PR and ABM… say what? Yes, there is a modern PR approach where these two strategies work together, adding more value to your PR investment. Our host, Lindsey Groepper, forgoes a guest this week to share her thoughts on this topic, including how to align your ABM targets with thought leadership efforts to create direct touchpoints with the individual prospects your BDRs are targeting.
Hot take: PR isn’t always measurable, and that’s okay
When an executive hears a marketing or communications proposal, odds are they’ll ask the age-old question: How can we measure this? What constitutes success for this campaign? Sure, it’s fruitful to ask these questions about specific activations — a paid ad on social media, for example — but Lindsey suggests it may do more harm than good in some instances.
“It’s… a head-scratcher to me and a lot of the marketers that I talk to,” said Lindsey. “I still have conversations with founders — it’s not so much marketing leaders or CMOs — where they’ll say to me, ‘Lindsey, ultimately, what’s the ROI of PR? I spent X amount of money with BLASTmedia, your agency… What do I get in return, bro?'”
In response to these questions, Lindsey encourages leaders to consider the importance of the following — all of which a strong brand fosters:
- The ROI of being a beloved brand
- The value of warming up a sales lead of interest
- The value of investing in PR, which drives your brand story
Although these high-level goals may be immeasurable (or at least difficult to track directly), they remain vital for B2B and B2C businesses.
ABM and PR can go hand in hand
More likely than not, your sales team has an ABM strategy. Maybe you also have a good PR strategy. But have you considered the headway you could make if you combined these two directives?
“When you have really good communication with your PR team, and you’re willing to get in the weeds with them and make the right introductions, PR can support an ABM program. You can set goals around it with your PR agency,” said Lindsey.
That’s right — ABM and PR don’t have to be schoolyard rivals or even siloed strategies. Marketing and sales leads should start conversing with their PR leader or agency about how brand-generating activities can tie into ABM.
This partnership could manifest in numerous ways. For example, let’s say your organization has a contributed content initiative. Your PR agency can conduct due diligence into one of your ABM targets — say, Jenny Jones. Your agency can create a powerful touchpoint using Jenny’s publications of interest. Perhaps they write an article likely to interest Jenny or even quote Jenny in a byline attributed to one of your organization’s SMEs. From there, your sales team can tag Jenny and facilitate an engaging, top-of-the-funnel conversation.
Let PR work with you, not next to you.
Your PR agency wants to plug in with your existing marketing goals. But PR professionals — although magical in their own right — cannot read your mind, nor the mind of your executives. As such, it behooves you to communicate organizational goals with them so they can craft an appropriate PR strategy.
“When you look at your overarching goals, you have all these levers that you’ve pulled to help reach those [goals]. There’s a lot of them underneath it, right? Stick PR in there,” said Lindsey. “PR doesn’t have to sit out on the side as just some random brand-builder. You have to be able to tie it to these broader goals and broader business objectives.”
Ideally, your PR agency should be asking after these goals proactively, likely during onboarding. And if they aren’t, well, it’s probably time to jump on a call.
Listen to episode 355 of SaaS Half Full to hear more of Lindsey’s insights.