Speaker 1: Hello and welcome again to this month's Ask Me Anything. The topic for today is PR, public relations, how you can create an influential media strategy. I chose that word carefully, influential, no matter how great your company is, what other people say about you is far more important than what you say about you. Following, I'm going to give you five steps and these steps are how to create an influential media strategy by choosing who you're going to put your content in front of. The media looks different these days, can be magazines, podcasters, YouTubers, TikTokers. I am not on TikTok still, kill me now, but I get the value. The audience that you can be in front of is your media. So let's start by kicking off with the first topic. The first point, how do you create an influential media strategy? The first thing is to choose your target audience of media venues. And like I said, you start by making a list of the magazines you read, not the magazines you wish people read, the magazines you actually read. I don't read very many magazines anymore, Speaker Magazine, I just don't like the print coming into my mailbox. But what magazines do you read online or in print? Make a list of them. Add to it the newspapers you read online or in print, Washington Post, New York Times. Newspapers can be as simple as the Montclairian in my local Oakland town. What newspapers do you read in print or online? Add them to your list. Add the podcasters you follow. I don't follow a lot of podcasters anymore either, Bulletproof Radio. But who are you following? Who are your clients following? You could ask them, what's your favorite podcast? Remember that LinkedIn boasting where you could put out a question? Or no, that was not LinkedIn boasting, whichever episode that was in, where you post a question on LinkedIn and you ask a question, ask them something. They answer you. What podcasts do you listen to? What newspapers do you read? What magazines do you read? Add them to your list and add radio stations, satellite or terrestrial. A lot of people are listening online in different ways, in different medias, mediums even. Add them to your list, radio stations or paid creative artists you support on Patreon. Where do you have a monthly subscription? This is how you create your list of media venues that you're going to send your media content to. You make a list of everything you read. You add everything your clients read and now you've got the list. Also add to this list places you wish would talk about you. The biggest conference of the year in your sector, maybe you wish they were inviting you to be a speaker. Maybe you wish they were talking about you and your work. Add them to your media list. How about the New York Times, Forbes magazine? Add all the high profile publications you really respect. Is someone going to feature me in the New York Times? No, but I have been featured in Forbes magazine by accident. I was given a feature in Oakland magazine, the San Francisco Guardian. All of these things came about because of who I was speaking to. Add them to your media list and add your favorite authors. Who are you reading in books? Sometimes your authors are paying attention too. So authors, podcasters, bloggers, YouTubers, TikTokers, put Oprah on the list if you like. Here's the email address for adding Oprah to your list. OprahMagStoryIdeas at Hearst.com. So Hearst is a media mogul. OprahMagStoryIdeas. It's as simple as finding the email address for who takes your content. Oprah wants to hear your story ideas, your content ideas, what you're talking about, what your press releases are about. Some companies just post your press release on their site automatically because you sent it to them. We'll get to that in another point. But the first point is choose your target audience of media venues. Start with what you read. Add to the list places you wish would talk about you. And all of those high profile names that you should be proud to be covered in because they are all looking for content. Why not give them your content? What other people say about you is far more important than what you say about you. And if you're going to create this content for yourself anyway and put it out there, let someone else be boasting about you too. So that's number one, make your list. Number two, choose the top 10 on that list as a place to start. When you create this list, when I created the list, that's my first list, there were a lot of people, hundreds. I'm going to suggest add everybody to your list and then isolate, just highlight them with a marker, the top 10 on that list. And that will be the place to start. Keep it small so you actually complete this step. When you choose the top 10, you're going to go to their website and find the email address or contact info for the journalist, editor, or press person. Now, it used to be really easy to create a press list. Everything was editor at hearst.com, editor at omag.com, editor at newyorktimes.com, editor at insert any media title. It's not so simple anymore. There are lots of editors at, you will find them. But more often than not, when you go to the website and you're sleuthing for who writes the blog, for who handles the press releases, you're going to get the journalist's name or the editor's name or submit your press contacts to this person, add them. Absolutely use whatever email address you can find. And don't overthink this one. Just choose the top 10 on your list. Keep it small so you actually complete this step. Visit their website and find the email address or contact info for the journalist, the editor, or the press person. Add it to your spreadsheet. That's step two. Now you've got 10 of them that you can email. Maybe you do 10 every week until your whole press list is fleshed out. I don't know how many people I have on my press list. It used to be 400 at one point. I think we have 200 by now. That didn't grow all at once. We keep adding to it. Who should be added to the press list? Over and over and over is a conversation. So choose the top 10 on that big, long list. Search for the email address and the contact person and have that be your second step. Because the third step is reach out to them. Reach out to each of them and develop a relationship. Pop them an email. Hey, I'm going to send you press releases or content. I'm checking to see that this email address works. See if it bounces. Tell them what your content is going to be about. Are you a consultant? Do you have products and services? Are you attending a conference? Are you writing press releases about your industry? Are you a thought leader? Tell them. Because they're going to say in response, if it doesn't bounce, oh, thanks. Or here's the person you should be sending it to. So reach out to each in an effort to develop a relationship. Pop them an email and tell them you like their work and you're going to be sending them your content. That's a way of establishing the relationship at a foundational level. You can quote them in one of your social media posts. Go back to the LinkedIn boasting topic I did, quoting an author in a social media post with a link to them. Wow, they love that. And then they're commenting on the fact that you commented on their post. They want that interaction too. So make a comment after one of their articles online. Take the time to be substantive. That you read what they posted and cared about it. Or why the hell are they on your media list? Now, I don't necessarily, everyone on my media list has really grown because I do press for my clients. I don't necessarily care what New York Times is covering because they cover so many different sectors. But when you're getting all into the bloggers, the podcasters, the things that you listen to and you read, make sure that you're commenting on articles that appeal