Intro:
Broadcasting live from the Business Radio X studios in Detroit, Michigan. It's time for Detroit Business Radio. Now, here's your host.
The Mag
Lee Cantor here, another episode of Detroit Business Radio, and this is going to be a good one. Today's episode is brought to you in part by activate your great consulting agency. Today on Detroit Business Radio, we have Karen Swim with Words for Hire. Welcome, Karen.
Karen Swim:
Thank you, Lee. It's so great to be here with you today.
The Mag
Well, I'm excited to learn what you're up to. And just a heads up, this is a kind of a weird thing. But when I put you when in my calendar, Google was trying to help me by putting a swimming pool. So I was like, What is a swimming pool in my and then that was because of your name.
Karen Swim:
Google knows probably knows that whenever I am speaking my name to someone that does not know me that I will say, Karen Swim, last name Swim as in swimming pool. So thank you Google for understanding.
The Mag
So it was kind of a little for me, I'd normally it just turn red. And then it was a swimming pool. So I was like, that's interesting. But let this is all about you. Now, Karen, that was not about me. Tell us about Words for Hire, how are you serve in folks?
Karen Swim:
Words for Hire, in spite of the name. I know, I started out as a content marketing or copywriting business and quickly pivoted back to my background in marketing and then evolved into a full-service PR agency. And so that is what I do today, I serve people, I still offer marketing services as well, but mostly live on the PR side of the house these days. And I work with b2b technology, healthcare, and any occasional nonprofit client.
The Mag
Now has a PR, marketing, digital marketing social media, isn't their kind of a blurring of the lines of where one starts and one ends?
Karen Swim:
You know that is such a great question. In some respects, yes, in that we definitely all do more integrated campaigns. And we may use some of the same tactics. But having worked in those disciplines, they really are very specific skill sets and a different sets of expertise, and a different approaches. So I very much see them as very different. PR and marketing definitely are very different. Yes, you do have a similar skill, sometimes in common, but the approach and the tools that you use, and the results that you're driving after are very distinct.
The Mag
So now when you're working with your clients, how do you help them kind of discern what maybe they need? Maybe they're asking for one of them? And they don't know really? How to articulate what it is they want? And then how do you explain what a PR person does as opposed to a marketing person or a social media person?
Karen Swim:
Yeah, actually, you know, because I have expertise in that area, what I usually work with clients is in customizing a fully integrated engagement for them. And so sometimes that may include delving into the marketing side, and other times it may mean leaning more heavily on the PR side. So the beauty of having that double expertise is being able to really customize an engagement to solve the client's specific problems. And I think that that's really important for everyone, whether or not you do both PR and marketing, or one or the other, or something else is that not to get so caught up in the label and the job description, but to really listen to the problem that your client is trying to solve and propose a solution that uniquely matches what their goals are and what their specific challenges are. Because at the end of the day, clients don't really care what you call it, they just care that you can solve the problem for them.
The Mag
So now when they're coming to you, what is the typical problem that they have?
Karen Swim:
Yeah, it really depends on the industry. So I work. We work sometimes with a lot of startups. We're early-stage companies. And so their problem is that they have this great solution, but they don't have the recognition yet in the marketplace. So they're looking to us to help them to drive the visibility of their brand and get them in front of their customers. For established companies. It's often that they also are seeking to make D Burke connections with their audience, sometimes companies are looking to make a pivot, whether they're looking to raise another round of funding, or maybe they're looking at the acquisition, or maybe they just pivoted a little bit in what their brand offers, and they need support in clearly articulating that message and getting in front of the right people.
The Mag
So folks aren't typically coming to you for a maybe a more traditional need for PR like they have a crisis, or there's something hectic happening, they need to kind of manage the messaging.
