Graham McGregor: How to get positive media publicity for your business

Honor Borg, a property manager from CVue Property, says find the journalists who are already writing about your industry and make the effort to connect with them in a meaningful way. Photo / 123RF

I recently invited a number of service businesses to share with me their experiences in getting media publicity for their business.

Here are some comments that I found particularly helpful from Nicole Ashby the founder of High Profit Media.

Let me hand you over to Nicole for her comments.

If you're a business owner, here are some quick tips on what you should be doing to secure publicity:

1. Keep your ear to the ground. Listen to your local talk back radio station a few times a day, what topics are they speaking about? Have a flick through the newspaper when you're at a café. What are some of the headlines and breaking stories and are they relevant to you? Watch the news once or twice a day?

Again, what are some of the breaking stories and trending stories and do they relate to your business and what you do?

If the answer is yes, then get in contact with the media outlet that published the story and follow up.

2. Know how to write a media or press release. If the media don't know you, a well-crafted media release can be a great way to grab their attention and land you an interview. One interview could literally change your business overnight!

3. Identify the media mediums that your ideal customer consumes.

For example, which current affairs show are they watching? What news station do they watch? What about radio stations, do they listen to AM or FM and which ones? Once you know this you'll have clarity on which media to start pitching to first.

One of my clients, Honor Borg, a property manager from CVue Property in Perth, wrote a media release highlighting her unique business offering which was a flat fee for rentals.

So whether you were renting out your business at $1000 a week or $350 a week, Honor would charge you the same flat fee to manage your property; quite revolutionary really.

The local state paper, The West Australian, picked up the story and printed it. It was printed in the business section and the story was a half page feature on Honor and her business and showcased a stunning photo of her, in the doorway of her business with the business name and contact details on the door.

A local talk back radio station contacted her that day and also interviewed her. I listened in to the interview and Honor's business name, CVue, was mentioned no less than 5 times in the 4-minute interview.

The results?

Honor was flabbergasted. She had calls and emails from new potential clients that had read about her business and or heard her radio interview. New clients, for free! I also liked a great media publicity tip I received from PR expert Alison Bach.

Here is her tip…

Commenting on journalist articles:

Find the journalists who are already writing about your industry, and make the effort to connect with them in a meaningful way.

There's nothing worse than getting the standard LinkedIn "Please add me to your network" message from someone you don't know, so make your connection request relevant to them.

I like to mention a recent article of theirs that I have read, and tell them what I enjoyed about it – it shows that you're taking an interest in their work, before you even think about pitching your own story.

As an example, I read a great article that was highly relevant to an industry that we were trying to gain PR traction in.

I shared the article on my own personal and business social media channels with a caption about why I enjoyed it, tagged in the journalist, and actually received a LinkedIn request direct from her!

This resulted in some great coverage for my client, and also in my own business being featured in The Huffington Post.

Summary:

There are a lot of useful things you can do to get positive media publicity for your business. And it's often a lot easier than you think.

"Publicity is absolutely critical. A good PR story is infinitely more effective than a front page ad." - Richard Branson

Action Exercise:

What will you do this month to generate some positive media publicity?

- Graham McGregor is a Marketing Advisor and helps businesses who offer an expensive service to quickly attract ideal new clients. You can download his brand new 106 page marketing guide 'The Expensive Service Marketing Solution' at no charge from www.TheExpensiveServiceMarketingSolution.com