Melanie Rembrandt helps her clients grow their businesses and increase awareness through creative copywriting and strategic public relations.
She started writing at a young age and began her career doing public relations (PR) and content marketing while working her way through college. After graduation, she helped ‘Mom and Pop shops,’ non-profits, various small businesses, Fortune 500 Companies, and celebrities. In fact, she worked directly with the world-renowned author, speaker and strategic consultant, Dan Kennedy, plus she spoke at his annual conference, providing helpful tips on copywriting and public relations. In addition, she has worked directly with best-selling authors and personal financial experts, Robert and Kim Kiyosaki of The Rich Dad Company, among others.
“Numerous small business owners complained to me about having bad experiences with larger firms who made a lot of promises but showed very little results. With this insight, I formed by own company to specifically help small business owners get their message heard without wasting time and money.”
To spread the word accurately, it requires sending an appropriate and unique message to the right audience at the right time. Melanie uses all types of content such as press releases, direct mail, blogs, articles, landing pages, tips sheets, case studies, white papers, emails, and more to do this. The content is streamlined to a particular market segment to gain the most response.
“For any business, it’s about providing valuable and unique content to a targeted audience for the best results possible.”
Melanie writes content specific to what each client is trying to accomplish. Many times, this includes writing regular blog entries. Usually starting at about 300 words, these blogs allow her clients to share a unique message that offers valuable information in an easy-to-read format. Also, trained extensively in search engine optimization (SEO), Melanie adds the appropriate keywords, titles, links, and more when she is writing to help the final content get as much awareness online as possible.
“Your content will work best if you provide reader-friendly titles, sub-titles, the appropriate spacing, bullet points, and more. This way, readers will know exactly what your message is whether they just skim it or read the entire piece.”
Why Small Businesses Need Public Relations:
Melanie mentions that while you may think public relations only relates to the media, it encompasses all of the communications you have with employees, associates, investors, and more. After all, all of the internal and external customers that you deal with need to easily understand what you have to offer and why you are unique. This helps you sell more, build relationships and grow your business.
Now, this whole process takes time and effort for the best results, so it’s wise to hire an expert publicist and copywriter to help you. This way, you can focus on your core business responsibilities. However, you can also garner all the benefits of public relations even if you just have a small business.
“PR is perfect for small businesses because a single call can lead to a feature story in your local newspaper or a television or radio interview without paying for advertising. This is third-party credibility that can build positive word-of-mouth quickly.”
Melanie shared that if you have a small budget, you can start to reach out to the media on your own. It’s just a matter of finding the media members in your local area who cover your business or industry, contacting them directly and letting them know what you have to offer them. By making a simple introduction, informing them of your expertise, how you help the local community, and more, they will know who you are and possibly call you for a future story to get your expert opinion.
Also important in today’s multi-layered media community is to send the right message for your target market.
“Reporters are inundated with pitches from various entities on a daily basis. Before you contact them, think about how you can help them and offer value.”
With the deluge of media available today, Melanie stressed how messages easily get lost in the vast sea of information overload. To get through, she suggests researching the various media venues that your customers pay attention to and finding the reporters, producers, editors, etc. who will care about what you have to say. Then, you can craft a message specific to their needs.
“To be noticed, it’s important to offer unique and newsworthy information that each particular media member will care about. The days of sending out the same email to hundreds of reporters at once are gone.”
Have a Content Strategy:
By organizing all of your blogs, press releases, social media posts, case studies, landing pages, and other copywriting projects, you can get the most out of each piece of content possible. It’s important to have a plan in place to decide on your message, who it is going to, where it will be sent, when, how you will track it, and other data. This way, you can see what works best for your business.
“With today’s technology, you can see exactly what content your target market likes most and give them more of what they want. This way, you can spend time on what works and stop wasting time on content that doesn’t.
The Small Business PR Academy:
From her many years of working in public relations, Melanie just launched a simple, but comprehensive, online PR program anyone can quickly learn and implement immediately. That means small business owners can get this valuable training when it’s convenient for them or have an associate, intern or another employee take the course. It is available at www.smallbusinesspracademy.com.
Melanie also released her new book, “Simple Publicity,” that breaks down public relations into easy-to-understand topics. Small businesses may not have a sufficient budget to hire a public relations person, but by taking part in her Small Business PR Academy or reading her book, they can at least initiate some simple steps to gain more publicity for their business.
The book is available at www.rembrandtwrites.com.
In addition to her podcast, “Simplify your Business,” that’s available to everyone online, Melanie also gives presentations to various groups worldwide. She provides an entertaining experience with tips on how to use content marketing, public relations and SEO to increase customers and sales and have a better online reputation. Melanie is known for taking information that may be overwhelming and difficult and turning it into easy-to-understand steps that can be used immediately.
“You do not need to be a Fortune 500 company to reap the benefits of public relations. Learn the basic PR steps and develop a good message. For the best results, think about your audience first and help solve their problems.”
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Melanie loves being a copywriter and publicist but also enjoy her time off. When not at the office, you can find her taking Muay Thai kickboxing classes, practicing at the dance studio or scuba diving in the ocean.
“Scuba diving is great for relaxing and a lot of fun… it’s just me, the fish and an occasional turtle or shark swimming by!”
During COVID-19, Melanie suggests that entrepreneurs reach out to their customers on a personal level. A simple email or written note to ask them how they are doing and if there is anything you can do to help can go a long way.
For over 15 years, Melanie Rembrandt has helped her clients, both large and small, get their messaging out to the right audiences to help them grow and increase profitability… without wasting resources. Find out more or contact her through her website: www.rembrandtwrites.com.
