PR ON THE GO April 27, 2022

Public Relations Hacks: Top PR Tips For Food Brands

What is your best PR tip for food brands?

To help you best promote your food brand, we asked CEOs and PR professionals this question for their best strategies. From getting on TikTok to giving products unusual headlines, there are several tips that may help you promote and market your food brands effectively.

Here are 10 PR tips for food brands:

Create Experiences And Testimonies

Tonya McKenzie, Sand & Shores

"The best public relations advice that I have for food brands is to have as many actual experiences and testimonies for your product as possible. Particularly, before you go to market, collect an ample amount of people that have had your product, experienced the service, and are willing to write up or video testimony. There's nothing more compelling than the experience of someone else tasting, and enjoying this new brand. Long gone are the days when you can just tell people how amazing your product is. Having actual consumers experience it in their homes, under their circumstances, makes for a great PR.

A friend of mine has a pumpkin cheesecake brand. He sent more than a few samples. I put together a small brunch with a diverse group of ladies to try the different variations. The information from that event helped him fine-tune a few things. Most importantly, this brand had increased awareness now from the group of ladies and they had reviews on social media before they even got placed in Costco. Everything, even the smallest things matter when it comes to PR and raising brand awareness."

Get On TikTok

Maryolin Restaino, Twibi

"Gen Z and millennial shoppers have grown up with technology surrounding them and as such, it is a huge part of their lives. To attract them as consumers for your food brand, you can either use the trends to your favor (challenges, songs, etc) or make them trendy enough to warrant a must-have status. They'd mostly buy what their friends and the people they look up to buy, so partnering up with micro-influencers can do the trick since a lot of them are pretty critical of mega influencers (which is still a thing amongst millennials)."

Promote Remote Care Packages

Michael Alexis, TeamBuilding

"The rise of remote work has contributed to a rise of snack-based care packages. One of the most effective PR tips for food brands is to get involved with corporate care packages and gifting companies or with organizations directly to get products included in these swag bags. Corporations are often looking for easy ways to boost employee morale, and snacks are a sure bet. The companies are willing to pay for the product, and employees get to try the snacks risk-free. This approach often results in new fans for snack brands."

Showcase Health and Environmental Initiatives

Nick Shackelford, Structured Agency

"Think of ways that you can showcase your food brand as enjoyable, but healthy. For example, if you are able to produce organic versions of your food or impossible meat, this can be great for PR to show that your food brand is both health-conscious and environmentally conscious. When you are able to tie in your brand with important causes, this can definitely help with brand awareness."

Seek To Stimulate All The Senses

Karolina Zajac, Passport Photo Online

"Nowadays, food is a moment of pleasure, and customers' decisions are often impulsive and rely on a sudden fad. So, food brand identity should stimulate all the senses through colors, movements, and textures. Tempting commercials, such as Kinder Bueno or Magnum ice creams, are the best examples that this works."

Be Transparent and Consistent

Ilija Sekulov, Mailbutler

"Transparency is a big deal these days. Consumers are looking for transparency in their products. They want to know what's going into their food and how it was produced. Make sure that you are being transparent about your product and what went into making it. Consistency is also important. People have become accustomed to consistency in everything they consume. If you want to be successful, then you need to be consistent in your messaging and branding."

Incorporate User Generated Content

Katie Waldron, Statusphere

"There's no end to the benefits of integrating UGC into marketing plans. Adding in photo and video reviews gives would-be customers an unbiased account of taste, texture, and product packaging that feels personalized. It helps give a more rounded view of a brand without it feeling forced or pure advertising."

Tell Stories Through Good Food

Tristan Harris, Thrive Agency

"The best PR tip that I have for food brands is to be willing to tell stories. Creating an experience requires stimulating hearts and minds before you can fill stomachs. Our relationship with food brands, through the years, is not only bound by distinct taste and innovation, but more importantly by the timeless tales that we grew up with."

Include Crisis Manuals With Products

Agata Szczepanek, MyPerfectResume

"Food brands, don't forget about your crisis manuals as a part of your PR strategy! That's right. Food is one of the industries in which crises occur very frequently. Contaminated products, unauthorized ingredients, or toxic packaging are among the few examples of situations leading to severe problems. No brand can conduct effective PR activities without being prepared in advance for all crisis scenarios that may happen. So develop a crisis manual, a crisis management instruction that contains procedures for dealing with various crisis scenarios, defines the system of information flow and the responsibility of individual persons. Depending on how detailed the crisis manual is, it may also include holding statements, Q&A, checklists, and follow-up surveys to monitor crisis development. Having all of these prepared, you can realize the assumptions of image and marketing strategies."

Give Products Unusual Headlines

Anna Ditchev, Dentsu International

"When it comes to food, there's only so much you can write about a new vanilla ice cream brand. To get your product into the headlines, there has to be a surprise twist! Is this a dupe to a fan favorite -- meaning does it taste like something that folks have nostalgia about? This vanilla ice cream tastes just like a 1950s favorite that was discontinued, for example? Is it an unexpected flavor combination? I recently pitched pizza and mac n' cheese flavored ice cream and it got plenty headlines! Take a look at headlines on Delish and Tasting Table -- what are media writing about? It's the unexpected, the new and the overwhelmingly surprising."

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