How to get your brand/product/business in front of the media
You've got the marketing plan. Your social media is shining. You’ve thrown some money behind Facebook Ads. You’re blogging and building a database. Kudos. But there’s probably just ooooone thing missing – media coverage.
How the [beep] do I get media coverage, you ask?
Here’s some sure-fire ways to get your brand in front of the media.
Collate a database.
Some media email addresses are easy to get. It’s in the magazine / newspaper / website. Others are harder. This is where you would enlist the help of a PR company who has a bulky database and good relationship with the media.
Know your media.
Many moons ago, I worked on the other side of PR [in editorial]. Nothing would jack me off more than a PR company that didn’t know their magazines.
Like a PR co pitching a gardening book or the latest car accessory for a fashion magazine [newsflash: there was no gardening or car sections in the fashion mag I worked at!].
Or a high end fashion label sending me an email about their latest collection for a street press music mag. Delete. [in fairness we had a quarter of a page dedicated to fashion but that was aimed at more ‘street’ fashion].
Try and spend a little time sussing out magazine or newspaper’s regular features where your brand’s story would be a perfect fit. Media outlets are always looking for subjects for these regular features. And bonus if you go to them and they don’t have to search for it!
Congrats, you have made their job easier.
Media release must do’s.
Fact – journo’s are a busy bunch. Therefore, they don’t have time to read a media release thesis. Keep your media release short, sharp and to the point. Don’t be afraid to highlight or bold the important bits or add some dot points at the end. Also when emailing across a media release, include a high res image of what you are trying to get in the media.
If you are sending a media kit, add a USB full of images for their use. Who knows, your image might go nicely with a feature they have coming up.
Sending a little ‘gift’ [like your product or a sample/promo version of your product] with a handwritten note helps pique the interest of the journalist. They might even put it on social media as a way of saying thanks!
[Note - its good content for the media outlet too]
Whether it’s email or snail mail, just try to avoid the phone [unless it’s a specific question]. Which brings me to my next point…
No nagging
Sure you’re eager for your product to get featured. But remember journalists get thousands of emails a day from PR agencies, random people, in house staff PLUS they have to do actual work of writing, editing and finishing a story on deadline [for some it’s daily, others weekly – again see second point of know your media!]. So please don’t be pushy, send a billion emails or god forbid – call.
I used to get this one PR person [who shall remain nameless] who would email and then follow up with a call. While they probably thought ‘nice customer service!’ I was thinking ‘eff off so I can write my story!’
And then she would email again with a billion question marks – did you get my email Belinda????
It was then I half expected her to rock up at my desk demanding answers #singlewhitefemalestyle
No. Just no.
Be contactable
Picture this. You have three articles due by tomorrow and your editor keeps sending you more stories. You are about to interview someone for one of the aforementioned articles. But you can’t get hold of them. They are not answering their phone. They are not calling back in a hurry either.
Fact - nothing is more frustrating than someone who is hard to reach for an interview. Journalists work under tight deadlines. Please make sure you’re easy to reach. Okay?
Be targeted
Don’t send out mass emails. Super impersonal. While it takes longer, best practice is to send out individual emails instead.
Also don’t be afraid just to go to one media outlet to pitch a story [I recently did for one of my clients and luckily The Advertiser agreed, printed it on page 13 and @shitadelaide picked it up and posted on their newsfeed too]
Sometimes offering an exclusive to a bigger mag is better than trying to pitch to 100 smaller online media outlets.
Invite the Media
If it’s a launch, special event, hell, even the opening of an envelope – invite the media. Send them an eye-catching invite [I once got an invite with some fake turf that I had to roll out and build my own invite which I thought was WAY COOL]. They will more than likely cover it and if they can’t, ask the media outlet’s photographer to come and take some photos for some post event exposure.
Create a ‘media page’ on your website.
Make it easy on media to cover your business. Create a media page where the press can easily grab your logo and images of your products – all in high res versions of course!
Always say thanks
When a journo covers your story – it doesn’t hurt to send a quick email to say thanks! Or share the article on social media and put it on your website’s media page for reference.
There you have it folks - nine helpful tips to get your brand or product in front of the media. Neon Moose does PR for a variety of lifestyle brands [some have even wound up in Vogue magazine oooo]. Contact belinda@neonmoose.com.au to get your business in the media.