to you and giving them real feedback. Because this step three of reaching out to each is more than just, did the email bounce? It's the develop a relationship piece that I want you to hear. So reach out to each and develop a relationship. Pop them an email, tell them you like their work, tell them what you're going to be sending them and start to quote them in your social media posts. Make comments after the articles they post online so that you're developing that relationship. That's step three, reach out to them, develop the relationship. Step four, after you'd followed them and established a relationship with them at any level, sometimes you just keep sending the content. It didn't bounce, you know that they're the editor at and you're just going to keep on sending the content. But after you followed them and established a relationship at any level, you can begin sending them your content that you want them to be boasting about. Think about what they love. What did you learn from following them? What topics are they covering? If you match your content to what they care about and you do this consistently, guess who they're going to quote? Guess who they're going to call for an interview when they're covering your sector? This is a really powerful piece. After you follow them and established a relationship at any level, you start giving them content about what they love. Now, you're going to make sure they're on your list because you want them to be boasting about you, but you're going to give them content that feeds what they're looking for. So here's another piece on how to match to what they want. A lot of these press media houses, especially the larger ones or the conference lanes, they have the whole next year's conference schedule, what they call an editorial calendar, on their website a year in advance. All of 2022's topics are listed, what they're going to be covering month by month by month. The publications that are in print need three months in advance to pull that off. So you need to be giving them content well in advance so they say, oh, three months from now, I'm covering that topic. Can I interview you? You're an expert in that field. Thanks for following me. Yes, I can. If nothing else, they'll read the title because they've seen your name before as one of their followers. But sending them general press releases, too, is just smart. When you care about their content, you know what they're going to be covering in advance or what they're posting about in the moment. Some of these are real time. They're not way out in advance. Then you've captured them. So that's that fourth point. After you follow them and established a relationship at any level, begin sending them content that matches what they're caring about anyway so that you step into being who they care about. Here's the biggest point I want to take a section to say very clearly. Do not start unless you plan to send out PR content at least once per month for a year. Don't even start unless you plan to do it every single month. All the time I have people saying, can you send out this press release for me? The answer is just no. Can you run a press program for me for the year? The answer is yes, because you're wasting your time. If you think sending out one press release is going to make a big difference to them, it isn't. They want a relationship. They want to be able to count on you. Are you a real company? Do you have real products and services that you're consistently making changes in your sector for, always growing and responding to the trends in your sector? Do not start sending out monthly press to that list you created unless you plan to send it out every single month for a year. Now, we're not Apple. We're not LinkedIn. We can't have press releases every single day. I'm just not that important is what I often say. Once a month is enough. Once a month is enough. Because after three or six months and they see your name over and over again, they're going to read every title you send them. They may not use it, but they're going to read it. Now, here's the other piece. Some of them, as I intimated in the beginning, want your content automatically because they post it on their website. There are media sections, sectors, houses, venues that just take all the press releases and post it on their website because Google algorithms now ranks content and backlinks. So backlinks are the piece that you read about somewhere else and it links back to your site. That's how Google now ranks you in search engine priority, by backlinks. So if they are constantly having people link back to their site because they posted your press release, guess what? That links back to your site and it becomes a backlink for you as well. So sending out your press releases, whether they respond is important. A percentage of them will just post it on their website, yay, backlink heaven. But continually doing it gives you that relationship and that consistency so they know who you are and you're the one they begin to interview. What other people say about you is far more important than what you say about you. And that's how I step into more press coverage than I am surprised that I've gotten over the years, just because I put out press for other people. All right, let's talk about that fifth piece. This is make your pitch. The pitch section of the email or the press release gets to the point quickly, the snappy, clear subject line. That subject line is everything. Sometimes that's all they're going to read. Making it clickbait, yeah, it depends on what sector you're in. If you really are going to have clients from TikToking and clickbait, go for it. I don't really know how to respond to that. But in general, we're not talking about clickbait. We're talking about getting to the point quickly with a snappy, clear subject line, clearly explain why writing about your company, your product, your service would be mutually beneficial. And it provides an emotional hook for the reporter to want more information from you. So having that pitch section of the email, why are you sending it to them? That usually it's the opening paragraph. What are you talking about? What are you pitching? What are you speaking about? What are you boasting about? What's the point of this press release? Get to that quickly, that point right away with a snappy, clear subject line and the first paragraph outlining what it is that you're talking about so they want to read further. It provides that emotional hook, but it also gives them information about you and lets them want more information from you. Now, anybody who needs a press release template, let me know. I've got a free one. You can Google it. You don't have to have mine, but I'm always happy to give out my forms. Yes, this takes practice. Yes, it takes time. Don't start unless you plan to do it for a year. But building that list and continually staying in front of them is an extraordinary way to increase the attention onto your business and your client base. You're going to be in business again next year anyway. So take the time to grow. Take the time to have other people talking about you and driving traffic to you and what you offer. Every topic, every sector has a media expert who wants content. We all know content is king right now. Everybody wants more content. Why not give them yours and have them talking about you? That's my topic for the day, public relations, how to create influential media strategy. Next month topic, inbound marketing, the potent power behind automated sales and marketing using your CRM, your content and your website to catapult sales. This topic, the PR strategy, actually is fed and automated by inbound marketing. So please tune in next month and let's keep adding on top of this business strategy for you. Make it an extraordinary month.