📍    Welcome back to this episode of no silver spoons. I'm your host, Sarah, Beth Herman, and Amy Barko is back with us again from chatterbox PR and marketing. We had a fabulous episode last week. Talking all about where she came from, how she did this, why she decided to do it, and just really getting you the information you need to know about working with a PR agent and really what that means for your brand.

And truly that everyone needs someone in PR fighting for them. And the most important bit of advice that Amy gave us last week was that. Everything is built on relationships. You should be collaborating. It's not enough to talk about yourself on social media. You've got to have that third party person honing in on your product, your brand, giving credibility to who you are to reach the masses.

People don't really care what you know. They care what other people think about you, which is so crazy because you're always taught that other people's opinion of you doesn't matter. But I guess in this case, it really does. So, Amy, welcome back to the show. Thanks for joining us. Thanks Sarah Beth, I'm excited to be here again.

Awesome. So, we talked about very briefly at the end of last week's show that we're gonna talk about things that you probably shouldn't do. And I don't wanna say these things in like a negative way, but. Once you've been in business, I feel like for 10 years, like 10 years in business teaches you so much, Amy, you've got 18 years under your belt in this industry, in this brand, in this business and doing exactly what you do.

And I think all of that time has taught you a lot of things and you've probably met. quite a few people, some that  you will never work with again. Some that you have worked with since the beginning. And I want to talk about what you should be weary of. And then we're going to talk about some situations you've been in before that made you decide not to work with anybody before.

So, let's start at the basics. If you are launching a business, brand new entrepreneur, there are some do's and don'ts of marketing. There are some do's and don'ts in the PR world, right? So, talk me through what those are so that our listeners can really understand this for their own brand.  With pr it's really interesting because.

You really want to be aware of who you're reaching out to.  We're talking journalists and with the journalists, they're people too. And a lot of times, they, they don't get that impression from people. I would say 90 percent of their inbox. A lot of the emails fall flat because people do not do it properly.

So, the do's and don'ts, I'm going to go ahead and give the top three do's and the top three don'ts.  I'm going to start with a don't.  With your subject line, a lot of people will be very generic with your subject line.

And if you think about it, when an email lands in your inbox, The subject line is by far your first impression, right? The recipient's first impression. So, you really want to make sure that your subject line lands properly to get your your email open. So really pay attention to your subject line. Like a do subject line would be.

Best gift for kids under the age of 10 for Easter.  that is very descriptive.   They know exactly what they're opening Subject line would be the best Easter gift. The best Easter gift for who that's what they're thinking. So really look at your subject line and don't be afraid to throw your subject line into different AI formats that will help you perfect it but make sure that, they know exactly what they're opening.

 Another don't would be. sending a mass email so blind copying 100 different people or  cringe actually putting a hundred different emails into the send line and sending that out to a hundred different people.   What you want to do is you want to make sure that your email is personal,  that the journalist receiving the email knows that you know who they are, you know what their beat is, what their last article was this might be a cringe factor.

And this is another do. Search them on social media. Follow them on social media. What did they have for lunch? Mention that in your email. So that's a do. And another don't would be sending emails on a weekend.   you if you're working on the weekend. Go ahead and schedule your email to send like Monday at noon. Mondays are typically a bad day for emails. Journalists get about during the holiday season, they receive anywhere from 800 to 1200 emails a day.

And when I say the holiday season, we're talking from July to January.  Oh my gosh. Yeah.  Right now it's a little bit lighter. So they're only getting four to 600 emails a day. And how are they picking you  they're picking you one because they know you two, because  it can even be one if you have a fantastic subject line.

  I think a lot about this whole process of building these relationships and like getting our name in the hands of other people. I don't think the average person would even know how to find a journalist or what journalist. So back to the whole suggestion of setting up Google alerts wherever your competitors are being featured.

