How Storytelling Makes Your Business Easier to Trust

There are businesses doing remarkable work every single day. They solve difficult problems. They take care of their customers. They employ great people. They contribute to their communities. And almost nobody knows they exist. Meanwhile, another business with half the experience, a third of the expertise, and a founder who posts motivational quotes beside photos of rented sports cars appears to be the industry leader. That's not merely annoying. It can cost you customers, employees, partnerships, and opportunities. And that's what we're talking about today on Marc Haine Live. Welcome to this episode of Marc Haine Live. Of course, this is where small business owners and entrepreneurs can pick up some core skill sets to help them create the show-stopping, jaw-dropping experience that their customers and their employees deserve. I am your host, Customer and Employee Experience Strategist Marc Haine. And I'm really glad you're here with me today because my guest today is Amy George, the No Spin Story Strategist. And today, we are going to be uncovering how small businesses can use the stories already inside their organization to help them build visibility, credibility, and trust. I do have one request though. And I think you know what it is. Please make sure you're subscribed to the podcast. Please make sure that you follow me on social media. You subscribe to the podcast. That way, you'll get notifications when I bring you fresh new content each and every week. Okay. So, imagine that a potential customer hears your name for the very first time. They do what everyone does before making a decision. They look you up. They visit your website. They scan your LinkedIn profile. They check your reviews and they search for articles, interviews, and signs that other people trust you. And within minutes, they begin forming an opinion. Not necessarily an accurate opinion but an opinion nonetheless. And they may discover a clear credible expert with valuable ideas and a strong track record. Or they may find an unfinished LinkedIn profile, a website last updated when people were so excited about QR codes, and almost no evidence explaining why your business matters. And that silence tells a story. And that brings me to our Question of the Day. So, if your best potential customer searched for you today, would they find a trusted expert or a business that looks like it forgot to turn the lights on? Go ahead and share your experience on your favorite social media. I'd love it if you take the link to this show, post it on your favorite social media platform, hashtag it #ExperienceLeadership. Put your comments down and be part of this conversation. conversation because I know we all struggle with it, don't we? As I mentioned, my guest today is Amy George, an award-winning journalist, an accredited public relations professional, and the founder of By George Communications, a new savvy PR agency celebrating 10 years in business. How do you like them apples? Before entering public relations, Amy spent 13 years working as a journalist. She wrote for newspapers across the Midwest and Southeast before joining the Associated Press in New York, where she covered financial markets through the aftermath of the tech bubble and the September 11th attacks. She later created the award-winning personal finance column, Out of the Red for the Charlotte Observer. Today, Amy uses her experience from both sides of the newsroom to help businesses uncover meaningful stories, earn media attention, build thought leadership, and to protect their reputation. Amy, welcome to the show. I'm so excited.

Marc, I'm so excited. That intro was incredible. This is going to be so much fun. Thank you for having me.

I love having you. Hey, so Amy, maybe can you start off by telling us a little bit about who your clients are and how are you serving them right now?

Yes, of course. So, my clients really range industries, financial services, also cultural institutions. I have worked for Charlotte Ballet, Bechler Museum of Modern Art, small business owners, individual financial planners, healthcare, you name it. The thing about having been a journalist I'm a quick study. The people who work with me have worked in newsrooms as well. And so, we just love to learn industries. But we tend to really be in business, finance, healthcare, and the arts.

Okay. So, Amy, when we booked you for the show, I started getting really curious because I know that a lot of people mix up marketing and public relations. And I wanted, first of all, can we start by clarifying the difference between the two?

I would love it. You know, people ask that all the time, or they don't ask because they think, you know, that they know. So, uh, public relations is at its core, it's about relationships and not about selling to. So it's a part of marketing. It does help people buy from you, establish relationships with you, but it's not really intended to start with transaction, if that makes sense. I mean, the word relations is literally in the phrase public relations. So it's building relationships with all of the people and constituents and stakeholders who matter to you, starting with your employees, number one, and then, you know, going outward, thinking of customers, partners, vendors.

Right.

Investors if you have them. So, it's building relationships with those people versus talking at them or selling to them.

I love that because we've talked on this show about how we've kind of migrated from the knowledge age into now this relationship age where even with our employees, it's more than the fact that you just have employees that you're tapping into for their excellence. But it's about creating the relationship. And I love— thank you so much for making that tie-in because we hear the word public relations and I it loses the meaning of the word because people think PR, it's all stunts. It's ways to get in people's faces and so on. And we forget that actually, the idea here is we have to build relationships.

Exactly! It's no one tactic. People will also often come to me and say, I need a press release because I'm about to announce something or do something. And a press release is a tactic. It's not public relations. And if you send out that press release with no relationship, it's not going to go anywhere.

Yeah, yeah. And so, Amy, am I wrong in assuming that many small business owners believe that public relations, PR as a whole is something that they can postpone until they get larger? Because in my background—

100%.

Okay, so I'm not on— because when I talk to people, it's like, oh well, I'm just a 3-man operation. I'm not Google.