Karen Swim:
Yeah, you know, in 2020, I did get more than my fair share of crisis calls. And as in past years, you know, with all of my clients, we make sure that we go into it with a crisis communications plan, because the best way to manage a crisis is to proactively plan for it before it ever happens. So a lot of times, I will get those calls where the crisis has already erupted. And they're looking for counsel, that is not something that I do routinely. Although last year, I did take on some clients for specifically that reason. So that was a great thing to ask on, helping them to navigate that landscape. And then, more importantly, building in an infrastructure to deal with future crises, and really looking at protecting their reputation and their brand and building and all of those checkpoints going forward. Because it really should be something that's more systematic, and helping clients to be proactive, rather than reactive.
The Mag
Now, do you see businesses kind of make certain mistakes over and over that you're like, oh, here we go? Again,
Karen Swim:
I do, you know, there's a couple of them, one that immediately comes to mind is not being consistent, either in your public relations efforts or in your marketing efforts. So oftentimes, a company will hire, you know, a public relations consultant, or agency, and give up on the process within a couple of months. But it really takes a little bit longer than that to establish you in the marketplace. And that's really important. So it's not a failing of an agency or of a PR consultant, that they may not be delivering results, immediately, they've got to introduce you to that audience. And that means laying some groundwork. So you know, and I see this on the marketing side, too, that people will, you know, they'll develop this great marketing campaign or marketing approach, and they abandon it too quickly. All of these things require a consistent, intentional effort. And so I would say to companies that before you begin the thing, look at the end of it, it's kind of like investing, you know, you don't invest in the stock, and then you know, watch it every single day and after a week, get frustrated and pull all of your money out, it will be to your detriment to do that, you've got to have a longer-term view. And that means committing some effort and some resources to that and not expecting it to be this microwave process.
The Mag
Now, how do you kind of manage the expectations? That's it theoretically, that all sounds good, but when it's time and you're seeing effort happen, and then not getting results? Are there kind of bread crumbs, you can see that are at least showing you that, hey, this is kind of working, we just got to let it play out a little longer? And we got to make a longer timeline, than maybe we would have liked it to be. But the reality is, this isn't like you said, it's not a microwave oven. This is something that's going to take a longer period of time just to generate traction.
Karen Swim:
You set the magic word setting expectations. And so that begins from the very first conversation. So it's looking at what are the objectives you're trying to achieve? What would a successful program look like to you, and then managing those objectives, and being honest with clients before you ever go into the engagement, so if you're a brand new company, no one knows who you are? And your goal is to get on one of the top morning shows or to be on the cover of The Wall Street Journal, that's probably not a realistic expectation. And so, for me, I believe that I have to be realistic and say, Hey, we can't do that in month one, two, or three, but here's what we can achieve.
So right from the beginning, you're talking to clients and telling them how you can help to solve those challenges. And then here's the thing that you know, really bugs me sometimes is that people say that PR can't be measured. That's not true, it absolutely can be measured. So part of what we're doing with clients from day one is agreeing on what the outcomes look like, and then putting the metrics in place to show how we're making progress against those goals. So clients are never in the dark about whether their program is working when they work with us because we're showing them those metrics in those KPIs to demonstrate our success.
And also, because we've set those expectations up front, we are able to deliver results pretty immediately, we're not one of those agencies that you know, force you to wait three months before you start to see results. Because we are scrappy, even though we are a micro agency, and we have senior people, we're really scrappy, we're really agile, and we want to get the wins for our clients right out of the gate. So we make that our mission that we're going to deliver results immediately. Even as we're setting the groundwork and planning, we just, you know, we believe in optimizing a client's spend. So we never want to see $1 of your money go to waste, we want you to see the results. And we're pretty, we're pretty persistent and tenacious about making that happen.
The Mag
Now, assuming when you're managing their expectations, and kind of monitoring the results, isn't it important to define the outcomes in terms that really are beneficial to the client, rather than like I sometimes call them cause metrics, where they sound good, but they really aren't really relevant. And they like you don't win a prize for getting that?
