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Insights for Leaders Navigating
Visibility, Credibility, and Growth.

From media strategy to reputation management, we explore the trends shaping public perception and share the approaches that drive measurable results for growing brands.

Making the Most of Industry Events

Conferences and expos are excellent opportunities to establish thought leadership and network with potential and current partners, customers and the press. Events like these can help companies connect with media and pursue speaking, exhibition or sponsorship opportunities.

If you’re sending team members to an event, you want to maximize its opportunities.  Sometimes the sheer number of an event’s offerings can be overwhelming. It’s often the job of the PR professional to help their client get the most bang for their conference buck. So how can you help your clients maximize an industry event?

Below are some best practices to help increase brand awareness and position clients as thought leaders at conferences and expos.

Speaking engagements. Securing a speaking engagement helps leaders reach target audiences. It also positions them as a thought leader who can illuminate industry trends and offer insightful predictions.

When submitting a proposal, be sure to align your submission with both the themes of the conference and the spokesperson’s areas of expertise. It’s also helpful to highlight how the speaker’s role within their organization enables them to offer unique insights.

Media outreach. Industry press often attend conferences. This gives brands the opportunity to build rapport with key reporters and share their perspectives on the industry. Ahead of the event, PR professionals should create a media strategy to engage the press in attendance.

Many events maintain a list of attending media members available to participants. PR professionals can use this list to schedule onsite meetings with reporters during the conference. These in-person meetings are particularly valuable for fostering media relationships that can move the needle for their clients.  

Events are also great opportunities to announce company news, such as product launches. This news often motivates attending media to meet with spokespeople to learn more about the product or company and can result in editorial media coverage.

Sponsorships. Once you’ve established your thought leadership and media relations strategy, evaluate paid opportunities that could enhance your client’s presence and help it to reach target audiences.

As PR professionals, we’re tasked with assessing paid opportunities for an industry event, such as sponsorships or exhibition booths, and providing counsel on what will drive results. To do this, you must know which paid opportunities will be most impactful.

To increase brand recognition and awareness, consider investing in promotional sponsorships that increase the brand’s conference visibility. After securing a sponsorship, make sure to share your messaging and branding materials with the event organizers ahead of any deadlines.

Exhibit booths. Investing in an exhibit booth is an excellent way for organizations to draw in attendees and generate leads. A location dedicated to promoting the product while educating attendees on the company increases its visibility.

Booths allow organizations to present product demos or models to attendees. They’re great ways to highlight the company’s offerings and connect with team members on a more personal level.

Conferences offer direct connections to target audiences and industry leaders. There are many ways to maximize their impact. PR professionals should help their clients optimize their participation by understanding the value that these industry events can offer.

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When and Why to Pursue Business Awards

Business awards are an important part of a comprehensive PR program. They validate a company’s accomplishments, raise awareness of its products and boost morale.

But developing and submitting award nominations can be time-consuming. That’s why it’s critical to evaluate each award for its potential impact and the company’s likelihood of winning.

Below are some reasons to pursue business awards and tips for developing strong nominations to win them.

Why Pursue an Award?

Awards are a great way to validate a company’s product offerings and highlight its recent success. While press releases and blog posts do these things to a degree, awards offer the kind of validation that only comes from a third party.

Award programs promote winners through multiple channels, so they’re a great way to raise awareness of a company and its recent successes. Not only does this help reach potential customers, but if the award program is organized by a publication, it can be an excellent way to grab the attention of key reporters.

Beyond appealing to external audiences, awards can boost company morale by celebrating the team’s hard work.

How to Evaluate the Opportunity

Not every award is worth pursuing. It’s important to determine if a specific award is worth the investment of time and resources. First, review the award and any subcategories to determine its relevance to the company and its products.

Next, evaluate the award’s audience. Is the award program run by a trade publication that reaches key customers? Is it an outlet that potential talent may read? If an award reaches a desirable audience, then it’s likely worth pursuing.

Finally, it’s important to determine if the award program is well-respected. Awards’ websites can often tell you how long the program has been operating and some of its previous winners. If the award program has recognized competitors or industry titans, it’s likely relevant to the company.

