As a public relations professional, you likely have a solid set of skills, tools, and resources that help you thrive no matter what campaign you’re running. However, even these well-honed tools can be challenged when you’re running campaigns in specific niches.
Different industries—and even verticals within industries—require different methods to meet the expectations of clients and the needs of audiences. The type of content you apply to community nonprofit initiatives is unlikely to be the same as those required for tech startups. Understanding how to tailor strategies for niches can ensure that you and your clients experience success.
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Leverage client knowledge
Even if you’ve worked alongside a specific industry several times before, you may find that your more generalized knowledge won’t always suit the PR campaigns for niches. For instance, experience in creating patient-facing medical industry materials is great, but your tactics may not be quite as impactful for clients who develop surgical materials for facilities. Nevertheless, it’s important to recognize that your clients will have key insights into the specific needs, attitudes, and other nuances of their industry that only comes from being deeply embedded in it.
Commit to collaborating closely with your clients to gain a better understanding of their industry niche or vertical. Don’t rely on them for everything here. As a PR professional, you have a responsibility to perform relevant market research so that you have a baseline knowledge. However, make time to have thorough discussions with your clients about what they consider to be the key components of their niche. Talk about the details of relationships they have with the target consumers. Discuss new trends for the niche they see coming down the track that may not have reached the general PR landscape as yet.
This isn’t just a way to gain a solid understanding of the niche so that you can make more informed choices about the techniques, tools, and messaging to use. It also shows clients that you recognize how important the specifics of their niche are and that you care about representing these effectively. This may result in long-term relationships.
Identify niche resources
Effective resources are key to the success of any PR campaign. It’s also important to understand that the relevance of the resources you use matters. This is particularly vital when representing niche industries. The target audiences and even the intentions of campaigns can differ between niches and verticals in the same industry, therefore the tools you use won’t always be the same.
This may go as far as considering outsourcing aspects of campaigns. Deciding whether to perform marketing in-house or to outsource isn’t something that happens overnight—it takes careful consideration. After all, it can impact budgets and your PR firm is likely to relinquish a little control. However, if you don’t have the niche expertise in-house or the vertical doesn’t typically have a marketing component, external professionals can be an invaluable resource. It may also be useful to take a hybrid approach that sees partners collaborate closely with you on limited tasks so that you can still direct operations effectively.
Online groups and communities are another important resource for PR campaigns directed at niches. Many of these are likely to be on social media platforms or industry-specific forums. Establish channels to engage directly with these groups. Wherever possible, utilize members as social proof in campaigns. This may involve collaborating on user-generated content (UGC) that can resonate with their peers.
Establish meaningful connections
Alongside ethical actions and high standards of quality, one of the practices relevant to all businesses is making meaningful connections with consumers. This is particularly important for improving the PR of firms and impacting their long-term growth. Nevertheless, making meaningful connections in industry niches requires careful consideration. You need to remember that the audience you’re pitching to has expectations and preferences that may be different from others in the field.
This can begin simply enough with the language you’re using in your PR messaging. Consumers in specific niches may well be sensitive to the use of technical jargon, industry terminology, and even slang. Using terms that they adopt as members of a niche community may make them more receptive to your materials, so be sure to work with your clients to establish the right language here.
In addition, influencers can be powerful tools for making meaningful connections within industry cliques. Niche influencers are considered to gain greater engagement from their audiences. This is because there’s a component of trust and authenticity that comes from being recognized as a member of and source of expertise in the community. Aligning your clients with these influencers may help their reputation and engagement prospects.
Conclusion
Successful niche PR campaigns require a commitment to understanding the specific audience and clients involved. Wherever possible, collaborate with your clients to gain a better understanding of the nuances of their industry. Identify the most appropriate resources for the verticals you’re pitching to. Remember that PR can be most powerful when you make meaningful customer connections, so you should establish relevant messaging and work with influencers.
In addition, consider utilizing your PR network when navigating niches. Industry colleagues may be able to offer you additional perspectives and insights. Maintaining positive connections in this way can help you identify solutions during campaigns for particularly challenging, unusual, or even controversial niches.
