MacCommsMacCommsMacCommsMacComms
  • Home
  • About us
  • Our services
  • Who we’ve helped
  • PR tools & training
  • Our blog
  • Contact us
  •  

Founders Thoughts 1. Telling your story

    Home Thought piece Founders Thoughts 1. Telling your story
    NextPrevious
    MacComms and Cooper King Distillery

    Founders Thoughts 1. Telling your story

    By Ellie MacDonald | Thought piece | Comments are Closed | 15 May, 2018 | 0

    MacComms and Cooper King Distillery

     

    Welcome to my first thought-piece. Having spent the past three years advising entrepreneurs about the importance of placing themselves as an expert in their industry, I’m taking my own advice and will be providing articles which hopefully demonstrate and inspire young entrepreneurs to succeed in growing their own business through PR.

     

    After spending the sunny May bank holiday planning my content, I knew I had to start from the beginning – understanding and communicating your ‘why’ in business.

     

    Firstly, we’ll look at why this is important. The vast majority of business owners won’t be doing something completely brand new. I’m certainly not. There is a tonne of PR agencies out there, however I’m a firm believer that consistently communicating my why, which has led to our strong brand values and underlying ethos about creating a successful business based on treating people right, is what has accelerated our growth. People buy people; they deal with people they like, trust, admire and respect. So telling your story is a great way to ensure that key influencers and your prospective customers buy into you and then into what you’re selling.

     

    Entrepreneurs are naturally inspiring people, however, the too-often told “I didn’t like my job, had no qualifications and was told I couldn’t do it so I did” story, is only one level. You’ve worked bloody hard to grow your business so give your story the justice it deserves. Without the detail, it can seem like a lucky break, lottery win type story which lacks the human element, which is ultimately what people will buy into.

     

    Being brave enough to communicate your personal challenges and struggles, emphasising your determination and force for good, is the next level that people will buy into.

     

    How you tell your story must be compelling and appetising too.

     

    I was incredibly proud to have been part of the Entrepreneurial Spark programme in Leeds (now the NatWest business accelerator) for two years. The enablers (mentors) on the programme constantly drilled into us the importance of getting comfortable with being uncomfortable, namely (for me) public speaking and the importance of delivering a succinct 60-second pitch. This is a minimal time frame to get across all the points we were taught;

    1. opening with an impactful hook to capture your audiences attention (note their point of making it human and relatable)
    2. the problem / pain point your audience will understand and
    3. your solution to overcome it.
    4. the size of the market / your revenue model
    5. delivering traction through your and your teams experience and
    6. finally closing with your ask.

    That’s a lot to squeeze in in approx. 150 words so you see how important it is to grab the attention of your audience in order to speak to you further, where you can add the detail.

     

    Luckily in terms of PR, the media want the detail – the who, why and most importantly the human-interest element communicated in words and visually. Every newspaper, magazine and online publication has at least one key image on its page, after all, a picture speaks a thousand words.

     

    This is why we always advise our clients to capture great photography of the founder/MD with their product / in front of their building. Unless it is consumer press writing on the ten best lipsticks for example, they will not use a sole product shot, nor would a press release on a product, without the back-story to accompanying it, be used.

     

    Even without press content (although I’m confident you’ll have more to tell than you realise; any development such as launching, growing, taking on staff, anniversaries, new contract wins/products/services are all the basis for newsworthy content – your why will help add the magic) there are regular features specifically designed for entrepreneurs to tell their story. From the Yorkshire Post’s My Passion feature (part of the business news every Tuesday), BQ’s start-up stories and The Business Desk Yorkshire’s My Yorkshire feature are all completely free-of-charge editorial content which the media want.

     

    Real life example:

     

    Our client, Cooper King Distillery have only just began distilling their gin, with the official launch of the distillery held in June and their whisky scheduled for 2023. However, we’ve had enormous success in gaining them press coverage and blog articles because of their powerful and inspiring back-story.

