So, welcome everybody to today's episode of The Agency Accelerator Podcast. Now, today we are talking all about PR and how PR fits in your marketing strategy, and I'm really excited to have with me today, Michelle in Christian, you in from right on time. Now they are both two former journalists who've turned to the dark side and become PR pros, and then spent decades writing stories. And they've been featured in many of our biggest newspapers. Accelerate your agency's profitable growth with tools, tips, and value added interviews with your host agency owner, and coach Rob DaCosta.

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OK, on with today's show. So welcome, and why don't we start off by telling the listeners a bit about your journey from crossing from journalism into the agency world of P.R. Well 100% because we have effectively done what is known as going to the dark side. So myself, and Christian have both got extensive experience of writing for newspapers at a local, regional, and national level. And we have both independently gone into PR. Christian went through the private sector route. I went through the public sector route.

We've come full circle now and created our own PR agency, but we like to feel that, having actually been in that decision making. See, having chosen stories that get published. That's what gave those really insiders insight into the kind of stories that work so well for the press. So that's kind of a bit of our U.S. pay as former journalists coming into the PR territory. Yeah, what made you decide to start an agency then? Well, we've always had a longstanding ambition to work together. We actually met each other in a newsroom.

That's all the way back in 2012. So we fell in love like Glorious and Clark in the newsroom setting working together in the environment and then us. Instead, we went on our own pathways. But we always dreamt of returning to that co working together as husband, and wife. And because we'd learned all these skills from the private and public sector. See my career’s natural progression to set up our own PR agency. It's just where we found our kind of flow. If you will, it's where we felt most comfortable, kind of pulling together all our different skill sets on really helping people, particularly to find the confidence to take those first steps towards publicising their business.

I think that's our real strength. Yeah, I completely agree. And I think it was really important to Michelle and I that we showed up in a way where we allowed our own personalities to shine through as well. We wanted to be quite distinctive in how in how we show up in the world and try to teach what we know in a way that we feel is quite original and maybe a little bit, sometimes a little bit of reverend or maybe a little bit think outside the box, but still get into the ultimate objective, which is to help people to harness power of PR and use it for the wrong God. Yes.

Oh, for sure. I mean, I see you showing up all over LinkedIn, and that's where we met. And you know, you guys have a really great presence there. And like you say, Christian, your personality shines through, which I think is so important. We can't, especially small businesses. We can't show up his soul, faceless corporations. It's interesting. I was doing some, and with my group coaching programme last week, we had this amazing LinkedIn trainer on one of the questions the group asked her was, should we show up on LinkedIn with our company page or our personal page?

And she was like, you need to shop on your personal profile every single time because, you know, businesses do business with people they don't want to have these faceless conversations. So, you know, I completely agree with that. How long have you been running the agency now? Since 2017. Yes, so it's on. It's kind of evolved in that time as well, because we started out very much doing PR for people. So we were kind of behind the scenes people doing all the pitching on behalf of businesses.

And then, when the pandemics jocked in March last year, a lot of our clients were in the manufacturing, retail, and hospitality sector, so they weren’t able to work. So obviously the PR needed to be pulled back at that point on. That's when we first started to deliver our services online and actually step into more of a mentorship and training role to kind of pass along the skills that we've got so that people could do that own PR on its works out really beautifully because obviously working with a handful of clients, we could only have a small scale impact.

But over the course of the pandemic, we have been able to deal with so many different businesses in so many different sectors, and we really feel like we found our groove with that. Yeah, we feel like we found our calling. Since running, for instance, The 5-day Challenges for free and things like that. We've been able to help literally hundreds of business owners to identify great story ideas, to build their confidence and to help them really, really start to think about using PR in a positive way, but also to show them that it's important to be consistent with it.

Don't just do it as a one off thing or something that you do every now and again, and then you pick it up and put it back down. You've got to be persistent and consistent, really important. That’s cool. Yes. So, I mean, if we get a chance, we can pick this a bit more. But you guys are a really good example of, you know, using that awful word of pivoting during the pandemic and being able to react quick enough to keep serving your audience and obviously, you know, keep revenue coming in.

