Free Publicity: Get Published & Interviewed!
Guest Post by Anissa Wardell of PublicityInABox.com
Are you actively marketing and branding your business, service or yourself? If not, you are missing out on a ton of free publicity.
Just like Nike, Kellogg’s and Apple brand themselves you should too!
Whether you realize it or not, you face competition every day, just the same as they do and in order to stand out in the crowd, you must brand your product, service or yourself.
When you think of how you can market and brand yourself, you most likely think of social sites where you interact and/or press release submission.
Most online business owners write a press release and submit it to the search engines, but, not many actually know exactly why they are doing this, other than they were told that it was a good thing to do…
Some assume that it’s just for the keywords and the link back to their site, and some think that a reporter or journalist will find their story out of the thousands that are submitted each day, and will want to interview them or send new customers their way.
In today’s world, it’s important to evaluate how we are marketing ourselves and our businesses. No matter your product or service or your expertise, you need to have a unique selling point, or at the very least a good story pitch or “hook”.
Maybe you have in-depth knowledge, experience, or a passionate interest in a particular area, if so, this is what you want to use when you create your “hook” or story.
Sending a press release is definitely a valuable tool, but in a world where reporters and journalists are bombarded with information, you need to hire a publicist or become your own publicity expert and go to work connecting with the media that will best suit your niche or expertise.
Use Social networking sites like FaceBook and Twitter to build relationships with the media. Once the media see’s that you are there to help them, they will call on you for your expertise over and over again.
How do you get started?
The first step is to put together a contact list of reports in your local community.
Local media is generally separated into two categories: Print Media and Broadcast Media. Print includes anything written – newspapers and magazines – while broadcast media includes television and radio.
You will also want to put together a list of online websites or blogs that fit into your niche as well.
Identify the managing editor or writers in your niche that cover your local newspapers and magazines. For television and radio stations, identify the correct reporters and general assignment reporters who cover local community news or your area of expertise.
Assignment editors at the stations will be able to direct you to the right reporters. If your local stations have local talk shows, identify the producers of those shows as well. Once you have the list, you can begin to contact these people.
It’s always best to call the news desk or assignment desk and ask what type of contact the specific reporter or writer prefers, some will want email, fax, phone or regular mail. It’s important to know how they like to receive story pitches.
In order to ensure that the media is well informed about you or your event (product, service or expertise), you can use several communication tools to get their attention. In this example we will assume it’s an event, yet, these techniques can be used for product announcements, services, and for your expertise in a particular area as well.
Media Advisories: Send media advisories (about three weeks prior) to let the print media know of any events you might be holding. An advisory briefly summarizes the Who, What, Where and When of an event. A few days before the event, send another advisory with updated information and then make calls to the key people on your list to follow up.
Press Releases: Develop a press release about your event. The press release should emphasize the local angle and use quotes from the local community. Distribute this release to the online press release services.
Public Service Announcements: Contact local radio stations and ask them to broadcast PSA’s (public service announcements) prior to your event. Provide public affairs directors with scripts for a 15 second and a 30 second PSA. You should have these scripts to them about three weeks prior to your event. Send the scripts again one week prior to your event. Follow up with a phone call at this time.
Advance request for coverage: Several weeks before the event, send an advance request for coverage to local television and radio station reporters. Be sure to let them know in advance what your event is and provide them with the Who, What, When and Where of your event. A few days before the event, send another request for coverage, and follow up with a phone call to all reporters on your contact list.
To get coverage without a specific event
Even if you are not hosting a specific event, you can still encourage your local media to cover your niche or subject matter. For example, in any given month there are several Awareness days or topics that are covered at the same time every year, and you can use these topics as your hook. Using the same list of media contacts, the following tools might get you some local coverage:
Press release: Distribute a general press release about National Catfish Month or National Hunger Awareness Month. Insert local statistics to the best of your ability or facts and information that may be less known or that may be intriguing. Try to get local quotes about the importance of recognizing this day or month, contact someone to be quoted, find public figures or do highlights on a local story/person or a new product/service being released.
