Julie Fraser is a seasoned PR. Having freelanced for nine years and worked in a variety of agencies over the course of a 20 year career, she’s seen it all!

One year ago she went back to freelance, and straight away, was in high demand from those she had worked with over the years.  They knew she could come in and hit the ground running.  A safe pair of hands.

Julie’s story

“My contact book, built over years from hundreds of stories, is priceless. But I’m ashamed to say I have treated it badly.  Names crossed out, scribbled notes in the margins, post-it confetti and all held together with an elastic band.  

But it had seen me through years and years of media relations.  I’d always meant to go digital - even a spreadsheet would have been an upgrade! 

Until one day, I met PingGo.

I was working for an agency using a media CRM I had never heard of - PingGo. From the first sell-in, I was hooked. It’s not a word I use lightly, but using it on a distribution is thrilling! 

We had over 100 targets to reach and I was working with another two people on the day.

We worked together writing personal pitches, moving down the list, watching our targets move from ‘to do’ to ‘in progress’.  It can be lonely working on a distribution - keeping morale high is hard - particularly when you are working from home.  When you don’t hear anything back, it’s easy to start getting stressed.

But on PingGo you’re in it together.  We cheer each other on and keep the energy high.  It’s a race to see who finishes first.

When it comes to follow ups I approach those who have opened first.  Previously I would be calling blind, but now I have visibility of who has opened the email and I know who will be most engaged. I’m speaking into their listening.

But also, if there is someone I think should have opened and who hasn’t then I’ll zero in on them and make sure they have seen the press release. Once I’ve done the initial distribution and follow ups I’ll leave it for a couple of hours. And then come back to it.  I’ll always keep the dashboard open so I can see the press release getting opened.  If a hot lead comes on I can jump straight in.

PingGo creates the time needed to do follow ups and we all know that it is the follow ups that get us the coverage.  

When you are on a distribution you have to be totally in the zone.  You can’t jump onto other jobs - you have to have that singular focus.  PingGo keeps you out of your inbox so that you are not tempted to get drawn into anything else until the job is done.

An agency is not paying for me to spend time on cutting and pasting press releases into email. They want me on the follow ups, on locking down the coverage and getting results.  If we spend all our time getting the story out or cutting corners by blind copying, we are not serving our clients.

Today’s news desks are so busy and understaffed that speed is critical.  We have to get our press releases under their noses early in the morning.  Previously it might have been noon before I had got all the press releases out with a personal pitch.  The whole day would have been wiped out by a distribution.  And the following day with follow ups.

The speed at which PingGo allows you to work gives us the edge over other agencies - we are getting our story to the news desk before others can get their stories in.