So, it sounds like you've had a pretty decent time in a very challenging time with the pandemic by doing more of this mentorship, and I guess reaching more people. Yeah, I think it's kind of pushed us into a position that we would have hoped to have got to eventually anyway, because obviously you can only have a finite number of clients when you are doing the doing yourself. But the model that we're working at now is literally helping those to reach hundreds and hundreds of business owners, and because what we teach is applicable to every single trade in sector.

Because it gets down to the real core of identifying quality news stories, it means that we've not got a limitation on who we can work with. We have seen literally people from like accountants all the way up to people in the science community using the same process, and getting results in really key publications for them. So, we're really happy with where we've ended. All right now, you couldn't be more, couldn't be happier with the journey we take and then yeah, okay, Well, like, say, if we get a chance, would come back to that because I'm interested in learning more as some of the listeners will be.

So let's just talk about PR from an agency's perspective, you know, the agency wants to grow, they want to build their brand, and they want to win more ideal business, and they probably do this by focusing on having a social media strategy. They may well even do some paid advertising. But in my experience, a lot of agencies they’re not really thinking about using PR. So, tell us about why they should and wear it where it fits in that overall kind of marketing and new business strategy.

You go ahead, you're on the floor. We're very polite because we're a husband and wife team, as you’ve been able to tell. We're really trying to move off the top of each. Definitely, we’re going to talk about it in a bit. But carrying that might when we do start talking over the top future without question. The brilliant thing about PR is you can do and you absolutely should be doing social media. And we certainly don't say PR is a replacement for other kinds of marketing. Activity is all part of a really holistic approach to improving your visibility. But with social media, you can keep plugging away and speaking to exactly the same audiences all in one but gradually and incrementally grows. But when you actually do succeed in securing really good publicity in key trade publications, the serve of your ideal client or that have got really credibility attached to them, that's when you can really amplify your message to literally thousands and thousands of people. We've worked with people who've had regional coverage in newspapers that have got readerships literally in the millions. And that's when you can really start to get in front of why wide scale big numbers of people who could all potentially convert as a client. So this is very much about amplification. But it's also about credibility because obviously, with your social media, you can write whatever you want within reason on your own platforms. But when a newspaper chooses to write about you, they've got established readership.

They're very credible publications that can actually increase how people perceive you. You kinda see these phrases like “I’ve seen names”. We've got really big tick names that really attract credibility back to your organisation. And the second point I would mention is excellent for SEO. So, if you can actually get your agency mentioned in an article in a real key publication that has got a really good ranking on Google. Then that's really gonna help from your SEO strategy, and things like actually getting blue tick verification on Facebook.

One of the questions that is asked as part of that process is can you direct us to any media coverage? So if that is on your ambition list is well, then making sure that you have a solid media strategy is really important. Yeah. I mean, you know, you know that you're preaching to convert ‘cause I ran a PR agency for 11 years, so, you know, I totally buy into that. But I think like I said, when I'm talking to a lot, my coach, my agency clients, and we're looking at their marketing mix on their new base strategy.

PR often isn't a partner And I think one of the reasons which is the million dollar Question that you must be asked all the time, is how do you measure it? Because that is, You know, if I'm sending out an email, I can measure open rates. If I'm you know, looking at social media, I can look att, engagement and likes and comments already. How do I measure the effectiveness of my PR strategy? Yeah, for us. One of the things which we do turn to is that we are able to establish with clients the circulation of the publications which are being targeted.

That's usually very important. That's something that we could go away on research at the key metric. That is a key metric and circulation figures. If it is a title that still has a physical hard copy version, because countries what people may believe they do still exist, there has still think it's 25 million people in the UK that still take a regular newspaper, however, that being alone a weekly or daily. So we are able to give figures like that. So, it does give them an idea if they are able to then get in front of that number that there is a level of attraction so few for you to be able to say, for instance, a big regional city title where we live here, the Liverpool Echo that's got six million readers in total.

