In the past month I’ve been working with participants in the AusMumpreneur 6 Week Challenge to develop their PR strategies. I set them some questions to help organise their thoughts around promotional strategies for their businesses, and wondered if you could benefit from doing the same.

If you’ve never sat down and really though about your PR strategy then there’s a big chance you’ll go after every bright shiny publicity object on offer. I’m not saying you shouldn’t follow up great PR opportunities (I see excellent opportunities on SourceBottle every day), but if you have a strategy behind what you’re doing you have a better chance of staying on track and on topic.

So I want you to make a coffee or tea (or some other soothing beverage), grab a notepad and jot down your answers to these questions:

1. What is your PR goal? Make sure to include what you want to achieve and how.

2. What is your brand positioning statement – ie what is it that makes you and your business stand out?

3. What are your PR objectives – ie what do you want to achieve with PR? For example creating brand awareness, generating website traffic, building your customer database or increasing sales.

4. What is your promotion strategy – ie how are you going to achieve your objectives? For example using social media to build the brand, speaking at events and article marketing to establish your credibility, blogging to drive customers to your website or product launches when you introduce something new?

5. How will you evaluate your PR success? Look at your objectives to work out the various measurement tools. Obvious ones are increased sales, more clients, more followers and likers on social media or invitations to speak.

Now you’ve answered the questions, put all these ingredients together into a plan and put it somewhere you can see it so you’ll work towards your PR goals constantly.

I’d love it if you’d share your PR goals. What is at the top of your publicity list?