Sept. 15, 2025
Strategies for Securing New PR Business in 2025
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That Solo Life Episode 313: Strategies for Securing New PR Business in 2025Episode Summary
Karen and Michelle dive into optimistic data about the global growth of the PR industry and share strategic insights for solo practitioners looking to finish 2025 strong. Drawing from recent industry research, they explore emerging trends, niche specialization opportunities, and practical business development tactics that can help independent PR pros break through current market challenges and position themselves for future success.
Episode Highlights- PR Industry Growth Statistics (02:10) - Discussion of global PR industry expansion and what it means for solo practitioners
- Content Creation as Core Offering (03:06) - 76% of PR agencies now emphasize content strategy and creation services
- The Rise of Niche Specialization (04:18) - 37% of agencies focus on specialized industries like fintech and health tech
- Strategic Industry Targeting (05:40) - Identifying high-growth sectors with future potential, including infrastructure and healthcare
- Pricing Psychology (09:25) - Why charging more can actually win you more business
- Networking Beyond PR Circles (10:28) - Breaking out of industry echo chambers to find new opportunities
- Local Government Connections (11:18) - Building relationships with municipal leaders and borough managers
- Overcoming Business Development Fatigue (12:47) - Managing exhaustion while staying proactive in challenging times
- The PR industry is growing globally, even if it doesn't feel that way locally
- Specializing in niche industries offers competitive advantages
- Infrastructure projects present untapped opportunities for PR pros
- Higher pricing often signals higher value to potential clients
- Networking outside the PR industry can yield unexpected opportunities
- Your skills are transferable across industries - don't limit yourself
- Small, consistent changes to your business development approach can yield big results
Resources Mentioned:
- PR Lab: 150+ PR Statistics You Need to Understand the Industry in 2025
- That Solo Life, Episode 215: From Barriers to Bridges with Mary Ellen Miller
Industries to Watch:
- Health technology and healthcare
- Financial technology (fintech)
- Infrastructure and public works
- Municipal and government communications
That Solo Life is a podcast created for public relations, communication, and marketing professionals who work as independent and small practitioners. Hosted by Karen Swim, APR, founder of Words For Hire and President of Solo PR, and Michelle Kane, Principal of Voice Matters, the show delivers expert insights, encouragement, and advice for solo PR pros navigating today's dynamic professional landscape.
Ready to transform your solo practice? Don't let this episode's insights go to waste! Take action today by identifying one new industry or networking opportunity you can explore this month. Whether it's attending a targeted industry event or meetup, connecting with your local government officials, or raising your rates, small steps lead to significant breakthroughs.
Subscribe to That Solo Life on your favorite podcast platform and never miss an episode packed with practical strategies for independent PR professionals. Have questions or success stories to share? Reach out to the hosts at soloprpro.com - they'd love to hear from you!
That Solo Life Episode 313: Strategies for Securing New PR Business in 2025
Transcribing live conversations can be challenging, so please forgive any typos or errors you may find. Love something here and want to share? Great, please read the notes at the end. Enjoy!
Michelle Kane (00:12):
Thanks for joining us for this episode of That Solo Life, the podcast for PR pros and marketers who work for themselves, people like me, Michelle Kane, with Voice Matters, and my wonderful co-host, Karen Swim of Solo PR Pro. Yay. Hi Karen. How you doing today?
Karen Swim, APR (00:29):
Hi, Michelle. I'm doing great. How are you? Yeah,
Michelle Kane (00:32):
Doing good. Doing good. By the time this hits, we'll be well into September and bringing all those back to school vibes, although I'm not ready for pumpkin spice, but that's a whole other conversation.
Karen Swim, APR (00:46):
I feel like we already are, the nature has decided that we're transitioning with leaves falling and all kinds of things happening that are like, Hey, it's fall already. So even though we haven't technically turned the page from summer to fall, kids are going back to school. They are and fall things are happening. So
Michelle Kane (01:10):
That's true. To quote the great Justin Curry of Dimitri, the summer here is over in a million different ways. Anyway, and if any one person out there got that reference, that would be awesome.