So you know that if you're going to get into that particular publication, there were going to be millions of people who have got an opportunity to view that to engage with it, to interact with it online or to respond to it in some way. And it's not uncommon at all, which is obviously the name of the game, the people to get back in touch with those and say that as a result of appearing in such a publication. Somebody then reached out to me and said, I want to work with you so those are obviously great results as well.

That is evidence that using PR canon doors leads to costumes coming on board because they've had a chance to learn a little bit about you as a person. They've become attracted to you in that way, and then they've gone ahead, and instigated a business transaction. So there's definitely a sculpt for that. Ultimately, that's the key measurement, right? Do you have new customers come into your business, and if you've got the right systems in place to data capture the journey that they've come into your business on that consign post?

That PR has had an influential role in that, Then that's Kay on. We have very common real life examples, like the coach that we worked in Manchester appeared in The Manchester Evening News, and within 24 hours she had five new enquiries from people seeking information about her coaching packages. And that is very clear, draw the dots the line back to that coverage, so it's in some ways. While you might think it's the hardest thing to measure, it's often the clearest because if somebody comes to you and says, I saw you in the paper, tell me more about what you do.

You can measure that instantly. Yet the beauty of it is that if you're appearing in a newspaper piece rather than an advert, then you're there based upon your old merit. Because the news story that you've shared is there because it has got home at a connection with the readership that's being targeted. So there's always that unique level of authenticity that the newspaper article Curries that is completely in its own will to anything else really that exists, you know, to have that feeling of making it into the paper and have that ability to.

Then, you know, we hear a lot about people who will keep their clippings, you know, they'll have a scrapbook all they'll frame them on, display them proudly on their office walls and that type of thing. There is something very special about securing that coverage. And then when people do walk into, say, a bricks and mortar premises and they can see that coverage adorning their walls, it looks very impressive. It all already creates a conversation starter, and then it gets people really, really thinking about wanting to do business with that company because you can see the credibility is literally coming through the walls.

So it's very, very powerful in that spats as well. Yeah, it's funny, isn't it? That there is all these trendy new things coming and going. But it's still the traditional marketing strategies such as PR and, you know, it building your email list and networking and all that stuff. That is the solid foundation for everything. And I think we should all be doing it now, let me ask you a question of something that happened to us all the time. I worked in tech, and so our PR agency focused on tech sector.

We would meet a potential new client, and we would ask them what they're trying to achieve from the PR. And we were sitting with the CEO as someone they go, I'd love to be in the Financial Times. And you think you thought we roll our eyes and think. Well, okay, what do you do when you get someone stating a ridiculous? Well, not ridiculous, but a very ambitious goal that actually might be more ego based than actually supporting their business. That is such a good question.

And it does happen all the time. You sit down and the two things that people say towards us: I want to be in Forbes, and I want to be on the couch with Holly and Phil. And we're like, have you been in your local newspaper? And said “No, no I have not even been in my local newspaper.” But what we say is don't discount that. We would never say that can't happen. But have that as a stretch goal. And, we also say to think about your ideal customer. So if you are for example, an agency that specialises in working with people in the financial sector, having some coverage in the publication that serves that sector is much more likely to convert into paying customers in your business.

This is a piece in Forbes that's being read by millions and millions of people, admittedly, but are they necessarily going to come back and spend many money with you? So we certainly don't say don't go for the big tick objectives but also have a strategy that's based on what's going to convert, and make it most likely that I'm going to get sales into my business. And so that's how we tend to approach things with people. We have become known for providing healthy challenge ways. Do that with everybody that we come into contact with and who we have a business relationship with.

We're always happy to hear what their goals and dreams and objectives are, as you said, drop quite rightfully, always very respectful of their ambitions. But there has to be a bit of a reality cheque sometimes, and it has to be about working smarts and doing it in the right way, making progressive steps, starting at one level, building up that little bit of credibility through the press, establishing some credentials, revealing a little bit about your story in your background and then you can start to work towards those TV radio opportunities or the big hitters, such as a Forbes or Time magazine or which have a publication happens to be that people have mentioned she was, Yeah, I did.

