Public Relations: Holiday Style

17 Dec Public Relations: Holiday Style

The holidays are not only a time for food and festivities, but they also present excellent public relations (PR) opportunities for businesses. Now is the perfect time to focus on your business relationships with employees, customers, shareholders, vendors, legislators or other local businesses; thank those who’ve helped your company run smoothly throughout the year; and spread the holiday cheer.

The following are a few ways to put a little PR spice into your business’ holiday strategy:

1. Send holiday cards by snail mail or email, if you want to go green, and/or gifts to your main constituencies.
2. Throw a holiday party for your employees to show them you appreciate their hard work. Check out our free event plan template at https://fmpr.net/downloads/event_plan_template.pdf.
3. Coordinate or sign up for a community service event, and recruit employees to participate. Give your employees company t-shirts or hats to wear so you’re a cohesive group.
4. Donate a portion of your annual profits to charity. For more information about this tactic, contact us to prepare a Community Support Plan for your company.
5. Decorate your business for the holidays.
6. Send a year-end e-letter to your shareholders and other allies to let them know what your business accomplished in the past year, and what they can look forward to next year.
7. Host a holiday-themed game on you social media accounts (Twitter, Facebook, Foursquare, etc.), and give away prizes to reward your most interactive friends, fans, and followers.
8. Pitch a story to your local newspaper using a holiday angle. For information on how to write a press release, see our tips at http://www.yourpubliciswaiting.com/2010/12/how-to-write-a-press-release/.

To maximize these tactics, be sensitive to the fact that people celebrate different holidays during this time. Steer clear of sending cards or gifts specifying any one holiday. Instead, wish your recipients a “happy holiday season.” Also, invite the media to cover any community event that your business supports. And remember, the holidays continue through the New Year so it’s entirely appropriate to have the festivities run through that time period. Finally, and as always, be sure that all your PR strategies, actions and communications come from the heart.

For more PR tips, visit our website at https://fmpr.net/, subscribe to our blog at http://www.yourpubliciswaiting.com/, and follow us on Twitter at www.twitter.com/fmpr.