Karen Swim, APR (01:23):
Yes,
Michelle Kane (01:24):
Love it. The queen of the obscure lyric. But anyway, we're not here to talk nonsense. We're here to talk sense
Karen Swim, APR (01:33):
We, we actually have facts and data for you that we hope, hope we'll bring a burst of optimism as we round into the final stretch of the year.
Michelle Kane (01:48):
2025. Go away. Oh, I mean, yeah. So yeah, there are some interesting things in this article. I think it appeared on PR lab website and just different ways that we can look into bolstering our business and like you say, finish strong and look forward to 2026. I mean, it appears that globally PR is growing, which we may not feel that right now, but it's kind of nice to know that it's happening somewhere.
Karen Swim, APR (02:20):
Yeah, I love this statistic that backs up that the PR industry is growing, and I think sometimes when we're in our own little world and we're seeing such a slowdown and we're seeing companies not making decisions and doing a lot of business development without results concluding this year, it can be a little depressing quite honestly. But to know that the industry as a whole is growing, I think should fill us with hope, but hopefully it will also provide us some guidance into the pockets that we should looking in and how we should be approaching business development for the remainder of this year.
Michelle Kane (03:06):
And of course, part of that is maybe revisiting what our core offerings are, and I was very pleased to see that 75 or 76% use content creation and strategy, which it's kind of one of those things that make me go well, yeah, but it's good to know that not only do we as PR pros believe that those are of course essential to storytelling and moving the needle, but that seems to be in demand, which is fantastic.
Karen Swim, APR (03:41):
I think it is too, and I'm with you. I think that the stat was 76% of PR agencies offer that. And strategy to me seems like, okay, that should be a hundred percent of people that are offering strategy because how do you do the things without it? But maybe it's really calling that out as a core offering and being more intentional about selling that.
(04:10):
Another stats at the 37% of PR agencies specialize in niche industries like FinTech and health tech, and that is continuing to rise. So I love this. I think we've talked about this a lot this year in different ways about niche marketing, niche communities, and I think that trend really is going to grow. That's one of my prediction is that being generalized is probably not going to serve any of us well, generalized in our approach, generalized in the industries that we serve. But I do think that seeing that so many people are looking into these niche and specialized areas, and those are actually areas that I serve too, I think that we have to be really smart about. Okay, there's a stat that talks about the tech industry growing, and that seems great, except I serve at the tech industry. Yes, it is growing, but yes, they've been holding onto their money. Yes, investors have not been funding. Things are on hold. It's not over terrible or dead, but it's on hold. However, I think that for our solo PR pros, we have to really start to be strategic in looking at where is the future going to rely? What do we need in the future that's not going away? What are those pockets of the industries that we serve that have high growth potential and are really needed for the future? And this is where I need to start doing business development.
Michelle Kane (05:59):
I mean, certainly the health sector,
Karen Swim, APR (06:02):
It
Michelle Kane (06:03):
Doesn't seem to be going away anytime soon, but like you say, as well, given where we are in the economic state of everyday is different, it is tough to build that business with people who are not so willing to spend because everyone's sort of in a state of flux. However, you can still make some headway. You can still establish contexts.
Karen Swim, APR (06:29):
I agree. I mean, Mary Ellen Miller talked about this, God, it might've been two years ago, a year or two ago, about infrastructure and how our nation's infrastructure aging and her predictions of course, were so rooted in her, not only her experience, but in facts. And it's all true. Look around your local areas and you will see lots of infrastructure projects. Now, it's questionable whether the funding will hold up for all of this, but it's needed. And there are reasons to shore up aging infrastructure because it's a public safety issue. There is no reason why any cannot serve that industry. I think that we have to remind ourselves that our skills are transferable. And I know that a lot of times clients want to know you did this for somebody that I know that for a comparable company in my industry. So I think that we have to get better at selling ourselves.