A really interesting interview for the podcast is coming out in the next. The next actually probably would have come out by the time this one goes live with someone called Marcel Petitpas from Parakeeto, and we're talking about profitability, but he had a really good point to make this very salient to this point. And that is that when you first meet a prospect or a potential customer, you have to manage them, and you have to show up as a consultant and be equal and guide them on.

If you don't do that, you're setting yourself up for all sorts of problems further down the line to do with, you know, the relationship, but also to do with profitability and margins and all the rest of it. And this is a good example, right? So someone says I want to be on Holly and Phili’s sofa, and they work in the financial services, then you immediately know that's all about their ego and know about something that's going to, you know, actually engage with the customers and ultimately bring them more business.

So it's your job as the consultants to solve. Steer them as you said. And if you had this idea, this public hard question, I don't know. But if you could give, the listeners saw three or four tips on what they should be doing if they start thinking about PR because I suspect that some people listen to this probably haven't even thought about media relations is part of their strategy because they probably think that's what corporates do. And you know, we don't have the time resource budget whenever so what tips would you give someone like that if they were just going to start out thinking about doing some PR?

So the first thing we always say is try to understand your own PR personality. So are you a person who is more comfortable with being on camera or perhaps talking than you are writing on? If that's the case, then saving your energies for radio opportunities, TV opportunities, and potentially YouTube channel guest expert spots or even corp house, which is obviously taking off massively at the moment. So focus your energy in that direction. Conversely, if you are that person who needs more time to think on these, perhaps a little bit more introverted, or you like to take your time to put together a story idea or a proposal, then focusing your energies on newspapers and magazines and trade journals is going to serve you best.

So the number one thing is, we always say is understand your PR personality, and  what we try to say is identify where you are now, but also building some realistic stretch goals. So if it is that you have an ambition to be on the radio, practising on being courthouse for now would be a really good way of finding your voice, finding your talking points so that when a radio opportunity comes up, you feel a little bit more prepared for that. So PR personalities K a good tip as well.

Just to use Michelle's example, if you are hoping to make that radio appearance one day, is perhaps having a goal of going live on your own Facebook page just that you can practise your presentation. You’re doing it there in front of people that are friends, that are family there, a trusted audience. They're people that Khun, just maybe give you a little bit of constructive feedback. But you know that you're doing it in a scenario that isn't the real deal, but it's giving you that chance. 

For instance, you just work on things such as how you sound, how you come across your visual presentation. You know, whoever you want to have a particular local backdrop to what you do. These are all things which, if you were doing a visual and broadcast, these will be important. But for practise and just rehearsing and getting things right, focusing on what key messages you would like to be translating to people and how you get them out there, that's really, really good for practise as well. So considering doing a Facebook live or LinkedIn video could be a good way of just help me to prep for the real thing.

Yeah, we also say that the thing with PR is people focus on what they want to sell, so they're like, I want to sell my programme, I want to sell my course. I wanna sell my service package. They make the mistake of approaching a reporter with something that is, in fact, an advert on. That's why the end. You end up being shunted to the advertising team and ask to spend some money. So we always say, bring it back to news value. What are people going to be interested in?

What are they going to engage in? So, we always say a people first strategy rather than a product and service, that's strategy. So that involves looking at your business from a people perspective. What the interesting human interest stories within that on often that could be the journey to how you actually came to settle your agency. It could be a huge sense of why that's propelling your business or a significant life challenge that you've overcome on its being prepared to in a very controlled way. Lift the curtain a little bit and show people who you are.

So you're not just this faceless organisation, this faceless agency. It's about giving people the opportunity to get to know, like entrust you so that when they need a service you offer you become their first port of call. So really focusing on the news value that you want to offer, as opposed to the endgame of selling a product will put your thinking in the right lane. Yeah, so that's such a good piece of advice. You have to have a point of view and you have to have an opinion, because if you don't, then the journalist is gonna get bored and it's really funny.

