I’m aware that as well as bloggers following me, I also have freelancers and people with small businesses who so do. As someone who supports businesses with PR, today I wanted to share my top tips for getting press coverage or being seen in the media as a blogger or as a small business.
This is something that’s really helped me when being a blogger, I managed to get featured in The Guardian business section many years ago- and that really helped grow my Instagram presence. My blog has been featured in psychologies magazine and Daily Mail blogger of the week and this allowed me to start a career in freelance writing.
These mentions have really helped me grow. I’m also a journalist and deal with small businesses every single day so I thought this would be really helpful to just go over some tips from that perspective, too.
I’m not really going to cover talking to publications about pitching to them as freelance writer. So if you’re looking for your actual words to be featured in the press, then do check out my guide to building a writing portfolio without having to work for free.
1. Sign up to press request services trials
Now I’ve talked about Response Source on here before when I talked about how it’s a really good tool to use as a blogger or journalist. This allows you to send out your requests for products, case studies, or info you’re looking for and you get a response from businesses and PRs.
You can also sign up from the other side to receive the requests sent by journalists and bloggers-and this can be really useful if you’re trying to understand how press coverage works.
You can sign up for a free trial of response source and you can get an idea about the sorts of stories that people are writing and reply to requests.
There are other press request services, like Food4Media, Homes4Media and Diary Directory which are also worth trying.
2. Follow journalists online.
This is a really simple tip and I think it’s really useful whether you are looking for press coverage for your brand or whether you’re looking to go into freelance writing: actually follow the right people on Twitter!
Twitter is a very good place to find freelance journalists or editors. So follow those people and look at the kind of stories they’re looking for, often they’ll pop requests using the #journorequest hashtag and they’ll put callouts looking for case studies or products or things like that. If you wanted to get featured in a specific magazine, read it and, from the inside cover, find out the name of the features editor for that publication. You can then usually see if they’re on twitter and follow them. Some online sites include their writer’s social media handles on their articles.
Once you’ve found them, follow along and get a feel for the kind of stories they write-you can also often find their email address in their bio or, again, in the inside cover of the magazine.
3. Be helpful.
Build relationships with the press, be helpful: offer your story, offer a case study or samples. This can be really, really useful. This is why I always encourage people to take on press opportunities even if they’re not directly related to your business-journalists will remember you!
4. Facebook is your friend
There are lots of great communities on Facebook where you can find people who are journalists, or people looking for case studies. There’s a really great group called FeatureMe! where they’re specifically looking for case studies or Lightbulb: Entrepreneurs and Press Hangout.
If you’re not really a product-based service but you’re more like me and perhaps want to get into writing or PR or press, then Freelance PRs or No 1 Freelance Media women are great.
5. Don’t feel as if you need a press release.
Did you know that many press releases just get deleted? I always encourage every business to have one press release written (check out my templates if you need help with this), to act as a cribsheet for their business and provide an overview of what they do. However, there’s nothing stopping you from emailing a journalist without one and you don’t need a new one each time you launch something new.
Sometimes just having a conversation with a journalist (as long as you include got the information about yourself and your business) is what’s most important.
Also-keep it simple! I saw a thread once in a Facebook group about someone that was like trying to design their press release with fonts, colors, and illustrations. But obviously, if you do that then that really increases the attachment size and it’s more likely to end up in junk, so don’t waste time on things that you don’t need-it’s usually better to just copy and paste the text in the email body.
6. Send an email: what’s the worst that could happen?
Now, as somebody that gets hundreds of emails a day from small brands and businesses. I think we tend to really overthink things: just send an introduction about you, your brand your service your product, and your site, and just see where it goes.
Don’t feel as if you’re not qualified to do this, I think lots of people think’ oh I haven’t got a PR agency or I haven’t written a press release. Or I’m only a blogger. Or my service is new.’,
None of that really matters. A lot of bloggers who want to get into writing stress about the fact they don’t have a journalism qualification. Qualifications are important, in some cases, but what is more important 99% of the time is having a good story, a good angle, or a good idea. And that applies to get in your service or product too, so don’t feel as if you’re overstepping boundaries or you’re inappropriate.
As long as you’re polite and friendly and helpful then the worst thing they can say is no.
Useful resources for getting press coverage
If you want to get your business featured in the media, I have some useful resources that can help. If you’re not signed up to my newsletter, don’t forget to do so to grab my free press release cheat sheet and follow me on Instagram for more tips!
If you need more advice on getting featured in the media, check out my masterclass: how to get your business featured in the media today which will guide you through everything you need to do, step by step, to get press coverage for your business. If you need personalised support, head to my service page