Why using your own service can help you focus your PR on the consumer

Experiencing what customers do can help you put yourself in their shoes

Telling your company’s story and why it matters to your potential customers is a very important part of public relations. However, it’s possible to get so into storytelling that you lose focus on how your story connects to potential customers!

A great way to solve this issue is to put yourself in the customer’s shoes. It sounds simple, but going through the same processes your customers go through can help you understand what makes your product or service shine, thus helping you focus PR efforts on how your company can solve potential customers’ problems and make their lives easier.

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Use your product or service

Using your products and services can also help you understand what you can improve and give you an on-the-ground feel for what makes your service or product stand out from your competitors. This will help focus your PR efforts on what makes your company worthwhile compared to your rivals. Going through the process will also help you develop PR messages that are empathetic to your potential customers since you’ve experienced how your product can help them.

How you use your product depends on the product itself.

• For things like software, you can simply use the software.
• Restaurant owners can use mystery shopping as a regular customer to see exactly what the customer sees when they go to the restaurant.
• Have a dedicated customer-support system? Go through it and experience what the customer does when they’re looking for help with your product.

Observe as you use your product or service

While using your product or service, observe what happens and note what you see. Using your product or service gives you a great opportunity to see how customers are reacting to your company’s services in real time. This feedback can help you adjust your PR for your product or service by tailoring its message to focus on what potential or active customers like about your product or service.

Take note of things such as:

• What kinds of habits customers display
• How customers interact with staff or sales associates and vice versa
• What customers say to each other about the store or product

Step into the customer’s shoes

Telling the world your company’s story is exciting, and you need to remember how it relates to your customers, both potential and current. By using your product or service, seeing how the process goes for a customer, and observing how other customers are treated and react to your product or service, you can gain a solid grasp on what exactly makes your company stand out.

It can be difficult to find time to use your own product if you aren’t already using it, but it’s well worth it. Even a quick trip to a location or a brief customer service call can help you tweak your PR to effectively communicate how your company’s product or service can help customers.

Learn more about effective PR with our guide on how to maximize your PR investment.

Clients love Jacob’s speed. Jacob is an inbound marketing-certified webmaster. He earned an integrated communications degree from Florida State College at Jacksonville. Jacob joined Axia PR as an intern in August 2015 and earned his way into a critical role at our PR agency.