(07:38):
And maybe sometimes that means bringing on a partner. Is there somebody that has that specific experience that you can team up with to deliver services? Because I don't think that we can do business development the same old way where we're like, oh, we're getting referrals. Oh, we're doing this. Oh, we're talking. We've got to broaden what we do. And I think that we have to do our own scape for how we approach business and look for it. We have to really start to dig deeper, okay, what's happening now? Where are the trends of the future? What does the next year look like? What does the next two to five years look like? Where's the growth going to happen and how can I serve those pockets? Because realistically, in the worst of the worst times, somebody is still growing and somebody is benefiting because somebody is offering something that has a great need that's not going away.
Michelle Kane (08:41):
And even to echo that, and I fall prey to this as well, you do need to make sure you pop your head up. Even if you've been in this for a while and you're like, Ugh, ugh, networking events. Do something different. Try not to go where the same people are, that even though you know them and you can have a nice time, nothing's going to come of it just because it's not a right fit. Because I have heard two occasions recently where the business has gone to a bigger agency, not because they're better, because I think it's reverse psychology, but they were charging more. So also raise your rates. It's like your work is your work. And put the price on it. Because I think specifically in those instances, my guess is the proposal recipient was like, oh, I'm paying more. So even though it's the same things, I'll get more. Right. And that is usually the psychology of it. So shake up your routines and don't be afraid to add a zero or two.
Karen Swim, APR (09:58):
I love that. And I agree. And let's not forget that there is a psychology of pricing that is very real. We value what we really pay for. If it's free or low cost, people often don't value it because they don't see it as they think that they're giving up something to get that cheap price. So don't be the cheap priced option.
(10:24):
And I love what you said about popping our head up and going into different spaces. One of the things that drives me crazy about us as a PR industry is that we hang out with each other a lot. That's not a terrible thing. We need our peers. We need our colleagues. And yes, we can be a source of referrals and business for one another, but don't be afraid to go into the spaces that you want own. So if you want to break into a tech sector, look for some tech events that you can go to be around the decision makers. Get to know those people. Talk to your local council people, your fire chief. Nobody really makes appointments with them and see about local projects that might be happening. So I do things outside of the city, but that doesn't mean that we can't look within our own town for work. You might be surprised what really is available to you.
Michelle Kane (11:22):
That's so true. So true. Yeah. Make friends with your borough managers and your municipal leaders because yeah, you never know. And I mean, they know everybody. So even if it's just a touch base or an informational interview in the same way, I know in Philly, they have the Center City Business Business Owners Association, and I'm out here in the burbs. Does it apply to me? But I've been thinking, I'm like, you know what? If the speakers appeal to me, it's not going to kill me to go into town for breakfast. You just don't know. And I have found, it's not often the person that you meet that might lead to something, but it's someone in their circle like, oh yeah, I know a guy who's looking for blah blah, and they're actually out by you, or whatever. You just don't know. And it's just good to keep those skills practiced so you're not, and trust. I know every other day I would just love to be me and my laptop. Leave me alone, la, la, la.
Karen Swim, APR (12:22):
I mean, I will admit to this, and I'm sure that others can relate. When things are good, we're comfortable. We get comfortable. We get comfortable with our routines, we get comfortable with our business development process. We're not necessarily looking to shake it up or change things because working, it's when things stop working as well that we're just like, Ugh. And then a lot of us this year are also tired. So we're tired. That doesn't help this exhaustion. There's this trend that's not great where everybody seems to have multiple challenges thrown at them at one time. So life is really throwing a lot of things at us at once. And so you're exhausted mentally, and it's like you're exhausted mentally. You really need business. It's not coming in and you're tired. You don't want to be innovative. You don't want to shake up your routine. You just want your old routine to work. But
Michelle Kane (13:21):
Exactly,
Karen Swim, APR (13:21):
I'm sorry. Your old routine is probably not going to work. And you do need to shake it up. But the good news is there is work available. We may have to work a tiny bit, I don't want to say harder, but differently,
Michelle Kane (13:35):
Differently
Karen Swim, APR (13:36):
To break it free, but that's okay.