Press kit: Send a press kit with a cover letter to the reporters on your contact list. Include in this kit the press release fact sheets to give the reporters the background to write a story. Include in the letter a brief summary of your story or your connection to the subject or your own bio or personal press kit.
Offer your willingness to be interviewed and to help find other sources for interviews. Specifically request that they do a feature on the particular campaign you are suggesting. These kits should be sent to reporters 3-6 weeks (or more depending on how far out they plan their segments), with follow-up calls a week or so later.
Letter to the Editor: Write a personalized letter to the editor for all your local print media. Write a cover highlighting a story or news piece and ask that your letter be included in an upcoming issue.
Op-Ed: Many newspapers offer a “guest editorial” slot – not a letter to the editor, but an opinion column. Contact the person in charge of the editorial page of your local paper and ask them to print your op-ed piece.
- – - – - – - – - –
About the Author:
Anissa Wardell owns The Publicists Assistant, LLC, a publicity, marketing and outsourcing agency. She helps people become more successful at blogging, driving traffic to their sites, branding, marketing, selling products and services and boosting their overall branding & business.
Her companies handle national and international PR campaigns, her staff develops online press kits for authors, speakers and companies. To find out how she can help you take your business to the next level, visit her site at http://RSSApplied.com. Learn how to create Free PR with PublicityInABox!
Please share "Free Publicity: Get Published & Interviewed!" with your friends using the buttons below. Thanks!
Comprehensive post. Thanks for sharing it with us.
Isn’t the purpose of using press release services to reach out to reporters as well as news sites? Will you add letter to reporters (at press kits) to further create publicity and news coverage? Or you’ve got another purpose?
Follow me @Site_Booster on Twitter.
Wow! Would I ever love to more content like this. Outstanding post Anissa!
It’s amazing how once you begin to tap into the online world you end up putting the blinders on and block out all the incredible opportunities that are at our finger tips in the offline world that can be of huge benefit to our online businesses.
This post comes at a great time when I’m about to take the offline media world by storm. Any time that I’ve been on television, radio, or in magazines it’s offered a great boost in traffic to my websites and fitness business.
Follow me @FatLossQuickie on Twitter.
Excellent information!!! Wow – adding all this to my to-do list.
Follow me @TraciKnoppe on Twitter.
Very thorough and helpful – full of genuine experience and helpful tips. Thanks a lot!
Follow me @AlexNewell on Twitter.
The whole idea of press releases is something I have never looked into because as a blogger I didn’t think that there was ever anything that would get the attention of news channels.
Follow me @StandOutBlogger on Twitter.
Thanks for this excellent advice. Very comprehensive. Working to get by blog going has certainly been time consuming and often I don’t know how to best make use of it (time). Press reports are also something I’ve never considered. Do most people write them for themselves or have them outsourced?
Follow me @timelessreader on Twitter.
These are great tips to help build backlinks to your site. It isn’t just about branding, but also to help rank higher in the search engine.
-Kai
Follow me @lomak1985 on Twitter.
Wow, there is a lot of good information here. I guess branding yourself is like most other endeavours. You need a strategy and good execution of a proven plan.
Thanks for putting so much required information and helpful list together here.
Very informative post Anissa!
It’s great to utilize the power of press releases to gain some good exposure and brand yourself!
Follow me @PaulRoekle on Twitter.
Great posts. These are great strategies for online and offline businesses. When you reach out to offline users, you are potentially taking away your other competitors that are online. If the audience that you are targeting have not been exposed to an online service before, your will stand out and it will be a clear choice to the consumer.
Follow me @ArticleDirec on Twitter.
Lots of great comments and thanks for the kind words!
I wanted to address some of the questions as well as some of the comments. First, online businesses and internet marketers saw early on how powerful press releases were, and when adding in SEO techniques they were even more powerful, which is one reason they should be considered as part of your business plan. But, its not just about links and SEO.