Right, exactly. No, I mean, everyone needs public relations, everyone needs PR, and everyone can and should start by doing their own PR. You know, as an individual contributor in, in the corporate world, I had managers tell me, or I would have to remind myself, it's not enough to do the work that you love and to run the company that you love or run the career that you love. You have to kind of talk yourself up. You have to do your own PR. And so, whether or not you hire a firm or you get to that point, first of all, I believe that there is a firm out there for you no matter your size because there are public relations firms that are small business-owned, like By George, for example. So, whether or not you get to that point or I believe that you should get to that point, there's still plenty that you can do on your own. That is your own PR. Like you should no matter what always own your own PR to some degree.

I love that. It's funny as you were mentioning that about that there are organizations like your company that deals with smaller businesses. What's the difference between a PR firm, somebody who specializes in public relations versus hiring a social media strategist or a marketing person with a heavy hand in social media?

Yeah, I mean, that's a good question because I would say, you know, you have— you might have your large-scale public relations firm that does it all, and then you might have a firm like mine where we say, hey, we specialize in certain things, right? So, um, it would be important to know what is important to you and then to shop around for those things. If you want to hire individual, you know, siloed people, then you're going to have to manage all of those silos of this person's doing social media posting. This person's doing my video. If you can get it all in-house under one umbrella, that would be ideal as well. You know what I mean?

Yeah, it sounds to me that if you try to split it all up, then you're going to be juggling different voices. And then, you're going to have a challenge on how— you're going to be muddying the water of the brand.

Right, right. But I would say as a small business, you might not need the 20 to 30 services that a super large firm offers. So, maybe get to know a few smaller firms And, you know, if I were meeting with someone, I would want to know, like, is LinkedIn important to you? Because that's the number one social media channel that my team and I have experience in, that we believe in, that we can move the needle in, that we can— that we see the biggest value in. You know, additionally, we're very news and journalist and kind of news story driven. So, if you want to get news stories in front of print industry, TV broadcast, podcast, all of those journalists, like that's a sweet spot for us. You know, if you want to get thought leadership published by third-party, you know, outlets, that's another sweet spot for us. But I don't do, for example, media buys. You know, I don't go and buy advertising. I would find someone else because again, that's to your earlier point, that's like the marketing advertising part of it. There are some firms that do it all. They're just going to have a lot bigger price tag as well.

What do you say to the small business operator who says, let's say a pizza joint, where he says, oh, I don't need PR. Everybody knows I make great pizzas. They figure that because they have a core group of people who know them that they're a-okay. How do we shake that reality to make them understand that you're losing opportunity?

Well, I mean, the first thing that comes to mind immediately with what's been going on would be like, well, I hope no one gets, you know, food poisoned from the salads that you might also be serving, right? With this lettuce thing that's been happening, you know, like things happen, you know, like you employ people. Um, that has nothing to do with the lettuce. No, anytime you employ people or serve a product or, you know, a service, something can go wrong.

Mm-hmm.

And it doesn't even have to— it does not even have to be of your doing. You know, you— it could be the pizza joint down the street had an issue, you know. And so no matter what, I think you need to kind of let yourself imagine some worst-case scenarios. What are the worst things that could happen if I don't have any PR or any whatever, you know?

Right.

Let your head go to some bad places, right? And Yeah, what would happen if we had a recall? What would happen if an employee brought their domestic situation into our business? What would happen? How would we handle it? Who would we talk to? And there's a bad Yelp review, that's one thing. And then there are probably way worse things than just one disgruntled, my pizza wasn't hot situation.

Right.

That's not a crisis. Let's identify what a crisis is. And where the relationship part comes into all of this is if you've never built relationships with influencers, food people, grocery store vendors, reporters, whatever, you're going to have a lot harder time saying, no, no, that's, you know, we're very safe or we're very this or that. Like, it's harder to get that message out because people don't know you.

Right.

Whereas if there's a reporter who's been covering you from the time that you opened and now you're on your 3rd generation or whatever the thing is, well, maybe that wouldn't be the same reporter, but you get what I'm saying. Or the same food blogger has whatever and you've donated to food pantries and you've done all this stuff and you're out there, then people are more likely to remember like, oh, okay, we can trust. Everyone has a bad day or everyone could— anyone could buy bad produce or they're just more likely to trust you and then kind of forgive and maintain their relationship with you.

So, what I love about that was you use the magic word trust because it is about this idea of building trust. And at the same token, what you're also talking about is public relations in the guise of our crisis plan that we have to have some semblance. As a small business, you have to have a plan of what happens when stuff hits the fan. I mean, up here in Canada, we had like 4 days where one of our internet providers went down for 4 days. And the businesses weren't prepared for it. The banks weren't prepared for it. So, people would say on their store windows, cash only. And it's like you go to the ATM, the ATM doesn't work.

Yeah.

Right? And so, all of a sudden, people started. And it's like, well, find the little credit card slips. Use those little mini slips that we used to have when we used to encode things, right?

Right.

