How Branding and PR (and Other Elements of Marketing) All Work Together

Public relations is a REALLY powerful tool to help give businesses visibility for growth. But PR isn’t exactly a standalone powerhouse. Marketing, branding and PR all work together for that total package! 

Knowing branding and PR inside and out helps you set yourself up for success in generating results for your clients. Even better, you’ll be able to efficiently vet clients and provide strategic recommendations. 

But how do branding and PR work together, especially with all the other elements of marketing? 

What Does Branding and PR Actually Mean? 

There are so many different elements of marketing, and each one has its own unique role. Together, all of these elements help brands create a cohesive strategy that supports your efforts as a service provider. 

All of these elements are related to marketing and fall under the communications umbrella, but each area is a unique service that requires different skills. Sometimes, these elements overlap—and they almost always have the power to support each other. 

Let’s start off by explaining what each element means and looks like in relation to the others! 

What Is Public Relations? 

Public relations is all about communicating and storytelling. 

PR professionals craft unique stories to build a reputation for their clients through media, social media, and communications. 

As a PR professional, you’ll translate your client’s products (or experts) into positive messages to grow awareness.

What Is Branding? 

Branding creates specific meaning for a company and provides a consistent experience for customers and clients. Good branding helps people instantly recognize a company. It also helps boost loyalty by appealing to that company’s ideal audience.

Clear branding supports PR efforts through improved visibility and brand recognition. Consistency is a big part of both branding and PR! 

Good branding really helps you to maximize the impact of PR by presenting a strong, clear image of your client. 

Other Elements Of Marketing

There are a few other key players here that you should be aware of. These are: social media, advertising, and influencer marketing. 

Social Media

Social media is all about community and engagement. Different platforms have different purposes and success strategies. Some PR professionals offer social media management services, and others outsource to social media professionals. 

Social media supports PR by: 

• Amplifying your message in real-time
• Helping you build a strong community
• Giving you a visual, authentic presence that supports PR efforts

Media professionals, influencers, and journalists vet social media to look for alignment and consistency. Branding plays into social media, too! The stronger a client’s branding is, the better their social media will be, and the more presentable it will be to support your PR efforts. 

Related: How to Handle Clients With No Social Media Presence

Advertising

Advertising involves paid promotions to reach new audiences or nurture current audiences. 

Unlike PR, which is earned media, advertising gives you the opportunity to pay for visibility. With advertising, you select strategic audience demographics and goals and pay for the chance ot reach those audiences. 

Combining PR and advertising is a good way to boost visibility and re-expose people to brand messaging! They can work in tandem to skyrocket brand awareness and client growth. 

Influencer Marketing

Influencers are social media content creators and bloggers who post about a product or service in exchange for financial compensation, free product, and other rewards. 

Influencer marketing works in tandem with PR, but shouldn’t replace it. A strong PR strategy utilizes influencer marketing as one layer and press features as another!

How Should You Connect Branding and PR As a PR Professional? 

So, why is it important for YOU as a PR pro to know about every area of marketing? 

In order to get high-quality press placements for your clients, it’s important that they have other elements of marketing in place that aren’t necessarily in your wheelhouse. Some clients don’t realize how important they are or even that they don’t have them. 

With the right knowledge under your belt, you’ll be able to provide strategic tips, recommendations, and even education on what they need to do. Guiding your clients through the process of creating a strong marketing strategy on all sides is so valuable. Plus, it sets you up for success in working with that client! 

Here are some of the best ways to support your clients by connecting branding and PR. 

Offer Referrals

Offer your clients referrals to peers who offer complementary services to yours. If you’re struggling to find other service providers, consider making a post in the Profitable PR Pros community! It’s a place full of incredible PR pros and other entrepreneurs who are always willing to share their recommendations. 

Your clients will really appreciate your recommendations and referrals, especially if it’s in something they’re unfamiliar with. 

Work To Educate Your Clients

You can create a huge impact by educating your clients on what they need to improve. 

Provide educational materials on: 

• The importance of what they are currently lacking
• How that element is different from what you are doing
• How that element will support your work
• How they can go about getting or creating the assets or elements you need

Offer Services Yourself or White-Label Someone Else’s Services

Consider offering some of these other services like social media and branding yourself! Or, you could consider white-labeling someone else’s services. 

If you’re going to offer services yourself, be cautious about taking on too much. You certainly can offer additional services if you want to! But when you’re doing all of the things, it can become too much—that is a LOT of management. 

It’s also really important to niche down. When you’re offering multiple different services, it becomes harder to take advantage of niching down. 

Knowing about marketing and how it relates to branding and PR helps you steer clients in the right direction. Even better, you’ll set yourself up for success in providing the best service to clients and generating amazing results.