Is it, okay, now that's the route I go, that's who I reach out to. And then now I'm going to try to email that person in hopes that I'm going to get to them. Exactly. That's exactly correct. Yeah that's how you find who's writing about your space, right? Yeah. Yeah. And then what you do is, I subscribe to, databases that have journalists within it. 

Most people don't subscribe because they're extremely expensive, it is what I do.  It's important for me. But finding people that are within your space and that are writing about your beat.  The Google alert is going to be the best bet for that. 

 So let's talk a little bit about some of these situations that you've come across of things that maybe you've worked with people and they came on board and.  they tell you all about their brand, their business, they're doing X and you need to do Y. And you're like, there's no way we can do X.

We have to do Y. I want to know what is X that people are doing that absolutely not. And how are you moving through that? What are some of these things you've seen people do that you're like, Hey, that's a major no. What are you, why are we doing that?  That's a good question. I've had this happen 

in the PR space,  if you're a publicist reaching out to a journalist, that journalist wants to hear from one person, one person. They do not want to hear from four people from the same Brand, whether you're the publicist, whether you're, in house for the brand.  So what I've had happen is  I've had brands have an in house PR team and they're reaching out to journalists as well as I'm reaching out.

And then they have another PR team that is also reaching out. I literally had this happen and. Because they want to make sure that they're featured well, what ends up happening is they're going to go with the person that they know. But also it could actually backfire. And it could be. Like frowned upon, not only on me, but also the brand.

  If,   these journalists are getting inundated and all they're hearing about is this one brand from five different people, that's not a good look.   It's almost like you're  Desperate, like I want to get featured here. So we're going to send as many emails and be as annoying as possible.

Literally that has happened to me and hiring people. Like some people even give advice. If you're high, if you're looking for a job, you need to call them. You need to email them. You need to follow up on your resume or you're not going to land that job. I'm telling you people that do that. I literally want to hire them the least.

I'm not kidding you. My hiring team. This maybe is a parallel to exactly what you're saying, but like literally my hiring team will not want to hire you because you will seem annoying. And then we will think that when you are working with us, you are going to bother us all the time and you are never going to get your work done.

You are just going to be relentless. And annoying. And we need you to get to work. We don't need you to email us or message us 90,000 times. We just wanna like one and done, get it done. You know what I'm saying? And so I think you are saying the same thing journalists don't wanna hear from 97 people.

If we're interested, we're gonna let you know.  Absolutely. And they wanna know from one person, not 15. So yeah. I mean that by far is a major No-no. As a matter of fact,  I've had to add into my contract, I should say that if you're working with me, that you will be doing no other PR outreach and you will not be working with any other PR organization. 

Wow. That's powerful.  Just imagine all that you had to go through to get to that point  if you're working with me, you trust me. If you don't trust me,  let's not work together then. But if you do trust me, you've got to put all your eggs in this basket right now because I can't have someone else working against me  it's literally two positives make a negative. So we can't be doing this. We've got to get an alignment here so that we can get you where you want to go. And I think part of the lesson that I'm learning from you right now is that slow and steady wins the race. It's not darting for the target and hoping we get it.

It's you have a process. You've built out exactly what it looks like to be successful. To get names and brands in front of the right people and in the right hands. And if we try to deviate from that, we actually end up losing as, am I right in saying that?  Absolutely. Absolutely. And there's a good way to follow up, with journalists.

Think about   how many emails they receive and how full their inboxes. are.  There's a chance that they may have missed your email, so it is okay to follow up and  repitch, right?  It gives you the opportunity to get in front of them again and present your story again or at a different angle to it, right?

And really hit at home. Sometimes  it's in the follow up, right? But  it shouldn't be more people  following up or pitching the same thing or, not having well thought out pitches. But also  if I'm pitching, Jill, journalist Jill on this one thing, and that just so happened to not be a fit.

But then I have either a new release of a product, or I'm offering a different service, or. I'm a spiritual person and it's the new moon. And I, start pitching around that and change my angle. Then that gives you another opportunity as well. So take every chance you get to get inside their inbox to, to talk to them about something different, to tell them another, a different story, or to reiterate your previous story.