Have, you know, as we build businesses, we have to look at every aspect of our business and say, what happens if this fails? If you have a cappuccino machine and the cappuccino machine fails, what's your plan B with making cappuccinos? Are you just going to say we don't have cappuccinos? Or are you going to have a machine in the back that you can plug in?

Right.

But then, the same thing is true with this idea of we go into business and our reputation is key. But if we're not actively telling some of those stories, I think the reputation is just going to form on its own, won't it?

Oh, if you're not telling your story, someone's going to fill in the blanks for you. And you better hope that you like what they say. But it's out of your control.

Right.

Yeah. So, you have to— that is the owned part of media. There's paid media, advertisements, things that you have total control because you pay for that. There's earned media, talking to reporters. You don't have control. And then, there's owned where, again, you have control of your blog, your website, your LinkedIn.

So yeah, it's interesting because like as you said, even talking to journalists and stuff, if you're a person with a welding shop, right? I think a lot of people would go, I have nothing to talk to a journalist about. What am I going to talk to a journalist about?

Right.

But we had a local welder who during the crash in 2018, the oil crash in 2018, he had all these welders and stuff. He had to lay off most of his staff. But then, he started making fire pits.

Oh cool!

So, he ended up hiring back 5 of his welders and they used the actual pipes that they used for the oil pipes or whatever they call them. And he actually cut them and then, he made them into fire pits with nice designs along the sides and everything. And it was brilliant. And then, the media was all over it. The media was like, hey, here's a guy who's pivoted during this huge crisis, making these fire pits that all these major retailers including Costco wanted.

Right, right, right.

What a way to pivot a business and be public about it that people turn around and go, this is a business I think I want to do business with.

And what's interesting about that story is people think like what makes a good story is something that's happy like that. And that is so true. But it's also like a comeback story. It's a turnaround story. It's a rising from the ashes, no pun intended, story, you know. So, I always say, you know, just on the, like, looking ahead to, you know, I know we might talk about what makes a good story.

Yeah.

But what makes a good story is a little counterintuitive to people. It actually starts with tension. It's like, you know, fixing, you know, something has to be wrong. Something has— someone has to be the underdog in order to rise or whatever that is. So, that just struck me in that story that There is tension. And that's a good thing. It's not just all shiny happy.

Right, right. And I think a lot of times, this is where I think people hang their PR hat on is they go, oh, you know what? It's a major holiday. We're going to go down to the park and we're going to have hot dogs. Let's do a press release.

Right, exactly.

Who cares? Everybody does that, right? There's nothing wrong with it. Right, right, right. But if a business is not focused on kind of their reputation or how the public Are there any warning signs that a business has neglected its visibility or credibility and it's hurting them?

Oh, I mean, for sure. The opening story that you gave where you had mentioned, you're not getting noticed but your competitor who's posting kind of so-so content is. So, I think warning signs would be Your website hasn't been updated in years. You're not able to clearly communicate what you do. The people, your customers, they might not be your best referral, giving your best referrals because they can't communicate what they do. They know they like you, but they don't know how to put it into words. Your LinkedIn hasn't been updated. I see lots of small businesses that do not have a LinkedIn business page. That is a huge misstep. I would not hire a small business that did not have a business page because there are plenty of others that do.

Yeah.

Individual CPAs, maybe they're like a 3-CPA firm. You're not going to do my taxes if you don't have a business page on LinkedIn because I'm just not going to take you seriously.

It's interesting because that's a warning sign. Yeah, so because part of it is I think as human beings, it's not only about building the trust. It's also looking for values. It's also looking, are our values aligned? Are they talking about the same thing that's important to me and my community and my bubble, the world that I live in? And I think a lot of times, interestingly enough, what I see a lot of things happening is I see a lot of people on their business pages or even on their professional branded page start talking about things they really shouldn't be talking about if they want to encourage customers to be coming into their businesses.

Right, right. Well, that's the thing. People ultimately do business with people. That again is the relations part of public relations. So, they might be posting things that they shouldn't post. That's bad. Or they— but they also might not be posting at all. Or they might take themselves too seriously and kind of neglect a whole area of content. Like, I'll give one example. I post all the time on LinkedIn about what I'm reading, my favorite books, my favorite books of the month, the quarter, what I do roundups. I love books. They're a big part of like what makes Amy George Amy George. You know, my first job was in my public library. My first communications job was for a book major book company. It's who I am. Plus, I just love to read. But none of my books are like business and development. I hate that. You know, I'm not reading about PR. I'm not reading about how to lead a small business. No self-help, none of that. But that's good. You know, people meet me and they're like, well, you know, what did you think of that Booker Prize winner? Or what did you, you know, what's the best book of the year? You know, what did you think of that New York Times book review? Or You have to give people like some icebreakers, like some humanity, some reason to want to get to know you. And I think that goes also beyond the transactional. I'm not gonna show up on LinkedIn and just sell PR all the time.

Mm-hmm.

