Christine Wetzler With Pietryla PR & Marketing

Intro: [00:00:03] Broadcasting live from the Business RadioX studio in Chicago, Illinois. It’s time for Chicago Business Radio. Brought to you by Firm Space, your private sanctuary for productivity and growth. To learn more, go to firm spacecom. Now, here’s your host.

Max Kantor: [00:00:21] Hey, everybody. And welcome back to another episode of Chicago Business Radio. I’m your host, Max Kantor. And before we get started, as always, today’s show is sponsored by Firm Space, thanks to Firm Space because without them, we couldn’t be sharing these important stories. And we got a good one for you today. On today’s show, we have the founder and president of Pietryla PR and Marketing. So please welcome to the show, Christine Wetzler. Welcome to the show, Christine.

Christine Wetzler: [00:00:46] Thank you. Glad to be here.

Max Kantor: [00:00:48] I’m excited to talk to you about everything you’re doing. So let’s jump right in. Tell me a little bit about Pietryla PR and marketing.

Christine Wetzler: [00:00:55] Well, we’ve been here in Chicago for 20 years. I can’t believe it’s been that long. It’s gone so fast. But it has been. I have lived in Chicago a little bit longer than that. Worked downtown at a couple of PR firms prior to starting this one and for the last 20 years have been working with clients on both the B2B and B2C sides of the packaging, plastics and food and beverage brand side of things.

Max Kantor: [00:01:27] So what inspired you to start your own PR firm?

Christine Wetzler: [00:01:32] It’s actually kind of interesting because when I did it in 2002, there weren’t a lot of people. The gig economy wasn’t really a thing yet, and freelancing wasn’t really ubiquitous yet. So. So it was a little different. I started I had gotten laid off at an agency and that was happening at the time to too many different agencies. And the one thing that was kind of strange was our agency had a lot of different kinds of capabilities and PR was one of them. And so our staffing wasn’t as robust as I had seen at other agencies. So I was dealing with a lot of clients kind of on my own, which kind of made me realize, Wow, I’m I’m one person that can handle a lot of a lot of project management here. And then when I started interviewing for new jobs, I interviewed for one at a software company and they said, you know, well, this job really isn’t full time, but we can pay you part time. And they offered to 1099 me, which was kind of a new concept. And that just kind of melded those two things together and thought, well, gosh, if I could get 2 or 3 more of these, you know, I could run a successful business. So I reached back out to some of the clients that I had prior because they had nowhere to go. I mean, our agency was out of business and and picked some of them back up and and it just kind of rolled from there. It was, it was an, uh, you know, opportunistic. Two things just kind of came together and kind of clicked in my head. And, and then, of course, after a few years, everybody started getting the same idea. And now we have, you know, freelancing and starting your own business is something that is pretty fundamental, I think, for for most people Now.

Max Kantor: [00:03:32] What are some challenges a business would have to be facing for them to go, You know what, I could use Christine’s help.

Christine Wetzler: [00:03:39] I think, um, the biggest challenge is there are things about marketing and PR that are very difficult to understand. Um, and I think that it’s a very simple task. It’s kind of like when you look at somebody playing a game, you can look at it and say, Wow, that looks like a simple game, but then you start playing it and you realize it’s not as simple as it seems. And I think PR is one of those things where, you know, some people have a talent for it. They can be a little bit better at it than other people just naturally. But it is something that you have to practice over time and you have to develop the relationships over time and and know how to approach people. And I think that a business owner. Can very easily because of the way that they are kind of wired to want to be ambitious and to want to do everything can feel like I can do this myself, I can I can do this. And and I would say that when you get to the point where you realize, I need help with this, this is not something I can do myself. We’re the firm that bridges that gap because we do not function as a huge firm where we’re going to ask for, you know, $20,000 a month for a 12 month contract and and everything like that. We’re we’re going to come in small handful of people and say, okay, let’s talk about what you really want to accomplish.