Create a Winning Nomination

Once you’ve determined an award is relevant, it’s important to ask a challenging question: Could we be a solid contender?

A strong nomination has key proof points to support its claims and highlight the nominee’s success. For example, you might share revenue growth or how much time and money a product has saved customers. Be critical and identify strong metrics that demonstrate the impact of the product or offering.

As teams evaluate the nomination’s proof points, they might conclude that the data isn’t strong enough. If that’s the case, it might make sense to wait and pursue the nomination next year when the application will be stronger. 

Make the Most of It

So, you’ve won an award? Don’t stop there! It’s important to highlight the win to your key audiences, including your team and potential customers.

Publicize your win on social media. This validates your offerings to potential customers. And be sure to share the results with your team and congratulate them on their hard work.

While awards can be time-consuming, they are a great opportunity to celebrate accomplishments and demonstrate momentum.

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Take ChatGPT for a spin without compromising confidential data

As a daily user of ChatGPT for the past several months, I’ve come to regard it as an indispensable resource in my digital toolkit. Since it’s still relatively new for many, I thought it might be useful to share a list of my favorite prompts with those curious about ChatGPT, as well as some essential security considerations.

An important caveat before diving into these prompts: Discretion is essential with ChatGPT or any other chatbot or search engine. Don’t share confidential information with these platforms; caution is paramount with such tools.

One must consider the precarious nature of data privacy and security. When you use these services, your data could inadvertently be exposed or used in ways you never intended, compromising your confidentiality.

For instance, Engadget reported that on March 24 “OpenAI was forced to take its wildly-popular ChatGPT bot offline for emergency maintenance” because a user exploited a bug in the system to access the titles from others’ chat histories.

Worse still, in the wrong hands, leaked or exposed information can become a tool for identity theft, financial fraud and other nefarious activities. And let’s not forget the legal ramifications. Sharing sensitive data can flout data protection laws, regulations or contracts, potentially resulting in financial penalties and legal consequences.

In this digital age, where the line between public and private is increasingly blurred, we all must exercise caution with sensitive information. Sharing confidential data with AI systems, search engines or any vulnerable online platform is simply a risk not worth taking.

With digital tools like ChatGPT, one must approach the results discerningly. A critical mindset is essential: Ask yourself, does the generated content align with your expectations and logic? What factors make it convincing or perhaps cast doubt on its validity?

It’s a good idea to seek out and cite corroborating sources that either reinforce or challenge the content presented by the AI tool.

With these vital caveats in mind, I’m eager to reveal my favorite ChatGPT prompts, which I hope will inspire your use of this technology:

  • Take these four points and craft an email.
  • Make this less formal and more conversational?
  • What is wrong with this sentence?
  • How can I improve this?
  • What are the pros and cons of this statement?
  • How would you characterize this statement?

These prompts have served me well because they are narrowly focused on specific tasks, such as making a sentence more concise, double-checking the logic of a statement, or helping me to understand why a statement might be considered flawed. My objectives are clear and well-defined.

In these instances, I’m also using the software for work that is already destined for publication or wouldn’t cause me (or my company) harm.

I hope these tips are helpful as you consider embracing AI.

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Conducting Media Outreach for Multiple Trade Shows at the Same Time

This March, Delta-Q Technologies attended two trade shows, CONEXPO and ProMat. Both were great opportunities to showcase its new 3-in-1 mid-power charging solution, the XV3300.

The hurdle? The two shows had different themes.

CONEXPO focuses on the latest construction trends and equipment, while ProMat centers around manufacturing and supply chain innovations. That meant we had to conduct different media outreach strategies within the same timeframe.  

Trade shows and conferences like CONEXPO and ProMat are excellent ways for companies to spread brand and product awareness, network, and establish themselves as thought leaders. That’s why it’s important that PR professionals create an effective strategy to secure media coverage before, during, and after these events.