I want people to know what they get with me, which is we're gonna chat about books every now and then, or whatever, or my kids, or growing up in the Midwest, or, Having a typewriter. How many people can say they have ever owned a typewriter at this in the year 2026? People are going to like know me that I love to travel. I'm going to ask questions. So I guess it's just kind of a long-winded way of saying that you also have to pay attention to your brand and what's important to you and putting it out there in a way that is. I hate the word authentic because I believe in showing in that way versus telling people I'm authentic. No, I'm going to post about books because that really that is me being authentic. I'm showing you, not telling you. So, I'm just a big fan of like icebreakers and giving people some humanity, giving people a reason to want to know you.

And so, that's a perfect segue into our next segment. So, I'd love to dig into some actionable steps that the listeners can take to become more strategic with their communications and how they think around their public relations and their brand. And we'll get to that right after this.

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Welcome back! I am speaking with the No-Spin Story Strategist, Amy George. Amy, you had a client who operated successfully for more than 20 years before investing in public relations. What changed when they finally began telling their story publicly? What happened to their business?

I mean, first of all, she loves it and she feels so much more confident in her story and what she's doing. What's changed is she's getting out there. In just a few months' time, she's had several national media interviews, local TV interviews. There was one in which immediately after this local TV interview, a prospect called her and said, I— and booked a meeting. It was just amazing. I think it's that it's validating. It's validating of her work. It was on her to-do list for a long time. And she realized she couldn't do it on her own. There are some things she can do. She does her own LinkedIn. She does a good job. She does a great job. But she couldn't do— there are a lot of things you can do on your own, but it's hard to book your own TV and then know how to do the interview and to do it well. All of the media part, I would say that is the hardest part of the doing it on your own. And she finally was just like, I want to do it. I'm scared to do it but I'm gonna do it. And now, she's just like, why didn't I do this a long time ago?

Right? It's interesting because when you think about trust and validation in your business, getting onto a new show or a breakfast show on a major network, that's like a slam dunk. It's like nobody can really ignore that. And you can then cross-use that footage into your social media to prove to people, Hey, guess what? I was on ABC.

Exactly.

I was on NBC, or whatever.

Right.

You mentioned in your notes that credibility must be built before you need it. What does that look like in practice?

Well, one area again, and not to sound like a broken record, would be to start on your LinkedIn, right? I mean, like I'm such a big LinkedIn proponent. When I was a reporter, before I would interview, like, say, a financial planner, I would look at their LinkedIn to see, like, okay, what do they have to say? Maybe my topic might be taxes. Do they seem like they know a lot about taxes? Or whatever it would be, right? I would at least make sure they were on there and are they worth talking to or should I keep looking? You can build your credibility by posting on LinkedIn, by writing articles. Like you said, people have more content than they think they have. You know, my notes for this podcast alone, I've saved them because I'm like, oh, there's some good nuggets in here. I can be posting these on LinkedIn, and I'm gonna do that. You know, so like, if you start to think about all the, you know, you, you prepared for a client presentation. Well, Take some of those, turn them into Canva graphics or LinkedIn posts, and get them on your website, your LinkedIn. Like, you have more content than you think. You can write LinkedIn articles, a newsletter, an employee newsletter. You, you can slice and dice your content in so many ways that it, it kills me when people don't see it and, and they— maybe they are on TV and then they do nothing with it. It's like no one knows if they weren't sitting at that exact moment watching that exact program.

It's gone.

But because you never reposted it, put it on your website as featured in, no one knows.

Yeah.

Like share it early and often.

So, for the people tuning in, are there any strategies they should be aware of about their business that they could say, this would make really good stories on LinkedIn, or this would be really good? Because I think business operators and entrepreneurs get really confused about this whole idea of storytelling for their Because I think what happens is you get a business operator and he goes, I just do what I do. There's no story here. But to the outside world, it's completely different. One of the things that I fell into was a gentleman in the States. I can't remember where he is. But he has a donut shop. And so, one of his team encouraged him to do these video shots at 3 o'clock in the morning as he's prepping donuts and stuff.

Making the donuts. What was that commercial in the '80s?

Making donuts, right? And that's all he's doing is he's making donuts. He's making long johns. And he's talking a little bit about it. But then, people are engaging and asking questions about, oh, how much sugar did you use? Or what do you do with the leftover dough? And like, I mean, it's amazing to see the traction he's getting just by first thing in the morning setting up a camera and some, or one of his staff members recording him. And he's just doing the work.

I love that. People love behind the scenes. They like feeling like they can see something that— people are curious. They want to know how much sugar or how big is that mixer. You know, like if you see like an industrial, like that's kind of cool.

Yeah, huge.

So yeah, people, people love going behind the scenes. You know, I used to take reporters to the costume shop at Charlotte Ballet to see the production behind the production of like Nutcracker costumes or whatnot. And that would be in the summer. People aren't even thinking about it, except they are there. You know, people love behind the scenes. So I think to answer your question, you kind of have to tap into like your own curiosity. I think sometimes like we forget to be curious. We forget to ask questions. We take for granted like that we love what we do and what's right in front of us. And so we take for granted all the stuff we know, but that other people don't know about how the sausage is made or the donuts are made or whatever. So starting with like just a curious, fresh, open mind, and that is why hiring a PR firm, some outside eyes can help you, can help you do that, you know. And you don't have to be married for like life. You could also just say, can you help me with this project? Or we go in and we, we've trained clients who have small teams on how to do their PR better. So, we'll work with them for a few months and help them see all the stories within their organization. And then, they're like, oh, I didn't think about that. And then, we let them go do. And then, that's what they do. They go and do.

