Great PR for professional services isn’t just business as usual.

PR is a whole lot easier when you have new products to talk about, a groundbreaking story and a constant stream of news flowing in and out of your industry. But PR for professional services is a different ballgame altogether.

Unlike trendy consumer rollouts or industry-changing technology announcements, most professional service firms don’t have much to talk about that’s inherently newsworthy. Whether you’re an accountant, a financial advisor, a motivational speaker or even a lawyer, if you’re a service provider, there’s someone else down the road who’s likely to be doing the same thing.

So how do professional service firms make PR work? Here are three of our tried-and-true tips to get PR for professional services out of the shadows and into the spotlight:

Develop a clear story platform.
The services you offer might not be newsworthy on their own, but what they do and who they’re geared toward can form the foundation for a compelling story. Focus on your core strengths and points of differentiation, and then tell how your value-added offerings solve unmet needs or problems. If there’s a perceived gap in the market, your ability to fill it is legitimate news.

Create your own news vehicles.
Since content and news don’t always come naturally for professional services, you need to develop materials that do. White papers, research reports, industry commentaries and other materials of interest can be created and publicized in multiple ways. Valuable content not only drives PR results, it’s also the foundation for building credibility and cross-platform marketing opportunities.

Get third-party testimonials.
When dealing with PR for professional services, sometimes the hardest thing to do is to get the service firm’s own client’s permission to speak to the press. Oftentimes, there’s a great story and the service provider would like nothing more than to publicize it, but is unable to do so without third-party client’s permission.

We’ve found there are two ways to turn reluctant third parties into brand ambassadors. One, get their permission during the contract-negotiation phase. By offering a discount or other benefit for press and social media participation that’s actually in the contract, you’ll get the green light from very beginning.

Two, identify third-parties who want to publicize their own services. Many times, smaller companies want to broadcast their presence in the market and will be willing to work with you to make the publicity happen. Media are always clamoring for real-life case studies, and as long as the third-party is legitimate, it doesn’t matter how large or prestigious your client may be.