As a customer of Virgin Start Up, I first heard about this PR workshop via our newsletter.
Having just launched my new Kitchen product, this course sparked an interest with me. Without hesitation, I booked a ticket as I knew from experience that the Virgin Start Up meetings do sell out quickly.
On the day of the workshop, I arrived early and brought my product along with me. It was inspiring to meet other startups and hear how their stories began. We had a range of business start ups from Insect based protein bars to Organic tampons!
Ian Mason, Head of Strategic Development at Virgin Start Up welcomed us all and introduced Tetteh Kofi from JournoLink, our speaker for the event. With a background in journalism and broadcasting, Tetteh cleverly gave us an insight into how the PR minds work. It was intriguing to learn that you need not have the right skill base to create your own PR. As an entrepreneur, I am already running a tight ship and don’t have the financial resources to enlist PR help. So this was music to my ears!
We learnt that when writing a press release, the information is in fact all there in your mind. Remembering that it’s your story, so no one knows it better than you. But by asking the right questions, you can narrow down the content and start to streamline it towards a theme. It is by sieving through this initial dense content that you will produce some nuggets of gold. From here, you have the beginnings of your first press release.
As the evening progressed we got into groups and had to create our own press release. In principle it didn’t seem too hard, but in practice it was quite challenging. This really got our group thinking about our brands and what they represent for us. A rather reflective point of the evening and a moment where you realise that every brand needs to have a story. The key is planting enough information for the journalist to link it together and make their story.
Creating your press release is just one element of your PR but by engaging with the right journalist you can unlock your brands marketing. We learnt about how to find suitable journalist for your market and how to aptly interact with them. Interestingly enough the relationship between brand and journalist works in synergy. Neither can reach their height without the other.
In summary, it was an incredibly informative evening which allowed us to gain a fascinating insight into the mind of a journalist. With so many new companies being born every hour, how does a new business get the attention of a journalist? How do you make your business stand out from the crowd? By attending this workshop, I am a few steps closer to answering these questions. Tetteh was not just an engaging speaker but he kept me enthralled and captivated throughout the evening. A well thought out presentation and I have busily used this insight to create my recent press release.
The second part of this workshop is in a couple of weeks, and I am eagerly anticipating the next instalment.
delightfulmum 