It's interesting because we've said on the show many times, you can't see the label from inside the bottle. And that's exactly what you just described. I think we get so used to what we do. that we think it's no big deal. It's just work. It's no big deal.

Right.

But to the outside world, it could really be that kind of build. I mean, I remember back in the '80s, I was consulting for a young man who did— he would go in and he would calibrate TV sets. And he wanted to open up a brick-and-mortar to open up a TV and stereo shop. And he didn't know how he would compete with the bigger brands that were out there. One of the things that we did On the onset, which I think was at the time, now looking back on it, was actually like ahead of its time. It's like, why don't you invite people to come for coffee and donuts and then you can tear apart a particular technology and show people how to use it? Right?

I love it.

This was before YouTube, right? And I mean, at first, you only got like 3 people showing up. But then, 4 months in, I mean, he had to rent Chairs in order to fit the showroom so that he could have a stage that he could show these people what was going on. And so, the interesting thing about that was you become the trusted advisor because people see you. They talk to you. They see what you're doing. And because of that, the next time they want to buy a TV or stereo, who were they going to?

I love that. And donuts again. This is like the donut episode. No, but that also reminds me on LinkedIn or your blog or where whatever. I also believe in kind of giving away your expertise. Not everyone would agree on that, but coming from this desire to help, which is what you were kind of talking about with that guy, telling them how to do it. I've written so many articles on how to do LinkedIn, every angle, or how to do your own PR, or how to talk to reporters. Because I do. I mean, that's why I liked being a journalist as well. I liked telling people things that they didn't know, news that they could use, news you can use. That's the thing. And people will do it or do it themselves, or they will trust that you know what you're talking about and they will work with you.

I love that. So, Amy, for the people tuning in that this might be resonating for, could you just let everybody know how they can get in touch with you in case they want to Well, yes, of course.

So, I'm Amy Baldwin George on LinkedIn. I also have a LinkedIn page for By George Communications. And my website is bygeorgecomms.com.

Lovely, lovely. So Amy, how do you tell? And so, for people who are stuck, they're stuck in their kind of bubble. How can one tell a compelling story without the over-exaggerating, the over- sharing or slipping the whole messaging into spin?

Oh, well, to start with this, to start and end with the truth is the best policy. I mean, that's why I say no spin, because good PR really is, is the truth. You know, I don't really, I don't believe in spin. So start with the truth. Don't overpromise. Don't say things that you can't do or can't verify. You know, as a journalist, I'm very skeptical of whenever someone says, we're the first or the only of its kind in whatever.

Award-winning.

Award-winning, correct. You don't need those, those things. And they beg attention that you might not want, right? Just start with the truth and keep it very simple. And Tell a story. I mean, it sounds simple. I do believe that it can be simple, but being honest, telling the truth, and the telling the truth, it's in everything. I will say, and I see in small businesses a lot, this use of, you know, even doctoring photos. Let's Photoshop a new team member in. Let's Photoshop a Oh, we're going to leave a team member out because we've had turnover. No, you need to have another photo shoot or you need to have evergreen photos. But even your images, like, it's not just your words that matter. It's the whole, it's the everything. And so, these things that you think might not matter, oh, it's innocent enough. We'll just Photoshop this person into our team photo. It's bad. It's a bad look, literally. People will not trust you because of it.

And that brings up a really interesting twist on this conversation because AI now is everywhere. AI is our copywriter. It can produce our pictures. It could do all sorts of stuff. Can you do— is there any cautionary you would have about leveraging the power of AI when it comes to representing our brand?

Oh gosh!

We'll have to have a whole other hour-long podcast for that. But my cautionary is obviously to fact-check it and to use it maybe more for an idea generator. You know, like I might put a headline in and kind of do like an A/B test. Like, here's my headline, what am I not thinking of? And see if I like the AI headline more.

Yeah.

I use it almost like A brainstorming partner. A writer's block. Yeah.

Right.

Because I work by myself. I have a team, but we're all remote. I think of it as being in the newsroom when we were all in our own cubes and you could just shout across the way and be like, hey, what do you think about this? And everyone's talking to everyone in the newsroom. So I look at it that way or cleaning up my notes or things like that. But I think there's some AI fatigue that's happening. So, you know, I don't use it to like sum up meeting notes and send them around to like my whole team or my client, because if you were in the meeting, you don't need my notes and you don't need AI to clean them up, you know.

Yeah.

And I think if you're not a writer and you're using it to be a writer and you already don't know what you don't know about the writing, that makes me nervous for you.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. It's kind of like saying, oh, I know that to do open heart surgery, I need a scalpel. I need some rib spreaders and access to the heart. Let's see if I can make it work.