Scott said it best, his traffic spikes when he does offline interviews or advertising (I am not sure what he is doing offline, but it really doesn’t matter, he is doing something!). I have a client that has a food blog, she did a 5 minute or less segment on a local morning tv show and she had huge spikes in her traffic (for several weeks, and they linked to her site), and although it has died down a bit, she has not dropped to the traffic level she was at before, simply because she now has more readers.
When you are interviewed either in print, tv, or radio you are getting free publicity and advertising. If you look into rates for advertising at any of these media outlets, and see what a 30 second spot will cost you, you will be amazed! But, advertising isn’t as effective, simply put you are advertising, yet when you are interviewed, you are considered knowledgeable or even an expert.
You can hire a publicist to do all the leg work for you or you can do it yourself, but it all comes down to having a good “hook” or story, and being available when you are needed.
If you don’t feel capable writing a press release or creating your own press kit, hire it out. Its money well spent. The only thing I suggest is that you find a publicist that fits into budget, and that you are not paying for the firms prestige, rather you are paying for their knowledge and their desire to help you succeed, after all, if they get you one interview it will be worth more than any advertising you could pay for. You should figure that minimum, you are looking at spending $500 at the very low end to thousands of dollars depending on the type of campaign you require.
Follow me @AnissaW08 on Twitter.
This is a great bag of resources to keep! Definitely bookmarking. Thanks, Anissa.
As far as timing…I think I may have missed the boat, but you tell me: Last month I was featured on Forbes as one of the top 30 women entrepreneurs to follow on Twitter. It was such a great honor & I received a lot of kudos…but, I noticed that some of the other ladies wrote about the post on their own blog and sent out their own press releases mentioning the Forbes article.
Is it too late for me to send out a press release on an article from weeks ago, or to toot my own horn on my own blog? Did I miss the opportunity?
Thanks for your help.
Follow me @marketlikeachik on Twitter.
Coree,
Oh, its not too late! Add something to it, a new service a product, or just mention the article. Obviously it would have been good to do it then, but doing it now, you will be more visible from all the others who did a press release, plus, this is like a resume piece. Being on that Forbes list is something that should be in your press kit, should be mentioned on your website, etc.
If you have questions, feel free to contact me I would be glad to answer questions.
Follow me @AnissaW08 on Twitter.
Dear Anissa Wardell really you show truth about marketing publicity and show good examples and really i appreciate actually i have a SEO company and now i am facing a very bad face of my life and its totally about related to my company and company i think i am facing that it just because of bad marketing and publicity you show really a great idea about marketing and also can say about business i am agree with you and the point steps witch is you told is really practically implementable and really give me benefit.thanks for such a nice idea once i trying this method then i will tell about my experience with practical implementation with your post tips.thanks by heart..
Follow me @felishamartin on Twitter.
thanks for a great guest post Anissa. Some great info that I’ll be bookmarking for a closer look, not to mentioning taking a look at your site. Greatly appreciated.
Follow me @blogandlearn on Twitter.
You are welcome!
Follow me @AnissaW08 on Twitter.
Excellent worthy article. Although I’m not currently in a situation where I need this but definitely wish a need. Thanks for this Anissa.
Follow me @arafat21 on Twitter.
Awesome article. I was looking for this social Published and interview opportunities. Going to complete the steps..
Follow me @Cashfindforum on Twitter.
The easiest way could also be co-hosting a podcast for those of us who aren´t quite the PR professionals as Lynn is.
I too have sent press releases out with no clue as to the purpose of doing so. Your post and additional information is PRICELESS! I now understand not only why but what else is available offline that I knew about but for whatever reason continue to overlook the potential.
Thanks again Lynn!
Follow me @cookbookguy on Twitter.
Very comprehensive. Working to get by blog going has certainly been time consuming and often I don’t know how to best make use of time. Press reports are also something I’ve never considered. I appreciate your post.
Hi Anissa, it is a great post, thanks for the information.
Excellent article, very thorough. I have successfully used press releases on a local level, both to publicize a plight and advertise a product. In both cases I have developed relationships with specific reporters. Now, when I have something of interest to them, even if it is not about me, I pass it along. Having this great relationship has gotten me more than one headline!
Follow me @bulkcandyst on Twitter.