And just see if that angle is a fit.  Sometimes the secret is in the follow up. You just have to be very strategic in the way that you follow up.  Absolutely.  And I think that might actually be in anything truly. I think that can apply in every single thing in our life because even when we take that to the new hires I'm talking about, people that are applying to work with my companies, you can be strategic in how you follow up.

You don't have to be relentless and emailing and texting my website and sending us text messages in and calling our customer service line every day. Like some people are relentless and I don't find that so attractive, especially for   the brand that I represent and the other companies I have, I don't necessarily want someone that's being like that and not respecting the process of what that looks like.

And that really brings me to my next point. I'm sure when you work with clients, Just like in any business, we don't always get results as fast as we want, right? Some things take time.  It's like the way that a diamond is made under pressure and over time, and so I think in business. We have really become so accustomed to instant gratification because you can order from Amazon Prime and get something same day delivery, two day delivery at max, right?

You go in the business world and everybody wants us to call them back immediately. Respond to an email immediately, text immediately, be somewhere five minutes early. If you're late, I don't want anything to do with you ever again. Very little grace is ever given. And I'm saying that for a place of pure honesty, not because I operate that way, but because everybody else is.

And now we're in the heightened words of this year have been. boundaries, right? What are my boundaries with work? How do I find this balance of work and life truly? Because one is always taking over another. And so it brings me to my statement of this scenario that we've created where we get a new client and we sell them on who we are and what we're able to do, but then they don't get the results as fast as they want.

And so I want to know, how do we set these expectations? How are you setting expectations of how long is it going to take to get into the hands of these people? And then the people that don't care about that expectation, they just want results from you and they'll make your life. Not so great until you get them the results.

And I know you've dealt with that too.  It's interesting because a lot of people feel like they have the best brand out there. And we all do,  there's nothing wrong with feeling that way, but  the reality of it is the editors and journalists and publications.

They don't have that same feeling    let's go back to the lipstick analogy. If you have a lipstick that you're wanting to have covered, by the media, there's a thousand lipsticks out there.

 Why is yours great? Why is yours different, and why should they look at yours differently? Is it the right fit at the right time?  I make sure when I onboard a client,  even in the discovery call, we talk about the fact that.

PR is a marathon. It's not a sprint. And if you are looking for a sprint,  PR is not for you. There are other way, Google ads and Facebook ads, you might see better results, with that, the spend is probably a little bit higher. But the reality of it is PR is going to take time.

Cause if you think about it,  Right now I don't know when we'll be aired, but right now we're at the end of January.  So what journalists are working on right now is spring and summer. So if we're talking to a journalist today about your brand. Could it land, within the next four to six weeks?

It could.   When we're talking about the holiday season, there is a reason why the phrase Christmas in July is actually a thing. Because  Christmas happens in July. For retail for media in July, that's when the media starts writing their holiday gift guides.

 Just think about it. They have to have everything in advance to go to print. You have to have everything done in advance. It's not like recording a podcast and having it air two weeks later. You have so much research, so much bandwidth. You have to a lot. For all the things that are going to come your way.

And so I think this is a lesson for entrepreneurs, right? You want to be successful. You need to think about really how news outlets, marketing agencies, brand photographers influencers of all kinds work. They're on a schedule much different than your day to day reality. So you expecting something now you're already behind the times.

Like you're already six months late.  Absolutely. Yeah. You're already behind the eight ball for sure. And I feel like that is managing expectations is probably one of the most challenging parts of my job and because I say it, and I make people aware it's a marathon, not a sprint.

We really are looking at the long game of it all. But they often don't hear that. So it's something that we really do have to to remind people of on a regular basis. If you get four media hits a month, that is fantastic.  What's the ROI on that?

That's the other expectation that a lot of people are confused with because PR is not sales. It doesn't equate to sales. It equates to visibility. And credibility,   I think that brand awareness and that credibility that you're building for people is for future clients.