Yeah, yeah. Let me just pull up a video. I'm sure all will be fine.

Right. And we're seeing tons and tons of kind of fails when it comes to AI. way. We recently in Canada had somebody in the legislation kind of read off their thing and then they started reading the AI prompt on it. AI said something like, here's a version that is going to be more people-centric for the legislation. And he actually read it all out. And so now, he's under hot water like nobody's business. So, this idea of building in our values And building it, using it as a means to build trust. It would be fair to say that if we do anything that's opposite of that, so any shortcuts, anything that's not authentic and truly us would kind of help crash that belief system.

I couldn't say it better. I agree 100%. But it does start with knowing your values and the truth that you want to tell, right? And I don't think there are shortcuts around that.

No. And again, the more you say that, the more again, it all kind of falls back on bringing somebody in who's an expert who can see stuff that we don't see. Would it be fair to say that talking to our customers can help open up that portal a little bit? Talking to our customers and seeing what they see about our business?

Yes, I think talking. Yes, I think that that is absolutely like a great idea. I don't want to say I would take it with a grain of salt. But Yes, talking to your customers. But I wouldn't let them alone dictate your values. You know what I mean? Like, that should still come from you. But asking customers about their experience and things like that, 100%. Okay.

So, I'd love to get into some pitfalls and cautionaries as people tune into this. My fear obviously is that people who don't necessarily have the skill, they come up with the idea. They go, this is a really good idea. I should build this into my strategy. And I should do it. And I want to be really clear with some pitfalls and cautionaries. And we're going to get to that right after this.

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Welcome back! I hope you're getting tons of value from today's episode. As you can tell, Amy and I are on a mission to support businesses just like yours. So, if you belong to an organization that could use our help, or you Or someone you know might be planning something like a leadership retreat, a conference, a franchise conference with people, anything that has training leaders or training business operators to make their businesses better. Know that we're available. We'd love to explore how we could be of service to you and your people. So, don't be afraid to reach out. We're accessible, which is great. So, Amy, we talked a little bit about people doing this all on their own. At what point does do-it-yourself PR become risky, inefficient, or actually more expensive than actually bringing a professional in to do it?

Well, I think the more expensive part harkens back to the beginning about the opportunity cost of people not knowing about you, losing customers, losing out on business you might not even— is yours for the taking kind of thing. You should hire someone when you know you can do more and you want to know more and you're ready to put some time and money to it. I don't know any other— I guess, too, Marc, I would say it's those things like, gee, I want to talk to reporters, but I don't know how to make that happen. I've been writing a blog. I've been keeping up my LinkedIn. I think my website's pretty good. I'm ready for this next thing. And it so happens I'm unveiling a new product or service or opening a new facility or whatever that is. Or maybe it's like, I don't have time to do my own social media and I would also like to do videos. Or I would like to write articles that appear in my industry's trade publication.

Mm-hmm.

Kind of when you have things, or I have a team. We don't know what— you know, I have a PR and marketing, a small PR marketing team, and they, they need to be kind of next leveled, you know, like someone needs to come in and teach them her ways. Um, I would, I would be someone who would love to do that, you know, and I have done that. So when you kind of just want to take, take it to the next level.

Yeah, it's interesting because, you know, I've been, I've been around the block with with a bunch of small business owners who might have a marketing manager. And then, they expect that the marketing manager is also going to be their social media strategist and also the PR person and doing all this stuff. And it's like, there's not enough hours in the day. Like you're talking about multiple different technicalities within the confines of under marketing and expecting one person to be able to do all this stuff.

It's too much.

How do we become reasonable?

Oh gosh, I don't know. One, one project at a time. You know, one idea might be what keeps you up at night about your PR or lack of PR or marketing and tackle that. You know, I heard a client recently say that what keeps them up at night is how their employees feel and their employee culture.

Well, like OK.

What about a communications plan? And again, all communications should start from within because employees don't want to hear news about your company, not from you, from the outside. So, what is an employee communications, internal communications plan that you could execute maybe with an outside partner who could get your newsletter started for you? Or employee spotlights or videos or getting employees in front of media when they have a good story to tell. So that's one example. What keeps you up at night when it comes to your PR marketing communications? Start there. Maybe it's crisis. Maybe you're like, I don't know who would talk to reporters if something happened. I don't know. I don't know what our message would be. I think we would need a week to think about it when the crisis happens. Well, yeah, that's not going to work well. And when the crisis happens, if you don't have something to say right away, that's as bad as the crisis. Yeah, so what keeps you up at night? That's where I would start.

I remember back in the '90s, there was a restaurant chain in Montreal that they got shut. One of their locations got shut down by the health And the owners were livid. Like the owners of the whole brand was absolutely livid. They went into that restaurant. They tore it apart. They fixed everything. And then, they went on to this really great PR trail where they started talking about how important all this was. That this was a one-off situation and that they challenged the public. If you're in our restaurant, if you ever want to tour our kitchen, Just let the managers know. It doesn't matter what time of day. You can tour our kitchen. We will prove to you how clean we are. And I just thought when it came to trust building, this was absolutely brilliant the way that they did this. And because of that, they're still in existence 30 years later.