Michelle Kane (13:41):
Look at it as an exciting little adventure. And I don't think oftentimes, at least the way I process things, I'm like, okay, I'm going to do all the things. Just pick one. Just pick one. Go to a new thing. Get to know your town manager. I mean, I don't know. You just don't know, because yeah, yeah, they know all the business owners. No, no, no, no, no. Don't do that. And know that we're here for you. And we say this at the end of every podcast, and we mean it. Hit us up at soloprpro.com, send us your questions, and send us your examples. We'd love to share your success stories. So go for it. And well, we hope this has been an inspiring pocket of time for you as always. And if you did benefit from it, please do share it around. And until next time, thanks for listening to “That Solo Life.”
You are more than welcome to share the transcript (up to 500 words) in media articles (e.g., PR News, O’Dwyers), on your personal website, in a non-commercial article or blog post (e.g., Substack), and/or on a personal social media account for non-commercial purposes, provided that you include attribution to “That Solo Life” and link back to the soloprpro/podcast URL. For the sake of clarity, media outlets with advertising models are permitted to use excerpts from the transcript per the above.
But please note that no one is authorized to copy any portion of the podcast content or use That Solo Life’s name, image or likeness for any commercial purpose or use, including without limitation inclusion in any books, e-books, book summaries or synopses, or on a commercial website or social media site (e.g., Facebook, X, Instagram, etc.) that offers or promotes your or another’s products or services.
Got questions? Email us at info@soloprpro.com.
Transcribing live conversations can be challenging, so please forgive any typos or errors you may find. Love something here and want to share? Great, please read the notes at the end. Enjoy!
Michelle Kane (00:12):
Thanks for joining us for this episode of That Solo Life, the podcast for PR pros and marketers who work for themselves, people like me, Michelle Kane, with Voice Matters, and my wonderful co-host, Karen Swim of Solo PR Pro. Yay. Hi Karen. How you doing today?
Karen Swim, APR (00:29):
Hi, Michelle. I'm doing great. How are you? Yeah,
Michelle Kane (00:32):
Doing good. Doing good. By the time this hits, we'll be well into September and bringing all those back to school vibes, although I'm not ready for pumpkin spice, but that's a whole other conversation.
Karen Swim, APR (00:46):
I feel like we already are, the nature has decided that we're transitioning with leaves falling and all kinds of things happening that are like, Hey, it's fall already. So even though we haven't technically turned the page from summer to fall, kids are going back to school. They are and fall things are happening. So
Michelle Kane (01:10):
That's true. To quote the great Justin Curry of Dimitri, the summer here is over in a million different ways. Anyway, and if any one person out there got that reference, that would be awesome.
Karen Swim, APR (01:23):
Yes,
Michelle Kane (01:24):
Love it. The queen of the obscure lyric. But anyway, we're not here to talk nonsense. We're here to talk sense
Karen Swim, APR (01:33):
We, we actually have facts and data for you that we hope, hope we'll bring a burst of optimism as we round into the final stretch of the year.
Michelle Kane (01:48):
2025. Go away. Oh, I mean, yeah. So yeah, there are some interesting things in this article. I think it appeared on PR lab website and just different ways that we can look into bolstering our business and like you say, finish strong and look forward to 2026. I mean, it appears that globally PR is growing, which we may not feel that right now, but it's kind of nice to know that it's happening somewhere.
Karen Swim, APR (02:20):
Yeah, I love this statistic that backs up that the PR industry is growing, and I think sometimes when we're in our own little world and we're seeing such a slowdown and we're seeing companies not making decisions and doing a lot of business development without results concluding this year, it can be a little depressing quite honestly. But to know that the industry as a whole is growing, I think should fill us with hope, but hopefully it will also provide us some guidance into the pockets that we should looking in and how we should be approaching business development for the remainder of this year.
Michelle Kane (03:06):
And of course, part of that is maybe revisiting what our core offerings are, and I was very pleased to see that 75 or 76% use content creation and strategy, which it's kind of one of those things that make me go well, yeah, but it's good to know that not only do we as PR pros believe that those are of course essential to storytelling and moving the needle, but that seems to be in demand, which is fantastic.