It's not for your clients today. You as a. Entrepreneur are responsible for your clients today, tomorrow, the new sales you're getting in the six weeks from now, you are responsible for that working with you, Amy, and any other PR or marketing specialists. You are responsible for getting them brand awareness.

and recognition and collaboration 12 weeks from now, you're dealing so much in the future. And I think that many people are not understanding of that because of the instant gratification world that we live in.  Absolutely. To that point, people feel like.  When something is covered, they're going to click and buy, let's just talk it for simplicity.

Let's talk about a product based business. So if something is covered people have the expectation that they're going to click and buy immediately. But the reality of it is you've given them the opportunity to learn what your brand Looks like learn your brand logo, learn your brand name, which is the visibility factor of it, right?

And when they go into Target or Nordstrom or Ulta  and they walk through the aisles and they'll be like, oh, that's that brand I saw. I remember reading about it. They pick it up. they're more likely to buy it. So if they don't buy it like direct from the article that is being featured, that doesn't mean that you have not built that brand awareness with that consumer.

  If you're across these channels distribution channels, they could buy it anywhere. They could actually go from the article onto Amazon because they can get it. Like you said, by the same day delivery. Five and 10 tonight. Literally that could be where they end up buying it. So exactly measuring ROI off of a, off of PR is challenging.

That, that is probably one of the most challenging parts of my job is really. Educating  clients that the ROI is your visibility and your credibility because you have that's where profitability will come into play. Look at Kleenex, look at Pepsi, look at Coke, those brands and those brand logos are embedded in our brains because we've seen it over and over again.

I can say the golden arches and you know exactly who I'm talking about. McDonald's.  Absolutely.   Know the slogans. Yeah. Talking about slogans,  I'm loving it,  , with nothing by heart, and I don't eat it every day. I don't even eat it at all. You know what I mean? Like it's just, we know it.

It's a family name.  exactly. So by being consistent with your messaging and buying, by being consistent with your PR and branding, cause PR is branding, right?  By being consistent with that. That is what's going to end up having people come to you and enter your space, enter your universe.

That by far is the most credibility factor. Yeah, absolutely. Amy, this episode has been so good. I feel like you and I could talk for hours. I have learned so much from you in just these last little bit, Holy cow, things I never even knew before. You're fabulous and I'm so grateful to have you on the show.

You are actually a speaker at our Blueprint to Breakthrough mentor program, our 16 week container. If you want to know more about that, you can click the show notes. We have our wait list open for May of 2025. And so we are accepting applications into that program. Now, Amy, you are such a gift. To us all and such a gift to the world of PR and marketing.

I'm so excited to learn even more from you and our program. Amy, if anybody wanted to reach out to you, I know they can click the link in the show notes, but what is your Instagram handle? Do you have a website? Tell me a little bit about how to connect with you.  Absolutely. So Instagram it's Amy Barko.

And we'll have the link in the show notes so you can find me there. You can find me on LinkedIn. That's a popular platform for me  with LinkedIn. I'm obsessed.  I love you're not tapping into LinkedIn. You're missing a golden nugget. LinkedIn is by far.  So amazing. So I'm on LinkedIn and then my website is chatterbox brands with an S.

Awesome. Amy, thank you so much for being a guest on no silver spoons. This was so awesome. Oh my gosh. I just like. Want to keep talking and keep talking.  I can talk for days on this   I love it.   📍 Thank you so much for those of you listening. We appreciate you being on the show today and as always keep striving for the best version of yourself.

Grit and determination aren't just words. They're qualities that turn challenges into opportunities and dreams into reality. And Amy, you are a living, breathing example of that. Thank you guys so much and go ahead and click the show notes. You can actually text us questions and any questions you have for Amy will make sure to pass along her way.

Please follow her on Instagram. We would love to connect with you there. Thank you so much guys. And we'll catch you on the next episode.