Oh, that's incredible. Yeah, that's an example of doing it right.

Yeah, it's interesting. So, for the people tuning in, if people are looking for, if they think this whole idea, again, We're small business people. We have no idea how to hire a PR professional. What should they be looking for in order if they wanted to hire a PR professional or an agency? What are some of the things they need to be asking themselves in order to make sure they're not going down a money pit?

Right. I mean, it's a lot. I would start with asking your circle. If there's someone else, if your accountant or financial planner, if you see them on LinkedIn or the news, A friend of yours, someone in your social network. I'd ask, how did you do that? And you know, you know who who who are you working with? You know, I've a lot of my clients have come from other small organizations or small business owners who have they've they're out there, and so then their circle wants to know how is it that you're out there? How is it that all of a sudden your LinkedIn? Is amazing. You know, like what's what's happening here? So I would start with asking around, and I would get I would become very clear because you are a smaller business. What is it that you think matters to you? And you know, is it media? Is it your social media? Is it and you know talking to your employees and making sure is it a crisis that could be looming? So that way, when you do talk to a firm, it's not just like I need PR. I need some press releases. Because press releases are super expensive and super not targeted most of the time and usually a money pit. I try to discourage clients from doing press releases. They take a long time. They don't yield much return from what I can tell. They're expensive to write, to put on the wires, to distribute. They take a lot of everyone's time and they're a tech They are at the end of the day a tactic. So, be very clear on what it is you want and think you need. And then, ask a lot of questions because your PR person should also be asking a lot of questions.

So, people tuning in, they really want to get on this now. What are the pitfalls and cautionaries? Like where can this go off the rails and cause them a ton of problems?

Off the rails. Off the rails. Oh, there's so much. One is, in addition to being ready time-wise and budget-wise to make this investment, you have to also make sure that you're accessible and that your team, your people are accessible. Your PR people, they can't— we're not crystal ball readers. We can't get to know your people, find your stories if we don't have access to your organization. So just, it's kind of like the kitchen tour. were talking about, right? You have to trust your PR person. I've worked with people where companies where I know they're not telling me the whole story. They're hiding their bad stories from their PR person because they are afraid of telling anyone. But your PR person is really the conscience, your conscience, and the conscience of your organization. So, a pitfall would be, I'm going to hire I'm going to hire this firm but I'm not going to tell them the whole story. And I'm not going to give them access to our leaders or our people or our team because I want to control, control, control. Well, something is going to happen that's outside of your control, a crisis or something. And then, your PR person or firm, they don't know enough to help you.

It's really interesting, isn't it? Because part of that is, oh, I want to make absolutely sure people see the good side of it. But then, we'd become really public about it. And there are going to be people out there who've had experiences who's going to call you out on the BS.

Right, yeah. You have to start with the truth. And that includes with telling the truth to your PR person. And when I meet with people, I'll be like, so, what's the worst that can happen? Like, what do you not want reporters to ask you now or ever? And like, let's fix that or let's talk about why that is or just let's have that on our radar. But what's the worst that can happen? Or what do you think is real, you know, what's really happening here? Like, you're, you know, you have this contingency of people and they're complaining and they're very vocal. What are they really upset with you about? Like, let's like talk about that. So yeah, I think that's a big pitfall is you have to be ready for it. You have to be ready for the PR. On every level. And, you know, and another reason why you want to start with the truth and tell your PR person the truth is you can't have your PR firm out there pitching you for stories and there's some secret mess that's brewing. And then you get media attention at the exact wrong time because sometimes PR is also being quiet. You know, it's not lying, but it's maybe laying low.

And there's so many examples of this. Jared with Subway, right? Like, what did that do to the Subway brand, right? When the stuff came out like that. But not that Subway might have known it. I'm sure they didn't know it. But there's so many different things, so many different influences on our business that could really turn around and go, can we still trust this business?

Well, a couple years ago, Crock-Pot had an unexpected crisis. Crock-Pot, like the safest, most mundane brand there could be. And I wrote a column about this for Inc. I was a columnist for Inc., which is the small business publication at the time. The deal was in the episode on the night of the Super Bowl, a Crock-Pot ends up killing off a beloved character of this NBC hit show called This Is Us. And Crock-Pot at the time had no social media. They had no Facebook. They had no nothing. But people were taking to Twitter saying they were throwing their Crock-Pots away, not their slow cookers. Their Crock-Pots, you know, because Crock-Pot is like the Kleenex of the slow cooker world, right?

Pressure cookers and things.

Yeah, exactly. Yeah. So they very— it was impressive though. Within hours, they had a Twitter account that was the exact right tone of like, oh my goodness, we loved this character too. We're so sorry, but trust your Crock-Pot is safe and will not start a house fire. And, you know, a link to FAQs and things. It was beautiful. Now, of course, like, they have like a parent company and they are, you know, able to pivot and do that very quickly. And they did. So I think that's like just an example of how a small business could be thinking of like, okay, how would I very quickly pivot and get things going if the worst that I imagined happened actually happened?