Karen Swim, APR (03:41):
I think it is too, and I'm with you. I think that the stat was 76% of PR agencies offer that. And strategy to me seems like, okay, that should be a hundred percent of people that are offering strategy because how do you do the things without it? But maybe it's really calling that out as a core offering and being more intentional about selling that.
(04:10):
Another stats at the 37% of PR agencies specialize in niche industries like FinTech and health tech, and that is continuing to rise. So I love this. I think we've talked about this a lot this year in different ways about niche marketing, niche communities, and I think that trend really is going to grow. That's one of my prediction is that being generalized is probably not going to serve any of us well, generalized in our approach, generalized in the industries that we serve. But I do think that seeing that so many people are looking into these niche and specialized areas, and those are actually areas that I serve too, I think that we have to be really smart about. Okay, there's a stat that talks about the tech industry growing, and that seems great, except I serve at the tech industry. Yes, it is growing, but yes, they've been holding onto their money. Yes, investors have not been funding. Things are on hold. It's not over terrible or dead, but it's on hold. However, I think that for our solo PR pros, we have to really start to be strategic in looking at where is the future going to rely? What do we need in the future that's not going away? What are those pockets of the industries that we serve that have high growth potential and are really needed for the future? And this is where I need to start doing business development.
Michelle Kane (05:59):
I mean, certainly the health sector,
Karen Swim, APR (06:02):
It
Michelle Kane (06:03):
Doesn't seem to be going away anytime soon, but like you say, as well, given where we are in the economic state of everyday is different, it is tough to build that business with people who are not so willing to spend because everyone's sort of in a state of flux. However, you can still make some headway. You can still establish contexts.
Karen Swim, APR (06:29):
I agree. I mean, Mary Ellen Miller talked about this, God, it might've been two years ago, a year or two ago, about infrastructure and how our nation's infrastructure aging and her predictions of course, were so rooted in her, not only her experience, but in facts. And it's all true. Look around your local areas and you will see lots of infrastructure projects. Now, it's questionable whether the funding will hold up for all of this, but it's needed. And there are reasons to shore up aging infrastructure because it's a public safety issue. There is no reason why any cannot serve that industry. I think that we have to remind ourselves that our skills are transferable. And I know that a lot of times clients want to know you did this for somebody that I know that for a comparable company in my industry. So I think that we have to get better at selling ourselves.
(07:38):
And maybe sometimes that means bringing on a partner. Is there somebody that has that specific experience that you can team up with to deliver services? Because I don't think that we can do business development the same old way where we're like, oh, we're getting referrals. Oh, we're doing this. Oh, we're talking. We've got to broaden what we do. And I think that we have to do our own scape for how we approach business and look for it. We have to really start to dig deeper, okay, what's happening now? Where are the trends of the future? What does the next year look like? What does the next two to five years look like? Where's the growth going to happen and how can I serve those pockets? Because realistically, in the worst of the worst times, somebody is still growing and somebody is benefiting because somebody is offering something that has a great need that's not going away.
Michelle Kane (08:41):
And even to echo that, and I fall prey to this as well, you do need to make sure you pop your head up. Even if you've been in this for a while and you're like, Ugh, ugh, networking events. Do something different. Try not to go where the same people are, that even though you know them and you can have a nice time, nothing's going to come of it just because it's not a right fit. Because I have heard two occasions recently where the business has gone to a bigger agency, not because they're better, because I think it's reverse psychology, but they were charging more. So also raise your rates. It's like your work is your work. And put the price on it. Because I think specifically in those instances, my guess is the proposal recipient was like, oh, I'm paying more. So even though it's the same things, I'll get more. Right. And that is usually the psychology of it. So shake up your routines and don't be afraid to add a zero or two.
Karen Swim, APR (09:58):
I love that. And I agree. And let's not forget that there is a psychology of pricing that is very real. We value what we really pay for. If it's free or low cost, people often don't value it because they don't see it as they think that they're giving up something to get that cheap price. So don't be the cheap priced option.