In the blog post “Interested in Meeting Next Week?” my colleague highlights best practices for successful media outreach during trade shows. She gives tips for press release timing, content, approvals, onsite briefings, outreach timing, and support during and after the show. We kept those best practices in mind during our work for CONEXPO and ProMat outreach.

We began by collaborating with the Delta-Q team to develop a media relations strategy tailored to each trade show. CPR helped Delta-Q create press releases for each audience. We also developed and delivered pitches to reporters to secure interviews during the show and drive coverage before and after.

When working with Delta-Q on its dual trade show appearances, we kept a few things in mind.

Tailor messaging to relevant themes for each show.

CONEXPO and ProMat have different themes. Approaching reporters with the same general pitch wasn’t going to work. So, we customized our messaging for each show. We knew that we needed to tell reporters what specific topics our client could speak to, and why those topics were relevant to their coverage. The lesson? Don’t send out the same pitch and talking points at different trade shows.

At CONEXPO we focused messaging on electrification trends for construction, while at ProMat we leveraged talking points about the manufacturing and supply chain industries. Materials for ProMat outreach also highlighted Delta-Q’s lift truck on-board charging seminar during the event. While these pitches went out within close timeframes, they offered information customized for each audience.

Begin outreach a month in advance.

For both conferences, we distributed pitches about a month before the show to announce Delta-Q’s participation and notify reporters of future press releases. About two weeks before the show, we followed up with press releases. At trade shows, reporters’ schedules fill up quickly. That’s why we recommend reaching out early to schedule interviews while reporters still have availability, then following up with the press release closer to the event to reignite interest.

Keep everyone in the loop.

Effective communication is critical when scheduling trade show interviews. Clients are on tight and quickly changing schedules. Each team member should be in the loop about the timing of interviews. Make sure that there is more than one person available during the interview time as a backup in case the original interviewee can’t attend. Create calendar invites to hold times on participants’ schedules and provide briefing documents before the show outlining times, talking points and reporter backgrounds.

By following these tips, we were able to successfully execute our media strategy for Delta-Q at both trade shows. Below is a summary of coverage that resulted from CONEXPO and ProMat outreach. We also secured multiple interviews that will result in coverage throughout the next few months.

Delta-Q CONEXPO Recap

Delta-Q ProMat Recap

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Flowroute Announces Upgrades to its HyperNetwork Service + Tips for Product Relaunches

Despite the popularity and convenience of messaging solutions, voice calls are still important for organizations. Specifically, companies must be able to receive inbound calls from customers, stakeholders and employees to continue to grow and run their business. The ongoing increase of cybersecurity breaches and climate disasters pose a threat to network and internet connectivity. These threats have created a need for companies to have better call routing options.

Flowroute, a BCM One Company and a self-service SIP Trunking and SMS platform, offers a patented HyperNetwork service that creates backup, also known as redundant, call options. This service increases inbound call resiliency and redundancy for enterprises. Call redundancy is essential because it helps businesses ensure they can continue to communicate with their customers if one or more communication channels fail.

The HyperNetwork helps mitigate outage time. It detects upstream network problems and quickly reroutes calls. Because the HyperNetwork dynamically changes the routing of telephone numbers, calls arrive over a different path than the one originally assigned. 

Flowroute has offered the HyperNetwork for several years, but the company updated the capabilities of the HyperNetwork after BCM One acquired Flowroute’s assets in March 2022. Over the past year, BCM One and Flowroute have invested in new features to enhance the service.

Communiqué PR had the opportunity to partner with Flowroute and BCM One to announce the upgrades. The team supported messaging reviews, press material development, media training and other activities to help prepare for the announcement. We also secured an interview with a leading telecom analyst to discuss the HyperNetwork service upgrades and other company initiatives.   

Last week, Flowroute officially announced the launch of the new HyperNetwork with upgraded features. We distributed the news to target telecom, cloud, developer and channel communication reporters. Below is a snapshot of some of the articles secured from the media outreach around the announcement.

Below are a few tips for companies planning to announce product launches or upgrades. Taking the time to work through these details will help ensure a successful announcement.