Yeah, it's interesting. One of my most popular keynotes presentations that I do to the hospitality industry is how to respond to harsh online reviews. Because it's amazing to see when people get slammed on social media how defensive they get and how their ego gets in the way.

Right.

And they go to war with their customers. And it's like, but it's a simple process. We could actually turn this into an opportunity to make you sound like you are so great at what you do. Right, even though somebody's just slammed you on social media.

Exactly, exactly. And, you know, sometimes it's about like knowing when to stop looking backward and to start— and, you know, there is the apologizing or whatever that is, of course, um, but when do you stop that and start looking forward? Because if you're also not giving the market, the journalists, the customers something else To turn the conversation, to take— again, that's not lying. It is just changing the conversation, but you have to have material in which to do that. But at some point, you start to look forward instead of backward, or else that conversation is going to stay stuck in the past.

Well, and as long as the forward-focused conversation is not empty promises, because that's going to destroy even more trust somewhere.

Exactly.

It just won't rebound from that.

Right, right. No, it has to be truth, which is why I refuse to— I bristle when people call it spin.

It's interesting. We had a topic, something pop up on our screen here. I want a company that spends its money on making the good services I'm buying as good as possible. rather than on PR people. Oh, that's a really good point.

Yeah.

Having said that, Taco Bell had to weather the storm. They were a pretty respectable company and they had to weather the storm over this big diarrhea thing that happened. And yet, the way that they handled it, the way they talked about it, the way they kind of addressed it, I think was really important. So, in spite of the fact that you might have somebody who's doing really good work, Stuff happens, to your point.

Right, right. Stuff happens. And I totally hear what this person is saying. But I would say it's the PR people within an organization or on behalf of an organization that are often pushing for you. You know, like, hey, what are this? What's the safety data? What's the information that we can get out there that We are delivering an important speech to a huge audience. What can we do that will help make customers' lives better, their experience better, and that is truthful? PR people often push organizations to do better and be better. We aren't getting noticed for that. But we're happy to see when that happens. You know what I mean?

Yeah.

Because we're often like also the biggest fans of these organizations. I love the companies that I've gotten to work for and I want the best for them. And I love when I'm sitting in an audience and I hear someone say, this is my first time at the ballet, or, you know, I'm at the museum and people are like, I can't believe Charlotte has a museum as cool as this. You know, like we want the best for our organizations. And for the people who experience those organizations. So my, I guess, rebuttal, if you want to call it that, to that notion is PR people are in the background pushing companies to be honest with you and to do the right thing and to up their game and make a great experience and to listen to you and highlight you and all of those things.

Would you say that part of that process as well is that they're the master listeners as well?

Yes, yes, the master listeners, the question askers, the, the listening across the board. You know, leaders might just be talking and listening to other leaders. But that goes back to the access I was talking about, too, you know.

Yes.

Getting to go into the kitchen or behind the curtain, talking to everyone and being curious about how every single part of this process comes together and the people doing Love it!

Amy, this has been such a great conversation. Could you just remind everybody one more time how they can get a hold of you?

Of course. Please find me on LinkedIn, Amy Baldwin George, By George Communications. And my website is bygeorgecomms.com. And Marc, I can't believe it's over. This was so much fun.

It went so quickly, isn't it?

It did. In a blink. Thank you for having me.

And I want to thank Elongated Muskrat for putting his comment in or her comment in. That was great. As we wrap up, do you have any last thoughts about what we've talked about today?

I would just say everyone deserves PR or to be curious about PR, to do their own PR. And I just think everyone has a story and I want to hear as many stories as possible. And I hope to hear yours. And just yeah, keep doing what you're doing and what you love doing. And don't Don't count out PR until you get big enough because you're worth it right now.

I love it. Amy, thank you so much for doing this. I really appreciate you being here, sharing your knowledge.

Oh my gosh!

I love your expertise. I love your passion behind it all. It's absolutely brilliant. Thank you for doing this.

Marc, thank you so much!

Hey, and if you have any questions about today's episode or you'd like a complimentary 30-minute brainstorming session with you and your team, feel free to book yourself on my online calendar. The link is in the show notes. It's the one meetwith.marchaine.com. As always, I am at your service. And if you're looking at today's episode and you're thinking you really do need some help kind of setting the tone for your public relations, that you really need to take that first step, please reach out to Amy. Obviously, she's a thought leader and a master of what she does. And so, I know that she'll be happy to serve your needs as well. If you haven't done so yet, could you please make sure— you know it. You know the whole habit, right? Could you please make sure you subscribe to this podcast? Go ahead and follow me on social media. I'm publishing lots of stuff in there on my brand, marchaine.com, or under Elite Headline Speakers. Would love to hear your comments, your thoughts, get into a conversation. It would be my absolute pleasure. Thank you for joining me today. My name is Marc Haine. I hope you stay safe, stay healthy, and I hope you dare to be the exception. See you next week!