In the boardroom, the debate often plays out like a zero-sum game: “Should we put the budget into PR or Marketing?” The CFO wants measurable ROI immediately, pointing toward the granular tracking of digital advertising. The CMO argues for brand sentiment and long-term positioning. They are both asking the wrong question.
The issue isn’t PR versus marketing. The issue is sequence and integration. In the modern economy, where skepticism is the default consumer setting, the relationship between these two disciplines has fundamentally shifted. Here is the blunt reality: Marketing gets you seen; PR gets you believed. And in an era of digital noise, visibility without credibility is not just fragile, it is an incredibly expensive way to fail.
The High Cost of the Credibility Gap
Let’s dismantle a common misconception. Many executives view Public Relations as a luxury item, something you do once you are already successful to “maintain” an image. Conversely, they view marketing as the engine that drives sales. This view is backward, and it bleeds money. When a company leads with marketing but lacks a foundation of public trust, it is forced to pay a “credibility tax.” If a consumer sees an ad for a company they have never heard of, validated by no third party, their resistance is high. To overcome that resistance, the brand must increase frequency and reach, literally spending more money to shout louder.
Advertising fills the gap when credibility is missing. When PR is underdeveloped, marketing compensates with higher ad spend to overcome skepticism. However, when PR effectively pre-frames the market: establishing the brand as an authority, a thought leader, or a solution to a pressing industry problem, the friction lowers. Public relations provides trust, resilience, and legitimacy—qualities that advertising alone cannot buy. When a potential lead sees your ad after reading about your innovation in an industry trade journal or seeing your CEO quoted as an expert in the business press, the marketing dollars work harder, and the conversion path shortens.
PR: The Engine for Measurable Business Returns
PR doesn’t just boost brand awareness, it delivers measurable returns at every stage of your growth:
- Lowering Your Cost Per Lead: An informed consumer is easier to engage, and a trusting consumer is more likely to close. PR educates your market and builds credibility for your company, services, and team. By removing costly emotional barriers, PR reduces friction in your sales cycle and makes every marketing dollar count.
- Increasing Your Marketing ROI: PR penetrates your marketplace by publicizing your story and good works in ways marketing and advertising simply can’t. That earned credibility ensures every piece of outreach, and every ad placement works harder and more efficiently because the audience is already primed to believe.
- Augmenting the Value of Your Business: PR positions your brand as the credible choice in a crowded field. It builds the trust and goodwill that win customers and investors, giving your business a decisive edge.
Most importantly, PR accomplishes what marketing alone cannot: it pervades every aspect of your outreach, so your marketing strategy isn’t just noise, it’s grounded in trust.
Great PR Hits 3 Main Milestones for ROI
Brands that achieve true marketing ROI understand that PR is not a one-and-done effort but a journey that unfolds in three essential stages:
- Disruption: PR shakes up industry norms and breaks the status quo by positioning your brand with thought-provoking narratives and bold stories. This step redefines perception and gets you noticed with authority.
- Exposure: Your story then gains traction and visibility. Through consistent and strategic PR, you expand your reach and recall, with meaningful stories multiplying your presence in ways advertising alone cannot replicate.
- Influence: Over time, sustained PR establishes your brand and leadership as trusted voices. You become the go-to expert for both media and your market, driving easier sales, more referrals, and deeper loyalty. This influence converts to sustainable growth and higher ROI.
Neglecting any of these stages means you miss out on the compounding effect PR provides across your marketing and sales strategies. Brands often undervalue the shift from disruption to exposure to influence, when in reality, this sequence is what turns attention into belief, and belief into revenue.
The Sequence: PR First, Marketing Second
To maximize ROI, we must reframe the order of operations. Agile PR must go first to build credibility, authority, and trust. Marketing must follow to amplify what the public is already willing to accept.
Consider the “Anti-PR” approach to disruption. Before you saturate a market with ads, you must first disrupt the status quo with a compelling narrative. This is where PR functions as the tip of the spear. By securing earned media—articles, interviews, and features in credible outlets—you are not just buying space; you are earning endorsement.
As noted by Entrepreneur, marketing excels at short-term results and sales spikes, while PR plays the longer game of reputation and belief. But these aren’t parallel tracks; they are sequential gears.
- The PR Phase: You establish the narrative. You answer the question, “Why does this matter?” through third-party validation.
- The Marketing Phase: You take that validated message and scale it using paid channels to drive specific actions.
When brands separate the two, PR becomes underpowered, and marketing becomes unnecessarily expensive. Together, they create a credibility engine that lowers ad spend, improves conversions, and turns brand perception into measurable business growth.
The Gatekeepers of Belief
Despite the democratization of content through social media and owned blogs, the traditional gatekeepers of information remain the gold standard for trust. 73% of reporters review press releases when researching organizations. Even in a digital-first world, journalists remain the primary filter for credibility. They are the ones who separate legitimate industry contenders from “flash-in-the-pan” startups. If your marketing campaign launches, but a journalist cannot find a digital footprint of your expertise—bylined articles, press releases, or commentary on industry trends—you remain at risk. PR is the gatekeeper of belief. It ensures that when the marketing spotlight hits you, you withstand the scrutiny.
Compounding Returns vs. Instant Spikes
The final argument for integrating PR ahead of marketing lies in the nature of the return on investment. Marketing is often transactional; it delivers a spike in traffic or leads that typically stops the moment you stop paying for the ads. It is a faucet: on or off.
PR delivers compounding returns. A byline article placed in a major publication today remains searchable forever. It continues to educate prospects, validate your expertise to investors, and warm up leads for your sales team years after it was published. PR’s impact accrues through trust, authority, and familiarity—assets that lower friction across every future campaign.
The Verdict: Integration is Non-Negotiable
Brands don’t fail today from a lack of attention; they fail from a lack of belief. We exist in an attention economy, yes, but we also exist in a trust deficit. In an environment saturated with ads, credibility has become the scarcest resource. PR builds belief; marketing monetizes it. Silos kill good communication. A campaign that launches with a press release, social media posts, and internal memos is exponentially stronger than a campaign that launches in pieces. By cross-pollinating your editorial calendars and ensuring your PR narrative informs your ad copy, you create a unified front.
Don’t ask whether you need PR or Marketing. Ask if you are running them in the right order. Because if you aren’t building the foundation of belief first, you are simply paying a premium to be ignored.
About Karla Jo Helms
Karla Jo Helms is the Chief Evangelist and Anti-PR™ Strategist for JOTO PR Disruptors™. Karla Jo learned firsthand how unforgiving business can be when millions of dollars are on the line—and how the control of public opinion often determines whether one company is happily chosen, or another is brutally rejected. Being an alumnus of crisis management, Karla Jo has worked with litigation attorneys, private investigators, and the media to help restore companies of goodwill back into the good graces of public opinion—Karla Jo operates on the ethic of getting it right the first time, not relying on second chances and doing what it takes to excel. Karla Jo has patterned her agency on the perfect balance of crisis management, entrepreneurial insight, and proven public relations experience. Helms speaks globally on public relations, how the PR industry itself has lost its way and how, in the right hands, corporations can harness the power of Anti-PR to drive markets and impact market perception. More information is available at www.jotopr.com/.
LinkedIn:https://www.linkedin.com/in/karlajohelms
