Advertising or PR: is it possible to choose one?

Spend your entire budget on advertising to achieve sales here and now, or invest in PR for the sake of results for many years? What is more important and should you choose?

To begin with, advertising and PR cannot be contrasted at all. Just as it is impossible to compare them as alternatives. They don’t contradict each other, but they don’t duplicate either.

Let’s make an analogy. A person wants to make new friends. His voice, openly declaring, «Hello everyone! Let’s get acquainted!» is an advertisement. And the way he behaves, whether he arouses trust, interest, and what others think of him is already PR. Will it be possible to build a strong friendship if you only shout loudly about yourself, but do not have a good name? Or, on the contrary, have an excellent reputation, but remain modestly silent somewhere on the sidelines? Of course not.

Advertising (marketing in general) and PR should complement each other and be used together. It is this approach that creates a strong, well-known brand, forms a loyal audience and leads it to purchases, and the business to success and profit. This is exactly the integrative approach that we use in the 2L agency team when developing all special PR projects. But in order to combine them correctly, let’s figure out how each of these elements works and what tasks it solves.

Advertisement: quickly and directly to sales

The main purpose of advertising is to encourage people to buy. Banners on websites, ads in search, ads on social networks, from bloggers or videos on TV – all this quickly brings information about the product, discounts and advantageous offers to the audience.

What does advertising activity provide?

• Quick result: instant launch – contact – conversions – conversions — sales.
• Transparent analytics: you can calculate exactly how much it costs to attract a customer, which ad gives a higher conversion rate, etc.
• Targeted impact: advertising directly tells the user what the advertiser wants from him, and calls for action at the moment, without delay.

But there is a caveat: the effect of advertising lasts only as long as you pay. As soon as the budget runs out, the campaign stops, and with it the flow of customers. Therefore, in order to maintain sales on advertising, you will have to constantly invest, while the audience may burn out, the conversion rate may fall, and the prices of advertising platforms will rise for reasons beyond your control.

PR: the foundation of a strong brand

To build and maintain a good reputation, to gain the trust and loyalty of the consumer are the tasks of PR. Despite the obvious importance of these things, it must be remembered that PR does not bring direct sales. Instead, it lays the foundation for effective advertising in the future, and also supports brand interest and a share of natural purchases based on organic traffic, brand awareness and strength.

What does PR give a business?

• Credibility and reputation: comments from the brand in the media, articles about products, reviews and reviews from influencers, activity on social networks, etc. – versatile, constant PR creates recognition and a positive image of the company.
• Sustainable result: systematic PR activities produce a lasting effect that can persist for some time even in the event of a crisis, the abandonment of advertising, the «freezing» of public activity, the temporary withdrawal of the brand from the market.
• Emotional connection: whereas advertising hits the nail on the head, PR works more subtly. He uses more independent sources of information – journalists, bloggers, and users themselves (through UGC content) and builds communication with consumers based on trust, helping the brand to «make friends» with the audience rather than point them out.

The results of PR events are evaluated not by the rapid increase in sales, but by the number of views, the nature of reviews, and surveys about how attitudes towards the company have changed. This is an investment for the future, which helps to strengthen advertising campaigns in the future.

Why combine advertising with PR instead of choosing one direction

Imagine that you are offered to build a house, but use only one thing — either only the base or only the roof. It sounds absurd, doesn’t it? It’s also strange to contrast PR and advertising. A good reputation, which is formed by PR, is a reliable foundation. And advertising with specific offers is protection from market storms. One thing just doesn’t work without the other.

Let’s take an example. A new brand of natural cosmetics is appearing on the market. The company decides to bet only on advertising and immediately offers: «35% discount on all products!». What will the customer think: «Wait a minute, what kind of brand is this? Why should I believe you?» Now another option: the company publishes articles about the benefits of natural cosmetics, the creators of the brand talk in interviews about their values and views. People will be interested in the idea, but: in which store can I find this cosmetics and how to order it? A competent approach is based on the simultaneous use of two tools: PR forms an idea of the brand and product in the information field (articles about the popularity of natural cosmetics, reviews of ingredients from specialists, a story about the appearance of the brand), and advertising campaigns turn the interest into real purchases, thanks to clear commercial offers and simple ways to place an order.

Thus, choosing a strategy to increase sales should not be reduced to an either-or dilemma. 

• The lack of PR communications will deprive the company of fame: even the largest advertising expenses will not ensure sustainable sales growth without consumer confidence. 
• At the same time, the absence of advertising campaigns will make it impossible for the audience to respond quickly: despite the high level of brand loyalty, a short-term increase in sales volume requires active marketing activities such as discounts and special offers.

When the methods are combined correctly, you get a complete coverage of the audience and the user’s path: from the first acquaintance with the brand to the moment of purchase. Moreover, the effectiveness of the integrated approach has been proven in practice by both large brands and small and medium-sized businesses.

