Daniela Restrepo, a Colombian PR professional who lives in Pereira, who studied marketing and communication prior to working in international brand management and strategy execution, has been supporting companies in PR fro close to a decade, while also serving as a Mentor at the Founder institute.
For International Women’s Day, we had the opportunity to ask her for advice for founders looking to approach the Colombian media market, with a focus on female entrepreneurs.
Tell us what tips women entrepreneurs can use to start doing public relations for their startup. What would those first steps be to understand how to start connecting:
Public relations is an important element in supporting the reach and value of a brand for all stakeholders. All the corporate elements of the brand, from the tone and personality, the functional and emotional benefits, the central message, the final objective, and even its reputation -if they are fully harnessed with the internal and external public- can help to increase the performance, credibility and return of a brand or company.
Define your objective: What is the result you expect or seek from your efforts through public relations? Is it visibility? Do you want to position your CEO? Are you looking for traffic on your website?
Define your audience: Before you start creating any public relations strategy, you must clearly define who you are talking to. Who are they? What interests you? What problems do they face? This will help you create narratives and angles that resonate with them.
Create relevant and compelling stories: Good public relations is all about telling a fresh, interesting and compelling story around your industry. Identify the unique aspects of your venture and create coherent narratives aligned with your purpose.
Identify your relevant media: Investigate the media that are relevant to your business, specialized publications, podcasts, influencers, among others. Look for opportunities to connect, build relationships and collaborate with them, bringing actionable insights.
Connect with journalists: As you identify your relevant outlets, look for journalists who cover the issues related to your business and industry. You can follow them on social networks, initiate contact and keep them updated about the news of your venture.
Create quality content: The creation of quality content is a fundamental part of any public relations strategy. Publish articles on your blog, create infographics, post opinions about big news in your industry, and more. The key is to create content that is valuable and relevant to your audience.
Maintain an active presence on social networks: Social networks such as LinkedIn or Twitter are an excellent way to reach your audience and keep it updated.
Why and how can Social Media and Public Relations strategies create identity and credibility of my brand?
As I mentioned earlier, a recurring and well-executed social presence allows you to create relevant and useful content for your audience, which can increase your brand visibility and generate an emotional connection with followers.
On the other hand, a Public Relations strategy keeps you in permanent contact with journalists and the media, which can increase the exposure of your brand and establish it as a reliable source of information. Journalists often look for the prior presence of your startup in the media to verify its credibility, and an effective PR strategy can ensure that your brand is present and seen positively in those media.
Strategies to facilitate meetings between investors and audiences.
Attending industry events to which your venture belongs allows you to start building relationships, stay current, and be on the radar of investors and potential customers.
Apply to venture capital funds and investment programs in your country to present your business and get appointments with investors.
Enroll in pre-seed accelerators that accompany you throughout the process and help you shape your ideas and your final product/service.
Monitor the networks of the investors you are looking for, pay attention to your venture to find out their tastes and preferences.
Make a calendar of events relevant to your industry and the investors you are looking for, to provide more networking spaces.
How to identify which communication channels are best suited to my business model?
They say that if you don’t try, you’ll never know. This is the case with the different resources that you have available through a PR strategy, articles, blogs, podcasts, events, interviews, all of the above represents an opportunity to make your venture and your voice known. Many startups feel more affinity for speaking at interviews or events, others connect better with their audience through written articles. So I would not dare to say that there is a suitable channel for each business model, the more channels explored and a presence achieved, the better. Of course, always evaluating how linked it is to the objective sought with the PR actions.
How to stand out in the eyes of investors, press and clients?
Definitely, a solid public relations strategy focused on “brand awareness” or brand presence can be key to obtaining multiple benefits when looking for investors. By implementing this strategy, the press, investors and potential clients are provided with various sources of information about the news, capabilities and services of your venture.
Brand presence is essential for any business, since it allows consumers to easily identify the company, its products or services in the market. In addition to improving brand visibility, it can help build your business’s reputation and improve consumer trust; especially important factors when looking for investment.
Digital support tools that can be used to strengthen the media strategy and brand positioning.
Social networks
Web page
Blogging
Importance of the perception of the CEO’s image as accessible and close within storytelling.
The perception of the CEO’s image as accessible and close is crucial for a successful company. A CEO must be able to balance his leadership skills and business skills with the ability to learn and connect with his team on a personal level. Humility is essential to understand that a company depends on teamwork and the dedication of its employees.
In today’s business world, the image of a humane, inclusive, values-based CEO has become increasingly important. The way the CEO presents himself to the public and how he relates to his team and the media is crucial to the perception of his company and industry. A CEO who seeks to have an inclusive and positive impact not only on his company, but on society as a whole, is seen as an exceptional leader and is often admired by his employees and the community at large.
How to challenge gender stereotypes through egalitarian advertising, which includes the gender perspective in communication.
It is an important business responsibility that can have a significant impact on society, the team and the relationships between men and women and their roles within a company, providing equal value to both.
This can be mitigated by avoiding traditional gender roles, implementing and executing diversity programs in different areas of the company and having it reflected in company communications, empowering women on teams to discover their potential, emphasizing on gender equality as a premise and pillar of the company, and Considering both genders during decision-making in each company process are some of the things with which you can start to make a significant change from the inside out.
The rate of female entrepreneurship in Latin America in 2021 was described as one of the lowest according to the Mastercard Index of women entrepreneurs.
However, according to the data offered by the World Bank, female entrepreneurship in Latin America has reached 50% during the year 2022, data that encourages us to share information that trains in education related to the success of their projects, as well as giving visibility of them, so that every day the statistics grow in our favor.