Christine Wetzler: [00:05:17] Let’s focus on the things that really need to happen in order to push your business forward. And then let’s let’s work together to make those things happen. Um, you know, you’re working with me, you’re working with other senior leaders that have done this. We’re not, um, we’re not coming in with a team of young people who have to ask permission to do things before they do it. We’re coming in and really being helpful to an owner or to a brand owner. Um, the other thing that we, we offer and we do this a lot is because content has become so much, so much a big part of what we offer, um, is that we’re very quick studies, particularly in the industries that we service. And so when you, when you work with us, you know, you don’t have to get us up to speed over a couple months. Um, you know, we can write content and create content within a matter of days that resonates so because we already know what we’re doing. So, so it’s, it’s pretty, I think just to kind of the too long didn’t read version of your the answer to your question is we are the skilled kind of bridge between a much, much bigger agency and a very uh, very detailed single. Consultant. We offer the best of both of those things so we can we can help kind of ease you into doing this on a bigger scale.

Max Kantor: [00:06:57] Now, you talked a little bit about content creation and and writing copy. What are some other services that you kind of provide to your clients when they come to you for help?

Christine Wetzler: [00:07:08] Yeah, the content is a big one because that’s really. King Right now with with everything we’ve seen open up into social media and influencers and developing relationships with those kind of content creators as well as reporters. Um, but we’ve also seen, uh, different kinds of marketing. Right now we’re, we’re seeing people go back to more of the traditional basics. Um, email marketing, which sounds very old and traditional, but when we do it, it’s more personalized. It’s more segmented and fundamental. So we’re not recommending that people blast out 5000 emails to people. We’re recommending that they, they segment them into, um, bits of, you know, ten, 15, 20 contacts at a time and send personalized content to those folks and then use a, an automation system or a segmenting system like active campaign or, or, you know, there are myriad of them. But the one that we use is active campaign to make sure that you can do that at scale even if your list is 5000 people. Um, so we’ve been incorporating email, we’ve been incorporating Google ad campaigning, Um, and we’ve been, we’ve been doing quite a bit of keyword searching and creating content with the intent of getting people online to pay attention to what’s happening to.

Max Kantor: [00:08:48] So what it sounds like to me is like every time a business comes to you, you guys are really putting in the work to give them that unique experience that’s going to help their growth in a in a unique and specific way through research, through education, to introducing them to programs, like you said, active campaign or Google ads. You guys are really putting in the work to help each client individually.

Christine Wetzler: [00:09:12] Absolutely. Absolutely. And we’re helping them develop their own skill set, too. Um, you know, we’re agnostic, so I know I mentioned active campaign. That’s the one we like best, but we don’t need to work with any one specific software. I like to tell people, you know, we sit down with you. If you give me a problem, we’re going to help you fix it in the best way possible. And if that means that it’s a it’s another, you know, solution, then that’s what it means. We’re going to help you get up to speed with it or it might not be software at all. It could just be that maybe we need to help you reorganize your time and the the team that you have in place in house so that we can create more content in house. There’s a lot of folks that are that have the resources. They’re just not being used properly or they’re being used in a way that everyone kind of said, Oh, this is the way you need to do it, but it’s not moving the needle. And they don’t understand why we come in and say, well, this is why.

Christine Wetzler: [00:10:17] So let’s let’s focus more on, you know, doing this instead of doing what what everyone kind of told you you should be doing instead. Because at the end of the day, all of this is supposed to sell whatever it is that you need to sell. So, you know, it should be fun and it should be entertaining and it should be fun to work on. And ultimately, that’s what we all want out of what we do every day. But at the same time, it’s supposed to sell. So you want to sell your product, you want to sell the skills of your team. You want you want to create a culture that that draws people in is compelling. You can do that with content and you can you can radiate your company culture with content, but there isn’t a silver bullet for it. You know, you do have to sit down and give some thought to what the best way to do that is. And it is different for everybody just because everybody’s different, you know, there is no out of the box way to do it.

Max Kantor: [00:11:25] Can you share a success story that’s come out of you working with a client?