A young company that is just entering the market can use regional media and social networks to build a reputation: through the publication of information materials about the product or on related topics, possibly with elements of humor, visual graphics or other valuable content, and then launch targeted advertising to quickly get the first customers.

Large organizations build their strategy through collaboration with bloggers with a wide audience, use nationwide media resources to reach the maximum number of people, and advertising campaigns enhance the effect of PR events.

A large network company invites celebrities to promote, publishes in large publications, and supports high–profile events. But the bottom line is the same: PR builds a brand’s reputation, which becomes a powerful sales driver when well-designed advertising campaigns are connected.»

PR helps a young business to gain fame without spending a lot of money on advertising. Journalists are willing to publish materials about the creators of the project, how the product solves customer problems, covers important market needs, or if the release contains useful data, unique research – all this attracts media attention and gives free publicity.

Large organizations need PR for another purpose – to maintain a good reputation and maintain leadership in their field. Even a popular brand will have difficulties if it uses only advertising: the lack of regular public relations will lead to a loss of trust and emotional contact with customers.

How it works: let’s take an example 

So, our task is to increase sales of the latest smartphone model. Strengths – a durable case, a long-lasting battery. The main difficulty is that the market is crowded. How to build a job?

1. Creating a positive image through public relations

• Distribution of the press release through the media database;
• Selection of suitable authors and specialized media;
• Organic embedding of information in publications, testing from well-known technology reviewers and video bloggers.

2. Direct increase of customer interest by advertising tools

• Target/context with discounts and promotions;
• Launching a promotional website for a product with a simple purchase order;
• Retargeting for users who visited the landing page but did not place an order immediately.

3. An integrated approach

• Create a unified content strategy in which company publications contain information about special offers, and advertising messages demonstrate the brand’s credibility by referring to well-known publications.
• Tracking results by several parameters: how much people remember the brand, how many people have seen the materials, how actively they react to media publications, as well as specific sales figures from advertising campaigns.

Metrics

Evaluating the results, one must understand that PR and advertising cannot be measured equally, and there is nothing strange about this. Demanding an instant increase in sales from a PR is like trying to measure a person’s height with a thermometer.

Advertising indicators are clicks, conversions, the cost of an attracted lead or direct customer, the average receipt for purchases from advertising, and ROI.

Online PR indicators are different, although they can also be quantitative, i.e. quite specifically measurable. This is the number of brand mentions, the number of views and readings of materials, comments under articles or integrations, reposts, and the media index of publications. Important qualitative metrics of PR are: the tone of mentions, the emotional coloring of comments, and the assessment of the dynamics of brand attitudes based on surveys. Indirectly, the dynamics of the popularity of branded search queries will speak about the results of PR.

How PR enhances advertising

Advertising campaigns show much better results if they are complemented by PR support. This is a proven fact. 

CTR of companies with a good reputation is on average two to three times higher than that of brands without a name.

Let’s use examples. A person has read an article by a financial advisor on a reputable website that recommends an online service for managing the family budget. A few days later, he notices a banner advertisement for this service. Thanks to the preliminary recommendation, the probability of buying a subscription becomes much higher, because the user received a positive evaluation of the product from a specialist in advance.

Or here. The user is watching a video by a well-known travel blogger, which describes in detail a vacation in an exotic place and suggests booking a tour through a specific operator. A week later, after seeing the tour operator’s advertisement, the user feels more confident and is ready to book a trip, because the offer already looks familiar and evokes positive associations.

Both cases demonstrate the synergy effect between high-quality PR content and the subsequent advertising campaign.

A mini-guide on the integrated approach

What to do before developing a campaign. Diagnose the brand’s current position in the market. Find out if consumers are familiar with your brand, what they think about it, and why they might be hesitant to choose it. This will allow you to properly distribute efforts between PR and advertising.

When the brand is new and/or unknown. Start by creating a positive image through PR. Tell the story of the brand’s creation, show the benefits, reveal the unique sides of the product, and collaborate with experts and influencers. In parallel, launch targeted advertising activities for the same target audience.

If the brand is well-known, but sales are stagnant. Conduct an audit of customer perception of the brand. Evaluate the company’s reputation. You may need to update your strategy with a powerful PR campaign. In this case, the advertising campaigns will have to convey the same fresh ideas and benefits of the product.

With complex products or high prices. Use PR to increase the level of understanding of the benefits of the product. Create useful publications, demonstrate the application of the product, and provide expert opinions. Convert the interest of the target audience with regular advertising activity.

Bottom line: PR and advertising work together. PR creates a favorable background and trust, advertising turns consumer interest into a real purchase. Use both tools in a coordinated manner, based on business goals and market specifics.