     

    An engaged couple, Chris, a former architect and Abbie, a PhD Biochemist, had enough of the corporate rat race, quit their jobs and went travelling, including exploring Australia. Whilst over there they fell in love with the Tasmanian whisky scene and decided to come home, back to Yorkshire and literally build their own whisky and gin distillery. With a huge investment required to get such an impressive business off the ground, this required serious cash injection, funded via a crowd funding platform, their Founders’ Club, which we have helped to promote. By telling their story, gin, whisky and Yorkshire-lovers have flocked to support the start-up and they have smashed their monthly sales targets month-on-month.

     

    They are an absolute joy to work with, their passion is infectious and helps us passionately communicate their venture in turn. And, importantly, they continually provide us with great content; whether they’re giving back to environmental projects such as 1% for the Planet and planting trees for the Yorkshire Dales Trust, partnering with BrewYork to create a unique gin beer, or letting us in to understand their why so that we can communicate this to the media, we constantly have great content and their results in press coverage and, as a result, business growth, has been phenomenal. Watch this space, I’ve no doubt that Cooper King Distillery will continue to be a roaring success and we look forward to continuing to support them in future.

    entrepreneur, founders thoughts, PR, PR advice, PR tips, thought piece

    Ellie MacDonald

    More posts by Ellie MacDonald

    Related Post

    • Founder’s thoughts: defining success

      By Ellie MacDonald | Comments are Closed

      Our founder, Ellie MacDonald, shares her views on ‘defining success’ in this months ‘founder’s thoughts’ piece:   This September I’ve been thinking about success. How do you define it? Is it based on cash inRead more

    • Emily and Ellie

      Celebrating a year at MacComms

      By Ellie MacDonald | Comments are Closed

      Our senior account executive, Emily, shares her thoughts on her first year at MacComms:    I’ve now been at MacComms for a whole year, although to some this may not seem like a long time,Read more

    • Portugal retreat

      The importance of taking time out

      By Ellie MacDonald | Comments are Closed

      Given that running your business can be an all-consuming and absorbing task, it can often be difficult to take time-out. However, it is important that we occasionally put down our smart phone and take aRead more

    • Founders thoughts MacComms

      Founder’s Thoughts: why use a PR agency?

      By Ellie MacDonald | Comments are Closed

      Welcome to our August Founder’s Thoughts piece. We’re delighted that entrepreneurs understand the importance of getting their brand into the press and applaud those that set out to do it themselves. Often, start-up business ownersRead more

    • Yorkshire day

      Founders Thoughts 3: Promote your Yorkshire business ahead of this Yorkshire Day

      By Ellie MacDonald | Comments are Closed

      When working with entrepreneurs to identify media opportunities, we begin by researching the key days to tie your business content into. There’s a national awareness day for everything! From the recently trending ‘bring your dogRead more

    NextPrevious

    Blog categories

    • Client news
    • Company news
    • Founders thoughts
    • Industry insights
    • Latest news
    • Meet the journo
    • Positive news
    • Thought piece

    Recent posts

    • New senior appointment for GRM Digital 17th March 2023
    • Nutritional study gets underway for cats diagnosed with cancer 13th February 2023
    • New Years PR campaigns; how you can use to data to gain media coverage 3rd February 2023
    • Employees report increase in suicidal thoughts, reveals new workplace wellbeing report from Champion Health 26th January 2023
    • Milestone 50,000 users registered and £3million investment gained in pet care app’s first nine months 15th December 2022

    Contact us

    0113 869 5242
    info@maccomms.net

    Visit us

    15 Queen Square
    Leeds
    West Yorkshire
    LS2 8AJ

    • Cookies
    • Privacy
    • T&Cs
    • Sitemap
    © 2015 - 2021 Maccomms (Yorkshire) Ltd. All rights reserved. Site by Media29
    • Home
    • About Us
    • Our Services
    • Who We’ve Helped
    • PR tools & training
    • Our Blog
    • Contact Us
    MacComms