  • Define and Review Messaging – It is important to clearly communicate the resources for the product relaunch or new services. Before you announce changes, it’s a best practice to align on updated messaging and product details to make sure spokespeople have the latest messages and can communicate the messages the customers need to know and understand.
  • Develop an Announcement Plan – After the company finalizes new or updated messaging, review the elements available for the announcement and create a plan. A solid plan first requires clear objectives, messages, proof points and target audiences. These elements and the desired timing of the announcement will inform the media strategy. For example, the company might offer the news to specific reporters or analysts early, develop and distribute a press release via a wire service or opt to forego media outreach. The strategy for sharing the news will depend on the objectives and significance of the announcement for the company, its customers and the industry.
  • Identify Target Reporters – Identifying target audiences is critical to developing an announcement plan, so much so that it warrants its own step. Solid messaging and a compelling story will only go so far if companies are not sharing those messages with the correct targets. Companies must invest time into identifying and building a robust press list. A significant portion of the success of an announcement distribution relies on the press list.

There are other essential elements and steps to take when making announcements; however, the steps above are three important tips that will help strengthen the process and results. Check out other Communiqué PR blogs for guidance on PR plans and tactics.

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How Using Phygital Can Benefit Your Brand

In today’s rapidly evolving digital landscape, businesses are turning to phygital to boost customer engagement. “Phygital,” a combination of “physical” and “digital,” doesn’t just enhance customer experience. It’s a whole new way to tell your brand’s story.  

Chemi Katz, the CEO and co-founder of Namogoo, writes in TotalRetail, “[Phygital] presents an opportunity to create a more immersive, engaging and interactive customer experience. Retailers from Sephora to Amazon.com are utilizing phygital strategies to reap benefits, including increased conversions, personalized customer journeys, and boosted brand loyalty.”

Sephora has led by example. It has improved customer engagement by offering multichannel experiences and implementing artificial intelligence (AI) to give customers an interactive in-store experience. Consumers can interact with augmented reality (AR) and facial recognition to get their perfect shade of foundation. The mobile app also uses location-based marketing to share relevant information, such as store maps and deals.

Keeping this in mind, I have outlined some of the benefits phygital offers brands below.

  • Enhanced customer experience. Phygital can help businesses provide seamless and engaging customer experiences with virtual reality, AR, AI and other digital tools. According to Janelle Estes, chief insights officer at UserTesting, “embracing phygital reveals a growing recognition that creating seamless customer experiences across multiple channels is no longer enough — it’s now about fusing channels to engage customers with a more powerful and memorable experience than a single channel alone can provide.”
  • Increased engagement and participation. By incorporating interactive media elements, companies can create more engaging and memorable offerings. For example, the World Tennis League (WTL) partnered with Akshaya.io to create a phygital marketplace for fans to share unique collectibles and entice customers with a “once in a lifetime chance” to meet the sport’s biggest stars. Akshaya.io and the WTL successfully achieved their goal of creating “tangible, emotional, and digital experiences” for fans on a popular platform, the NFT marketplace.
  • Improved data collection. By enhancing the customer experience with phygital, companies can collect more first-party customer data about engagement. They can also identify essential touchpoints on the customer journey. Marketing and communication teams can leverage this data to plan events or campaigns and analyze these proactive effort results.
  • Increased accessibility. Carol Martinez at Inclusive City Maker states, “Phygital experiences actually combine the best of both worlds (physical and digital) to remove accessibility barriers and foster inclusion.” For example, online streaming platforms allow people in remote or underserved areas to access live events, creating opportunities to participate regardless of location.
  • Reduced carbon footprint. Phygital experiences lessen the need for resources like transportation to events, materials to build event venues and more. For instance, instead of exhibiting at CES, Panasonic created a digital booth to showcase its sustainable tech and offered virtual tours. In this case, phygital eliminated the need to use build the booth and repurposed some of the company’s existing factories to showcase these sustainability tours.

Leveraging phygital to create interactive experiences can enhance your brand’s impact. It helps you tell your story in a new and exciting way.

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