It’s the classic marketing run-around. You know you have a great story to tell, but getting people to pay attention feels out of reach. Should you hire a public relations (PR) agency, or try to run things yourself?
The reality is that effective public relations for small business doesn’t require a Fortune 500 budget. It requires a strategy, a system, and the right marketing tools. This guide will walk you through the steps of creating a successful PR plan, the tools you can use, and the benefits you’ll see.
What is public relations for small teams and what’s the process?
Public relations (PR) is the strategic communication process that builds and maintains a positive relationship between a business or organization and its public. Unlike marketing, which typically focuses on direct sales, PR focuses on credibility and reputation management, ensuring that when customers look for a solution, your brand is seen as a trustworthy and authoritative industry voice.
The actual process of starting your public relations journey for your small business begins with three concrete actions.
- First, develop your foundational PR assets, including a concise company boilerplate description, high-resolution visual assets, and a standard press kit containing founder biographies and key product facts.
- Second, build a targeted media list by researching the journalists, bloggers, and podcasters who cover your industry and audience, using your CRM to organize and segment them.
- Third, identify three newsworthy angles to pitch to media outlets based on recent company milestones, proprietary data, or unique insights into a current market trend.
Once these steps are complete, you can begin the strategic outreach of crafting personalized, brief, and highly relevant pitches to your targeted media contacts.
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Define your public relations strategy for small business
Your first step to kick off your public relations strategy is to define what you want to achieve. A successful strategy starts with identifying your core audience and the message you want them to receive. This isn’t just about what you sell — it’s about your values, your mission, and the unique problem you solve for customers.
Identify your unique story and audience
Every business has a compelling story, whether it’s the personal journey of the founder or the innovative way your product is changing a specific industry. Pinpoint what makes you newsworthy and relevant to your target audience.
Your message should be simple, consistent, and authentic. A recent Salesforce study found that 80% of customers say the experience a company provides is just as important as its products or services, highlighting the need for a strong, authentic brand narrative in all your PR efforts. Focus your outreach on publications, podcasts, and social media platforms that your ideal customer actively engages with.
You can enlist a marketing CRM to analyze your marketing data and contacts, keeping it all in one place. To learn more about identifying your niche, do some market research and learn where you fit.
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Set measurable goals for your PR efforts
What does success look like for your PR campaign? It shouldn’t just be “get mentioned in the news.” Set specific, measurable, achievable, relevant, and time-bound (SMART) goals. These might include, say, increasing website traffic by 15% from media-referred sources in the next quarter, securing three interviews with industry-specific publications, or seeing a 10% rise in your brand mention volume across social media. Here are some PR example goals to start with:
- Increase website referral traffic from media sources by X% in Q3.
- Secure placements in five Tier-1 industry publications within six months.
- Achieve a X% increase in branded social media mentions month-over-month.
- Host or secure participation in two industry-specific podcasts or webinars this quarter.
PR technology: How to boost business awareness
You may not be able to afford a full-time PR team, but you can automate tasks, track media mentions, and manage contacts with the same efficiency you use in your marketing and sales operations. This is where integrating your PR outreach with your CRM system becomes a powerful advantage.
Manage media contacts with your CRM
Treating journalists and media contacts like you treat high-value leads is the key. Use your CRM platform to manage your media list, segmenting contacts by industry, publication, and past interactions. Log every pitch you send, every email response, and every time they publish an article about your business — or a competitor.
This detailed history ensures you never send a generic pitch and allows your sales team to reference relevant press coverage when engaging potential customers. Think of your media list as a specialized group of stakeholders that your service team might also need to engage.
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Integrate AI into your PR workflow
The latest artificial intelligence (AI) tools can drastically reduce the manual labor involved in PR. AI can help identify trending topics that align with your business, analyze the sentiment of existing media coverage, and even suggest personalized pitch angles for different journalists.
Imagine using Agentforce 360 to automatically summarize complex reports for a quick quote, or using AI to draft a first-pass press release based on a few bullet points. By offloading these time-consuming tasks, your team can focus on the strategic relationship-building that secures high-value placements. In fact, our research found that:
78% of SMBs using or planning to use AI view it as a “game changer” for their business operations.
85% of SMB leaders believe that AI agents can help them scale operations and improve profit margins in ways that were previously out of reach for smaller organizations.
41% of average employee time is currently spent on repetitive, manual tasks that AI agents are designed to automate, such as data entry and meeting summaries.
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Execute your PR launch
Execution is where your strategy must translate into clear actions, and your actions must be tied back to measurable results. Start by creating content (yes, AI can help) and start tracking the data.
Create compelling content and pitches
You’re going to need a steady stream of compelling content. This goes beyond simple product announcements. Media outlets are looking for data, trends, and expert commentary. Use the knowledge gathered by your sales and service teams — for example, a unique usage statistic or a surprising customer trend — to create newsworthy stories.
Every pitch should clearly articulate the value to the journalist’s readers and be short, respectful, and perfectly tailored to their beat. One small business owner noted, “We started getting more placements when we stopped talking about our product and started talking about the solution to our customers’ industry problem.”
Track results and reporting value
After a piece of media coverage goes live, your work isn’t over — it’s just beginning. Track the impact of the coverage by monitoring referral traffic to your website, noting any spikes in leads, and analyzing social media engagement.
- Did your CRM analytics reveal more demo requests or sign-ups?
- Did your latest promotional article lead to an increase in contact form conversions?
- Did your sales increase after you published that press release?
By linking PR activity directly to business outcomes, you can provide clear reporting on how your public relations efforts are contributing, justifying the investment.
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Create a public relations strategy for your SMB today
A PR strategy means defining your unique story, audience, and setting measurable goals like increasing media-referred website traffic or securing industry placements. By finding your voice and using the right tools, you can reach your marketing goals and get your public relations game underway.
Start your journey with the Free or Starter Suite today. Looking for more customization? Explore Pro Suite. Already a Salesforce customer? Activate Foundations to try out Agentforce 360 today.
AI supported the writers and editors who created this article.
Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)
Public relations is the strategic communication process that builds mutually beneficial relationships between your organization and the public. For an SMB, it involves managing your brand’s reputation, securing media coverage, and communicating with stakeholders to foster credibility and trust.
The cost can vary widely, but for most SMBs, the investment should be more time-based than budget-based initially. By using internal resources and tools like your CRM and AI, you can execute a strong PR strategy with minimal financial spend.
A press kit, or media kit, is a package of promotional materials that provides journalists with information about your company. Yes, your startup needs one; it should include your logo, high-resolution images, founder bios, a company overview, and key statistics or case studies.
A CRM platform helps centralize all media contact information, track the history of communications (pitches sent, responses received), and log the results of media placements, allowing for targeted outreach and measurable reporting.
Marketing focuses on promoting products or services to drive direct sales, often through paid channels. PR focuses on reputation management, building credibility, and securing earned media (unpaid media coverage) to foster general public trust in the brand.
