Peter Drucker, recognized as the dean of America’s business and management philosophers by The Wall Street Journal, wrote “Entrepreneurship is ‘risky’ because so few of the so-called entrepreneurs know what they are doing. They lack the methodology. They violate elementary and well-known rules. This is particularly true of high-tech entrepreneurs.”

I believe this assertion especially applies to small B2B marketers today more than ever before. Digital technology has driven change with great velocity. Getting free exposure on the web in quality websites, social media, and respected blogs is being dominated by larger enterprises which have the knowledge, resources, and staff to take advantage of “The New Rules of Marketing & PR” as they were described by David Meerman Scott in his book by the same title. A must read for all small business owners.

There is nothing new about “taking advantage of free publicity.” Publicity has long been recognized as the most effective way to promote products and build your brand. In The Fall of Advertising & the Rise of PR, Al Ries wrote, “Advertising is not brand building. That is the role and function of PR.” A subset of PR is ‘product publicity’ which has been my specialty for 40 years because it evens the playing field for small companies and enhances their ability to compete with the big guys.

Just think of it: you cannot determine the size of a company by the news coverage about them, but you can by the size and frequency of paid advertising. Over the years, I have had many client’s products featured on the front covers of leading industry publications and websites; side-by-side with the largest multinationals in the world.  News is truly an equalizer!

Product publicity is an effective B2B strategy for small companies because it lets them gain brand recognition as “problem solvers” in specific market niches where users are always searching online for news about products and solutions. The facts are that product publicity is the best way to get the exposure necessary to compete in today’s marketplace and most people don’t understand what it really is, what it can accomplish, and how to make it happen. Very unfortunate.

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© 2016 Steven M. Stroum (with permission to share)