Karen Swim:
Absolutely. It's not about vanity metrics are things that make you look good, but that doesn't line up. And again, that's why it's so important to not only understand your own expertise but be able to speak in the language of your clients. I pride myself on really understanding operations and how business works, really understanding my client's business and understanding what's important to them, and what they value, and then aligning our efforts with what they're doing internally. So I think it's really critical to be able to do that. So even if you are a PR professional, you gotta speak in the language of your clients, you have to understand their business because what you're doing is one part of what they're doing. And all of those parts should make a whole, that's how you really get the best results.
The Mag
Do you find that sometimes, like, the client will come to you and say, like, you mentioned earlier, I want to be on the cover of the Wall Street Journal, and it's like, okay, well, that's nice to be on the cover there? But what are you really trying to do? Like, are you trying to drive sales? Are you trying to, you know, get more funding? Is that going to serve you in what you're really trying to do? Like, you got to kind of coach them up on, hey, if you want to get more funding, hey, being on the cover might be the way to do that, that might be the path to getting more funding. But if you're trying to get more clients, maybe this other tactic will be more efficient to do that.
Karen Swim:
Absolutely. And so it's all about asking questions, and being honest, you know, I, I don't ever operate in fear. So I'm not going to promise people things that are not only not realistic, but that doesn't serve them. And so you're right, it's all about asking the question like, Okay, that's great that you want to be on the Wall Street Journal, tell me about what you believe that particular media opportunity would yield for you. Sometimes in talking to clients, you'll find that the things that they want, are not even the path to getting them what they ultimately want. And so you'll have a client that sometimes will, you know, pick out a publication that they want to appear in, but it's not even where their audience is. And so I, you know, again, it's really critical to be 100% honest, even if that means that the client doesn't hire you. I am really, really, really steadfast about setting myself up for success well, and so I like to cultivate an environment that allows me to do my best work.
And for me, that means being honest operating with integrity, and never promising something that I can't deliver. So if you know I'm honest with the client about hey, you know, your, your objectives are not really even lining up with what you ultimately want to achieve, what the outcomes that you're trying to get, and they don't hire me. That's okay. That's I'm fine with that. I would 100% prefer to work with clients where we're on the same page and we're aligned in our efforts and they are going to take my counsel and understands that, hey, you do what you do very well. But I'm really good at my job too. And so when I'm providing advice, I'm providing it from a place of expertise and from doing this day in and day out.
The Mag
Now, is this something is PR something that is only for the larger firms? Or is this something that kind of the smaller micro businesses should be investing in?
Karen Swim:
It absolutely can be beneficial to clients of any size. And I personally have a heart for a small businesses. And so I don't, you know, people believe that you always have to have this huge budget to take advantage of PR. And that's not true. And, and honestly, my model is we run what we call a scalable micro agency, which means that we don't have any employees, we work with senior-level professionals who all have their own businesses as well. And we staff accounts that are customized for the client size, and for their budgets. And so that allows us to have a little more flexibility because we don't have you know, 10 offices. And so we can only take engagements of exercise, we're able to be a little bit more flexible because we don't have these fixed budgets of employee overhead cost.
And so yeah, absolutely PR can be beneficial, it can help you to clearly articulate your brand messaging, it can help you to protect your reputation. I think that sometimes people don't understand that having a great PR strategist on your team can actually be a secret weapon because we also have insights into your company that you may be missing because you're so close to it. So we're often able to see, you know, gaps or opportunities that they haven't taken advantage of, we can help with internal communications as well as external. So there are a lot of ways that you know, having a PR person work with you can really benefit your business, regardless of the size.
The Mag
Now, any advice for the folks who are thinking about doing this on their own? Is this something that you should be attempting on your own? Or should you at least have a conversation with a PR professional in order to at least get a roadmap?
