The story has got to be strong, interesting and newsworthy. But is there an added extra that you as a PR can include in order to whet the journalist’s appetite and secure your client a spot in their desired publication?
Of course nothing is 100% guaranteed, but there is a way to tip the balance in your favour and make the story stand out from the crowd:
Provide a physical experience that tells the story around your client.
There are two examples that immediately spring to mind here: review products and press trips. So why do these work?
Sending a journalist or blogger a physical example of your client’s product or sending them to experience it creates an immediate and unavoidable connection. It provides context for the journalist and allows them to see what you are offering for themselves, rather than be dictated to by a press release.
Let’s look at these examples in more detail:
Review products
Firstly, just as you wouldn’t expect an uninformed and badly written press release to pick up much coverage, if the product is bad it is very unlikely to welcome much press. So as a key starting point, it’s important that you believe in the product and can speak and write passionately about it.
The great thing about review products is that they are usually relatively easy to pop in the post. Print off paper copies of any additional material i.e. an accompanying press release and a handwritten note and send these along as well. This provides the journalist or blogger with both the product and the story around it.
We have worked on a number of accounts here at Tinderbox that are centred on client products. One example is a local company called Gadget Glamour that creates patterned smartphone decals and stickers. We sent out skins for review along with our press release to journalists and bloggers and the client featured everywhere from gadget blogs to Cosmopolitan.
Press trips or events
Allowing journalists to try out what you are offering is an experience that cannot be fully replicated in a press release sat in their inbox.
Inevitably trips out are more difficult to get a journalist to agree to as it involves them giving up their own time. But once they agree to go and the experience is suited to their interests, they are certain to write about it.
This year we worked with an onstage production and adaptation of the true story of the Yorkshire Ripper. The play received numerous reviews from journalists who we invited to our press night.
So how do you ensure your product or experience is suited to a journalist? Consider these three points:
- Target your products and events
Make sure the product you are sending or event you are holding will appeal to the journalist you are sending it to. We wouldn’t have sent a skull and cross bones phone skin to Cosmopolitan – we sent them an on-trend leopard print skin that would appeal both to the journalist and Cosmo readers.
- Make sure they’re relevant to the publications
We recently saw this post appear on Vice Magazine. An uber trendy mag, the Vice travel section usually covers trips to places like Japan and East Africa. The PR who got it completely wrong and sent a Vice journalist on a press trip to Magaluf certainly paid the price.
- Timing is everything
If your product is two years old, or if the press trip destination you are offering has already been covered in a certain publication, the coverage you want to see is less likely to materialise.
Unfortunately for B2B accounts, there are usually no such events or products to offer. The same can be said for some consumer accounts, where your product or event is for some reason not appropriate i.e. it’s too large or heavy to post. So what can be done in these situations? Is it possible to somehow create this same level of context and connection with a journalist simply via email?
Video can often be a great way of demonstrating what you are offering in these circumstances. One of our clients, an exciting consumer research consultancy, has created a video around their complex headset technology. The video serves as a bridge between the journalist actually using it and simply reading a release about how the technology works. By demonstrating how it is used and the outcomes it can offer, the video involves others in the product without them physically seeing or trying it for themselves.
Can you think of any other ideas that could begin to bridge this physical gap? We’d love to hear them.