Actually, that I use is a coach. Now. I use so many of the tips and tricks that journalists used to use, like what you would do media training with clients when they were about to sit with a journalist, and we would talk about some of the tips and tricks they use. And now I teach some of those in a different context to my client's, whether it be interviewing a potential employee or, you know, just kind of getting the best out climb when I'm coaching them. But you know, you have to have a point of view if you just go in and you, like you say, try to sell.

Are you going with very generic like the same thing everybody would say. But when we were putting clients forward for feature articles in the media. We would say, look, this journalist is probably talking to five people, and they're probably going to use two quotes from those five people. So if you want to be one of the two out of five you have to have an opinion on, you have to be controversial where you possibly can and you know you can't just give the corporate, you know, the corporate spill.

And, like you say, we'll try to sell because Jonas are cynical beasts. So they are going to get very turned off by the by that approach, that's really good advice. Let's just switch tacs because I'm self conscious of time. And one thing I'd really like to touch upon is the fact that you work together as husband and wife now. Personally, for me, I am interested in that, because I I don't know why, but I have a lot of husband-wife clients, and I have a lot of the partner clients. And so I suspect in the agency world, your setup is pretty similar.

So tell us about what that's been like. The pros, and the cons, and the pitfalls and the boundaries, and all the things that you need to put in place to working each other. Yeah, it's a big question, isn't it. Should I start now? Yeah, you go. Yeah, I think it's really important, first and foremost, I mean again, it's one of those questions when when you answer, I'm trying not to sort of got fall into saying anything cliche to stereotypical, but I suppose it's because it's free.

The biggest thing I think for us is about compromise. It's really, really, really important that we both feel that when we're talking about any given thing regarding a piece of work that we might be undertaking for a client, or we're actually discussing the strategy of how to take our own business forward, that we both have the opportunity to feel that we're being heard. And sometimes it can be quite tricky. If we are in different directions with that, it could be that I might be down one end of the road to Michelle might be, you know, down the end of the road round to call on one of the roads again. So, it's important that we try wherever possible to speak to each other respectfully, which we do to take our time, considering each other's thoughts and feelings, because we're both experts of what we do.

So that can be difficult sometimes, when you kind of have that niggling thing to think. Well, I actually feel that I'm correct here completely, before that. That isn't always. The case usually ends up happening is we take a breath, think it through, listen to each other, and then we will reach a point where I feel like my contribution or my thought is being heard and reached some level, and then and then vice versa for you. It's never a way where it's my way or the highway. Neither of us do that with one another.

We love and respect each other too much to do that. We value each other's ability to do that. We compliment each other in terms of their things, which Michelle is certainly better at doing than I am. But then there are things that I feel Michelle would agree, hopefully, that I'm better at doing some other things as well. So it's about playing two to the strengths is very important, recognising where one of us needs to maybe take a backseat, and let the other one take the lead. Hopefully, we've done that a little bit and demonstrate that today on the podcast of how we answer questions. And yeah, I think it's just always about as well as trying to train to have form, and all that might sight seem a bit silly. But we try shopping in a way where we are educating people and we want to be informative. I think someone wants to call us entertainers, which we were happy to be called that. But I think it's important at the end of a working day, we remember that we're not just business partners. That's something that you do, you really need to think about that. You don't let work on work or work related matters continue to dominate that you know the life that you have outside of work.

You know what? The end of the day, we're a couple. We want to have a marriage as well as having a business relationship. So sorry to interrupt you, but how do you manage that, though? Because I would say that's the biggest challenge. How do you make sure that when you're on holiday, you're not talking about work or when you're It's the weekend and you haven't got much to do that you don't just lurch back into work mode, because I know that is a problem for a lot of a lot of my clients and just tell it, talk to us about that.

So, I think we are. We've kind of learned over the past three years to set some boundaries. So if we are going for a day out, we might confine work chat to the journey on. Then when we arrive at the place where we are, we're present and in that moment, and that is something that kind of works quite well for us, I'm the driver in the relationship. I love to drive when I'm driving. That's when I tend to have my most great creative ideas. And when I like to talk things through. So we keep that conversation in the car, and then when we get where we're getting, too, that's when our personal time begins, and we can catch each other in the sense that if we are drifting into  work chat.