Karen Swim:
Yeah, I, you know, my theory on the do it yourself culture is that so often, you can spend a lot of time energy, and effort trying to learn how to do something on your own, and it would have been cheaper and better to pay someone to do it. So unless your passion is to become a PR Pro, as a founder of a company, you honestly don't have the time to invest in doing your own PR, set aside a budget, and hire someone who knows how to do it, they're going to get to those results a lot faster than you will on your own and it'll be well worth the investment. So have a longer-term view, you know, don't be you know, what is it Pennywise. and pound foolish is the old saying, so don't look at those at that immediate span and freak out about that. When honestly, if you look at the time that you're going to try to spend doing it on your own, it's really not worth it.
The Mag
Now, a lot of folks are dealing with a pandemic, and the uncertainty and the chaos that's happened because of it. Is this a time they should be thinking you know what this is when you kind of double down on your PR this is when you should be investing in PR because you're going to stand out?
Karen Swim:
Absolutely. You know, in marketing, it's always been said that you have to stay the course and when things are bad, that's really the worst time to cut your marketing budget. So I know that the pandemic has been challenging and you're right and there may be budget challenges, but talk to a consultant, even if it's, you know, taken advantage of, hey, you know, can I book a couple of hours of your time to work through a plan to get me through this crisis but definitely don't avail yourself of these experts that can help you to navigate through this crazy time. And you know, honestly, the uncertainty is not going away.
And if we're really honest as business owners uncertainty is something that we live with every single year pandemic or no pandemic we have to plan for those ups and downs and we have to see ahead and we should have you know those reserves in terms of you know, what we do as a company and cash reserves as well to see if through the ups and downs because life is gonna happen and it's not always a smooth sell. And sometimes really big events happen. We have these black swan events like a global pandemic that you can to some degree pre-prepared for, if you're proactive about looking ahead and understanding that you could be hit with something that, you know, is unprecedented.
The Mag
Now, what's the pain that these technology firms or healthcare firms that you work with are having right now where they should call you or somebody on your team?
Karen Swim:
I think honestly, the pain is really connecting with their audience and making sure that they remain visible, you know, in technology. And in healthcare. As you can imagine, 2020 was not a year where they saw a lot of losses. Fortunately, those are industries that are in high demand, and things like working from home and remote work definitely accelerated the need for their services, even in the health care area. And we work with a lot of healthcare technology companies demand went up tremendously because they met a very real need. And so but you know, there are other industries that you know, quite honestly took a huge hit like hospitality, unfortunately, and the food industry took a huge hit, and it's no fault of their own.
However, having a PR professional to help you to make a plan, because at some point, even you know, and we were saying this during the lockdown to people that serve those areas, at some point, you're going to need to reopen, and you have to have a plan for that you need to be prepared, how will you win those customers? How do you stay engaged with your customer base, when you can't serve them in the same way. And so, you know, again, even if you've been very Hardhead, and forced to decrease the amount of people that you can serve, having an expert on your team, even at a basic level, you know, and again, maybe that's just exposing yourself to a few hours of their time. Or maybe it's buying, you know, information that they packaged up to help you a plan that they can provide for you is valuable during times like this.
The Mag
Now, Karen, if you weren't busy enough, running your own agency, you also are the president of Solo PR Pro, a professional membership community for folks in the communication, industry, talk about how that came about and how you serve your members there.
Karen Swim:
Oh, that's one of my favorite topics. I love the solo PR pro community. So it was founded by Kelly crane. And I worked with her behind the scenes to serve that membership for a number of years. And then I took it over a few years ago. And it is one of the greatest joys because I have the opportunity to work very closely with these very bright and savvy individuals that are at the top of their professions as well. And one of the benefits to me personally is also that I have this built-in support network and a group of people to turn to when I have issues or challenges that I need a gut check on or I need someone to brainstorm with, or I need an expert to bring onto a client account because the community is filled with subject matter experts. And so it is a great love of mine.
