I’ve found that the general public and business owners have been bombarded with the terms, “marketing”, “branding” and “public relations”, but they don’t really know what the terms mean. To add to it, there seems to be a growing number of “experts” giving false information to the public and to their clients, it’s easy to see why people can get confused.
Let’s start first with public relations. PR manages the relationship between your business and/or brand with your customer, and when its effectively done, “gets you out there” into the public’s consciousness. This is done through events, press conferences, press releases, interviews/features in the media and also building social media awareness.
Next is marketing. Marketing is the process of promoting, selling or distributing your business or product. This is done through branded materials – like business cards, brochures, flyers, websites, banners, catalogs, promotional products and newsletters.
Then there is branding. Branding is actually a function of marketing (meaning – without marketing, there is no branding!). If marketing is what you do, then branding is what you are. Branding creates a connection between your company (and if applicable, your product), to the customer. Branding separates yourself from the competition and ultimately builds loyalty with your customers.
How is branding done? Well – building a brand is not easy and I will cover that in articles to come!
What did you think public relations, marketing and branding entailed? Let me know if this article made it easier for you to understand the difference between the three!