One of this will be like, hang on, let's part that from one day or let's park that for the more name on one of the things. That we always do at the end of every working day is review our to do list, cross off things we've achieved, update for the next day on that allows us to draw a line under the working day, and moving to our into our private life after that, Yeah, we have, umm, pretty much that philosophy that once we closed the office door over, that door was shut into is physically and it's metaphorically shut.

And then we don't do anything. Then, until that door was reopened the next working day, and that's when the work, think and resume again. So that's really important. So yeah, good advice. And you know, I'm a big fan of Michael Herd, and I use his concept of morning and evening rituals, which is kind of what you're talking about, you know? So my morning away starts off with my cup of coffee, and that's the signal to start my day, and I review my to-do list.

And at the end of the day, I review my to-do list, create the next day's, close everything down, and I clear my desk. And I'm ready to go for the next day, so I completely concur with that. And I think you know, you guys have done really well if you can get those boundaries in place because I think, you know, years ago I used to work with my partner and it was a challenge of kind of being to work all the time and invade. Using tough solved slides back into work mode, and almost become the easiest discussion.

One thing you said, Christian,you kind of said in an almost apologetic of flip ways about having fun. And you know what you know myself, strap line from my what I do is helping agencies grow in a profitable, sustainable and enjoyable way, because I think too many people grow their businesses, and they get fixated on this fictitious end light of the end of the tunnel, and they forget that they're actually supposed to enjoy the journey along the way. And, of course, we all know that often we never get to that light at the end of the tunnel. So we better make sure what present and enjoy the journey.

So I think that that is a fundamental part of what we do. It's like if you don't, you know, enjoy being in a broader sense, what you're doing and you don't have fun doing it, and you need to do something else. So I, how heartedly off buy into that. There's lots of things. Yeah, there's lots more things we could talk about, but I'm conscious of time. I was interested to hear about your 5-Day Challenge, but maybe if there's a link, we can include that in the show notes.

And so, if people are thinking about starting PR than that seems to me like, that would be a good thing for them to do. Yeah, we have run the 5-Day Challenge four times in the past 12 months. And altogether, over a thousand people have taken part. Today, every single one of them have been either business owners, or authors in lots of cases, or artists, anyone who's kind of got on entrepreneurial slant to what they do. We have had some agency owners involved in that process, as well as.

And basically, we take people from Day 1. We assume from a baseline level that they've never been in the press. Some people have before, and they just need to revisit that build back up. But we take everyone from having no story, no clear newspaper or outlet in mind, and no structure or process to pitch on Day1 but on Day 5, we are very strict in that. By Day 5, people will literally have press send on a fully formed pitch with a central story idea to a publication of their choice. The reason we do that is we don't want it to be a dress rehearsal, or a dry run, because that pushes people into procrastination. They didn't never end up hitting send. So we want to really help people to make that journey over the course of 5 days, in a really supported, and calm way with lots of fun involved, and lots of information involved, and a really value packed learning experience. So that's kind of the nature of our 5-Day Challenge.

Okay, so we can include some links to that. Is that a free challenge or is that I paid for service? It's completely free. We've done four so far. So the best way to find out about future challenges is to follow us on social media, and also on website. But we can include the links for you. For you for that, Rob. Yeah, sure. Okay, so last question before we wrap things up today, and a question I ask all of my guests, which is, if you could go back in time and give your younger self a piece of advice when you were starting out on business which, admittedly, is not that long for you guys.

But what would that piece of advice be? Okay, we should go one at a time. Yeah. You wanna go first? Well, my advice would be keep up with tech. I remember like being a journalist fresh out of university, and at that point, we were still pitching to the nationals on a fax machine. We were still using yellow pages on the telephone directory to ring round and find story leads. On the curve that journalism has gone on since I graduated in 2001 has been huge. The number of new technologies that have come out on social media has obviously revolutionised everything.

And I think a key strength of ours has always been to evolve with that. So when anything new comes up to be an early adopter on, then you can help all the people coming down the line to upscale as well. So for me, I would say always be at the forefront of new tech,and even if you are not a technical person. Use it as a user just so you can have an understanding of how we operate, and then you can let reach that to push your agency forward. Yes. Okay.