(10:24):
And I love what you said about popping our head up and going into different spaces. One of the things that drives me crazy about us as a PR industry is that we hang out with each other a lot. That's not a terrible thing. We need our peers. We need our colleagues. And yes, we can be a source of referrals and business for one another, but don't be afraid to go into the spaces that you want own. So if you want to break into a tech sector, look for some tech events that you can go to be around the decision makers. Get to know those people. Talk to your local council people, your fire chief. Nobody really makes appointments with them and see about local projects that might be happening. So I do things outside of the city, but that doesn't mean that we can't look within our own town for work. You might be surprised what really is available to you.
Michelle Kane (11:22):
That's so true. So true. Yeah. Make friends with your borough managers and your municipal leaders because yeah, you never know. And I mean, they know everybody. So even if it's just a touch base or an informational interview in the same way, I know in Philly, they have the Center City Business Business Owners Association, and I'm out here in the burbs. Does it apply to me? But I've been thinking, I'm like, you know what? If the speakers appeal to me, it's not going to kill me to go into town for breakfast. You just don't know. And I have found, it's not often the person that you meet that might lead to something, but it's someone in their circle like, oh yeah, I know a guy who's looking for blah blah, and they're actually out by you, or whatever. You just don't know. And it's just good to keep those skills practiced so you're not, and trust. I know every other day I would just love to be me and my laptop. Leave me alone, la, la, la.
Karen Swim, APR (12:22):
I mean, I will admit to this, and I'm sure that others can relate. When things are good, we're comfortable. We get comfortable. We get comfortable with our routines, we get comfortable with our business development process. We're not necessarily looking to shake it up or change things because working, it's when things stop working as well that we're just like, Ugh. And then a lot of us this year are also tired. So we're tired. That doesn't help this exhaustion. There's this trend that's not great where everybody seems to have multiple challenges thrown at them at one time. So life is really throwing a lot of things at us at once. And so you're exhausted mentally, and it's like you're exhausted mentally. You really need business. It's not coming in and you're tired. You don't want to be innovative. You don't want to shake up your routine. You just want your old routine to work. But
Michelle Kane (13:21):
Exactly,
Karen Swim, APR (13:21):
I'm sorry. Your old routine is probably not going to work. And you do need to shake it up. But the good news is there is work available. We may have to work a tiny bit, I don't want to say harder, but differently,
Michelle Kane (13:35):
Differently
Karen Swim, APR (13:36):
To break it free, but that's okay.
Michelle Kane (13:41):
Look at it as an exciting little adventure. And I don't think oftentimes, at least the way I process things, I'm like, okay, I'm going to do all the things. Just pick one. Just pick one. Go to a new thing. Get to know your town manager. I mean, I don't know. You just don't know, because yeah, yeah, they know all the business owners. No, no, no, no, no. Don't do that. And know that we're here for you. And we say this at the end of every podcast, and we mean it. Hit us up at soloprpro.com, send us your questions, and send us your examples. We'd love to share your success stories. So go for it. And well, we hope this has been an inspiring pocket of time for you as always. And if you did benefit from it, please do share it around. And until next time, thanks for listening to “That Solo Life.”
You are more than welcome to share the transcript (up to 500 words) in media articles (e.g., PR News, O’Dwyers), on your personal website, in a non-commercial article or blog post (e.g., Substack), and/or on a personal social media account for non-commercial purposes, provided that you include attribution to “That Solo Life” and link back to the soloprpro/podcast URL. For the sake of clarity, media outlets with advertising models are permitted to use excerpts from the transcript per the above.
But please note that no one is authorized to copy any portion of the podcast content or use That Solo Life’s name, image or likeness for any commercial purpose or use, including without limitation inclusion in any books, e-books, book summaries or synopses, or on a commercial website or social media site (e.g., Facebook, X, Instagram, etc.) that offers or promotes your or another’s products or services.
Got questions? Email us at info@soloprpro.com.