And it's also a joy to be able to help them to navigate their business challenges and to develop resources for them and to provide this community where they don't have to be in business all by themselves. So as a solo, you have the support of this community. You have this 24/7 built-in network of people that are always there to help you in small and large ways anything from you're having a bad day and you need to share with people that understand your day to day job two, you have an intense business question and you're looking for a problem to a solution that may be outside of the realm of what you normally do. There's always somebody that can assist you.
The Mag
And then who would be the appropriate member like is this people only in PR or they can be in marketing communications, like, like, who joins this?
Karen Swim:
Yeah, so it's really the communications field. So we have people that specialize in social media, public relations, internal-external communications, crisis communication, and communicators, and they are not only solos, but what we call solo plus, which means that it may be a solo that has one employee or maybe they have a team of subcontractors that they work with, or maybe they just have an assistant that helps out on the administrative side. And so all of those people are very welcomed into our community but it really is all about the communicators.
The Mag
And then this is the membership that you join, like every pay every month or every year.
Karen Swim:
You do so we have two membership apps. stands for sell OPR Pro, there's a monthly option. So it's month to month, and you can cancel whenever you want to. And then we have an annual membership as well, which is, you know, affords you a little bit of a cost-saving. So some people do join and choose to join annually because it saves them dollars. But we have a number of members that also love the month to month because it gives them the flexibility that they need with their budgets.
The Mag
And then what happens when you join, like, what are some of the stuff you get?
Karen Swim:
When you join, you get access to a members-only content resource library that we've been building for over a decade. So any question that comes up in your day-to-day business, we have developed a resource to answer that from how do you charge to how do you manage a difficult client to probably you have difficult conversations to how do you measure profitability? How do you do a proposal we have templates, tips, and pools. And then one of our most popular resources is that we have a private community on Facebook, that's only open to members. And so members love that some people never touch the, you know, the resources, they don't really care about that.
But the community is something that they feel that they can't live without. And many friendships and business partnerships have been formed throughout our community. And that's always a joy for me to see how this community truly is a community. It's not just a group of people, they really are connected and genuinely care about one another, and help one another to have the best business that they possibly can.
The Mag
Now, is it an opportunity for them to kind of let everybody know, like, Hey, I'm an expert in this? So if you need this, you know, lucky boy, they can kind of join forces on projects, or does that ever happen?
Karen Swim:
And it happens all the time. Oftentimes, if somebody has ended an engagement or has extra hours, they'll come to the group first and say, Hey, this is what I do, you know, I have some extra hours if you need help, and people team up all the time on projects and accounts. So we see and we're seeing a lot more of that over the past few years, as the world around us has also seen that growth. You know, there's been a huge growth in team Lansing. And there's a study by MBO Partners, which is a client of mine that talks about the state of independence in America. And they've been doing that study for 10 years and independence, Team teaming up is one of the big trends and one of the survival tactics going into the 20s. As we're now calling them.
The Mag
Well, exciting times for you and all of your folks in your, all your communities. If somebody wants to learn more, have a more substantive conversation about you and your PR firm, what's the website for words for hire?
Karen Swim:
It is wordsforhirellc.com, and it's for as a FOR, not the number four hire as in hire and fire llc.com. And then, you know, of course, I'm all over social media. You can just you know, my name Kiran Swim. I'm on Instagram and clubhouse and LinkedIn and Twitter, of course, and Facebook. So feel free to connect with me personally, and I'm always happy to answer questions from business owners or from independents. It's what I love to do. I love to help other people to succeed. And so I'm happy to make any connections.
The Mag
Now if there are any communication professionals out there and want to learn more about solo PR Pro, what is the website for that?
Karen Swim:
That is soloprpro.com
The Mag
Well, Karen, thank you so much for sharing your story today. You're doing important work, and we appreciate you.
Karen Swim:
Thank you so much for having me, Lee. It's been a pleasure chatting with you.
The Mag
All right, this is Lee Canter. We'll see you all next time on Detroit Business Radio. I remember today's episode is brought to you in part by activate your great consulting agency.
Image source: https://www.linkedin.com/in/karenswim/