And from my point of view. How about you, Christian? Yeah, from my point of view, I think that’s myself and Michelle would have saved a lot of time and energy that we expended had we have reached the conclusion earlier that it's okay to support your hands up, and seek help from experts within any chosen field. So what I mean by that is that we were very guilty, right at the beginning of trying to do everything on our own. So not only we’re be trying to run the PR agency and show up in a way that we knew that we were experts in.

But we were also trying to do a myriad of other things as well, which we were not so great up, and things which we didn't particularly enjoy doing. So when we began to learn the value of outsourcing, and we had a lot of people telling us to do that. Who’ve been in business for a lot longer than we are that really started to open our eyes. It gave us a massive energy boost that allowed us to focus on the things which we knew we needed to be doing in order to give the most value that we called and just to trust other people to do all the aspects of the business which is so important, and let them take care of.

That is sort of one of those things where you can pass it over, trust that person or people or organisation to do it for you and then it just frees you up to really, really get enjoyment and form, as we talked about earlier looking at the things which like you open that you want to be focused on. So why do you wish that I had taken that step earlier to have outsourced quicker than we did? That's that's more of a recent thing for us to be fat. Yeah, yeah..

Good advice. I think we all need to identify what are our superpowers and delicate everything else as much as we can. Because, you know, I always talk to people about what their value of their notional hourly rate is, and the concept of a notion really rate is how much is an hour of your time worth. And if you're on, this is not about you know how you shout clients because you should never sell time. But if you are doing a task that is worth less than your notion hourly rate, then why you doing it?

Why? You aren’t outsourcing. You should all be doing tasks that at your hourly rate or higher, because those the ones that are going to move the needle forward for your business. So, great advice. It's always good to hear these things because we might all think we know them, but it's really good to be reminded of it as well. And just on your point, Michelle, when I was, you know, when I was running my PR agency, it was fax machines. It was printing off press releases, stuffing them in envelopes, put them through the franking machine.

There was no internet back in the early 90’s when I started agency, so they're very different world to the one that we are in now. And in some ways it was simpler, and it was way less distracting. And in other ways, of course, there's so many new ways of reaching our target audience. So, it's sort of pros and cons. Anyway so, we will include your contact details in the show notes. But if people want to find you, what would be the best way for them to do that?

But the absolute best way to connect with those is on LinkedIn and Facebook. Those of the places that we are most active, and see you will find us as Michelle Ewen and separately, Christian Ewen on LinkedIn. And our surname has the unusual spelling of E-W-E-N, and then over on Facebook. We are right on time, UK and again, please feel free to send us a friend connection request on Facebook, because we are active on our personal profiles as much as we are on our business page.

Eso anyone who wants to come into our world, we’re always sharing little prompts or advisory points or just a little bit fun. Lots and lots of pictures of our car, if that's your thing. Anyone who wants to just come and have a little bit of fun but also learn some really key skills about moving their PR strategy forward come and hang out with us on social media. Yeah, of course. We all know that social media is all ready for our pets anyway. Don't wait.

I will confirm that you're suddenly on LinkedIn. I always read your content. You're reactive on there, and you produce great. You share great content, which means it gets lots of engagements. You're a good advert for making that stuff work. So listen, thank you so much for your time. Today has been really interesting. I feel like there's other areas that we could have touched upon today. But I hope this has inspired you guys listeners to think about how media relations fits into your business. And also think about the best ways of you getting out there, as Michelle said, whether it be written or on video ,or audio, like these podcasts ,or compounds. Go and start doing it because it is such a great way of reaching a wider audience.

And as you guys said, it's also a really good way of building kind of endorsements, and credibility, because it's seen as much more credible than a paid ad. So I really concur with everything you said today and just want to say, thank you so much for your time. She has been an absolute pleasure, and we're so appreciative of the chance to speak to your community thoroughly. Enjoyed it. Thank you, everybody, thank you Rob.