How to Get Covered by Offline Media
- Written by Neil Patel on April 26th, 2007 |
- 13 Comments »
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Who wouldn’t like to get their picture in a newspaper? In most cases it is just going to build up your name and provide the perception that you are successful. Most people do this by paying a PR company, but if you don’t have much money here is how you can get covered in publications such as the Wall Street Journal and Wired Magazine:
Figure out who is in the limelight.
In my industry (Internet marketing) I noticed that sites like Digg and a lot of contributors on Digg were getting covered by online and offline media. The way I figured this out was by browsing through all the trade publications in my industry. Once I figured out who was getting the buzz I started to get to know some of those people. Some of the people who were getting interviewed listed their emails and AIM screen names publicly. I simply created a list and started contacting these individuals.
Start asking questions
Once you get to know the people who are getting interviewed ask them on how they got contacted by the media. In most cases they will tell you that journalists just contact them because they found them on XYZ.com. What you want to do is try to replicate the effect they created as well as ask them if they can drop your name to the journalist because usually at the end of an interview a journalist will ask “do you know anyone else that I could potentially interview”. This should help increase the number of journalists that contact you.
Build relationships
When you get interviewed by a journalist make sure you are very friendly. You want to build a relationship with the journalist so that the next time they need to interview someone in your industry they think of you. One of the things you should always do is give them more than they require because that will definitely improve the chances of them interviewing you in the future.
Rinse and repeat
After you do this with a few people you need to keep the wheels in motion and not stop there. The thing with media is that one minute one thing maybe hot and the next minute something else is hot. You have to keep on finding the people who are getting interviewed as well as build relationships with journalists because the window for you to get in there is very small.
Good Luck!
Neil, it would be great if you could dive into more detail with some examples on each of these…
Great idea for a later post. Thanks!
Great advice. I’d also look at working into speaking engagements, these are often good avenues to mainstream press. Speaking gigs grant a lot of credibility (especially to those outside the industry, viz. potential clients), garner more link citations, and in turn media exposure.
Excellent advice you’re offering here Neil — I’ll be putting it to use in the near future, actually!
I’m interested to read a follow-up with more detail as well…
Great advice as always, Neil. Building relationships with the media community is definitely the way to go.
Not only should you give the reporters more than they’re asking for, some of them will be very appreciative if you can help them with additional information that they’re seeking–ask them if there’s anything that you can help them research or anything that you can do to make their job easier like finding additional people for them to talk to.
Also, you don’t always have to hit a “home run” all the time with the larger news media like the WSJ. Your local news media is a great place to start, as well, especially because a lot of the bigger news outlets find their stories from local news outlets.
Getting your name in front of your local journalists can be as easy as sending (or better yet — delivering) printed press releases that you’ve written to them. Email is great, but it’s easy to delete and doesn’t seem to have the same impact.
Of course, you also need to know to whom you’re sending the press release (so do some research), and make sure that it’s written about something they cover (research), and make sure it’s well written (be smart and have something unique and insightful to say).
They might not do anything with your story the first time they get something from you (or the second or third), but if you keep your name in front of them they’ll remember you when they need a quote or a source for a story related to your area of expertise.
Hey Neil:
How about giving me your msn?
Great advice Neil…so far I have been in the newspaper 5times..now I’m trying to go for the big guys!
Congrats Fredrickus! 5 times is a good amount of press.
When attempting to build rapport with journalists, a few things to keep in mind;
They’re often working against deadlines. ask if it’s a good time to speak. If not, ask for a more suitable time to be suggested.
Everyone has their preferred means of communications. Start with an email mentioning you’d like to speak to them. They’ll probably let you know if it’s ok to call or if they’d prefer an email.
If you’re pitching yourself as an on-call expert, offer a link to a fact file or profile on yourself so they can review your expertise at their leisure.
Be available by phone. Journalists often want immediate answers, which means they’ll often pick up the phone if they need quick answers.
Mubin my MSN user name is neil168@hotmail.com
great post but i think getting media coverage is difficult not unless you have a very good content on your site.