Christine Wetzler: [00:11:30] Oh, absolutely. We have one right now. We’re we’re just finishing up a really successful lead generation program for a company called Secure Applications. They’re women owned business manufacturer’s representative for security packaging solutions. So when you are, you know, say, like Intel, you’re shipping a bunch of pallets of computers, you need to have, you know, RFID packaging. You need to have certain kinds of shrink wrap solutions, you know, like tape solutions and things like that on the cargo to make sure that nobody steals anything while it’s sitting in the cargo bays and things like that. This company makes that. People don’t really understand that until they need it or it’s mandated by somebody to have. So they have an audience that is educated after the fact, which is really tough because they don’t know what they don’t know. So we came in and created a new website, created some content. We’ve been able to create a little bit of content on social media to help to help create some forward education, like why you would need this, how simple it is to enact where the point in the process is to start thinking about, you know, implementing some of these security measures and and why it’s important.

Christine Wetzler: [00:13:06] And then and then also just case studies talking about when other people do it so that, you know, people aren’t thinking about it when they’ve been told, hey, it’s a regulation, you have to have this kind of label on your palate before we can store it. We want them thinking about it before that. And so we’ve been able to basically overhaul their entire lead system. And they’ve not only gotten more leads, but very high level leads out of it. So we’re very pleased with the results of that program. Um, and as we roll out their new website, I’m, I’m expecting it to be even better the lead quality once that that happens. So you know and that kind of thing really wasn’t unattainable. It wasn’t something that costs an arm and a leg. It just was just a tweak. It was a couple tweaks and a re shifting of how we talked and how we communicated with people online.

Max Kantor: [00:14:12] So, Christine, that story is a perfect kind of transition into my last question for you. This is a question I ask every guest that comes on Chicago Business Radio for you. What would you say is the most rewarding part of what you get to do?

Christine Wetzler: [00:14:28] Oh, that for sure. I mean, that business. Like I said, Gina, the owners woman-owned business, I know that it had the capacity and the opportunity to help a lot of people, you know, protect their assets. Um, you know, she works with people in a way that’s very similar to us, very principled, very, very nice and welcoming. You know, she’s the kind of person when somebody calls her and they say, what can I do? She’ll stay on the phone with you forever and tell you what all the different ways you can do things and and find the least expensive and the easiest way for you to do it. And so helping her improve the quality of the leads she was getting, helping her expand her business, she got to the point where she could hire a salesperson. That was amazing. Just feeling like that was something that we had a hand in helping with was, I mean, I can’t even describe that. That’s just such a good feeling. And so, yeah, I mean, I think we have we have it’s different with every client, but we have a moment like that with almost all of our clients where, you know, there’s there’s opportunity to be had. And we finally get to that point where they’re realizing it and it’s just a nice little celebration point. And it’s it’s fun. That’s that’s what makes us worth worth all the hard work every day.

Max Kantor: [00:15:56] Now, if someone wants to work with you guys or learn more about all the services that you provide, what’s a good website or maybe social media where they can do that.

Christine Wetzler: [00:16:06] Mhm. Well, um, this is how we used to spell our name when we were little kids. It’s pi. Try a pr.com. So that’s petrilla.com is our website. Everything’s on there. You can also just email me directly. Um, I usually answer everything directly. It’s Christine at petrilla pr.com. And again that’s just pi try la pr.com and then you can also call us at (312) 612-0283.

Max Kantor: [00:16:41] Awesome. Well Christine, it was such a pleasure talking with you today. I mean, hearing you share all your stories, you’re so passionate about what you’re doing. And it was just a pleasure to learn more about your business and everything you guys are doing for the community. We appreciate you.

Christine Wetzler: [00:16:54] Oh, thank you. I appreciate you asking all these questions. It was lovely to share some.

Max Kantor: [00:17:00] Of it, of course. Well, thanks to you for listening to another episode of Chicago Business Radio. I’m your host, Max Kanter, and we’ll see you next time.

Intro: [00:17:11] This episode of Chicago Business Radio has been brought to you by firm space, your private sanctuary for productivity and growth. To learn more, go to firm Space.com.