR as part of the bigger picture rather than as an island in the steam will in time offer your brand more value from PR activity.
PR can take many forms, and attributing success to PR activity through old fashioned or limiting metrics is a fad to leave in 2022. It’s time to see PR as less about direct and traceable ROI and more about how well it is supporting your brands positioning in your niche or sector.
Perhaps it is the soft skills of the Marketing disciple, but any recruiter worth their salt will tell you that it is these attributes and insights that can make all the difference to success in the long run. Embrace the soft skills, and let your PR team challenge your perception of what their activity looks like.
Want to tear up you PR strategy and start again? Get in touch at [email protected]
