In the world of PR, knowing the difference between what’s advertorial and what’s genuinely newsworthy when pitching to the media is KEY. Your story must capture the journo’s attention and be of genuine interest to your media outlet’s target audience.
It is important to avoid stories that are promotional in nature and/or sales focused, as journalists are trained to sniff out an advertorial pitch, and some media outlets have strict rules about promoting commercial brands and products.
When preparing your media pitch, understanding the purpose of a newsworthy story is important and should include one (or more) of the following elements:
- Inform & educate about something new or exciting that is happening in the community.
- Provide value to the media outlet’s target audience by explaining why people might want to know about this story.
- Ensure it is timely, current, and relevant through use of current statistics, events, trends, and topical stories or themes.
Here are nine ways YOU can create a newsworthy story:
- What media is your audience engaging with: Following your target media will inspire you for the type of story you could create – include mainstream media but don’t forget niche industry publications and podcasts.
- News & Innovation: Ensuring your story is timely is absolutely crucial! This could be new appointments, rebranding, signing a wholesale or export deal, arrival of cutting-edge equipment, a new premises, and/or award wins/nominations.
- Share your customer success stories: Look for case studies that demonstrate the particular problem you are focusing on and how your product/service solves it.
- Industry Trends: Industry trends add relevance to a story – consider what is topical in your industry right now that you could leverage off.
- Statistics & Surveys: If your industry releases a regular survey, look for a local angle that you can leverage off.
- Sponsorships: Consider incorporating sponsorships into your marketing strategy, and actively look for authentic ways in which your product/service/organisation can be included in media opportunities to help promote the community group or event.
- Marketing & Activations: Look within your Marketing Plan for existing events or activations that could lead to a PR opportunity – or create a new one.
- Collaborations: Is there an organisation you are partnering with on a project that is newsworthy?
- Key Dates & Holidays: Knowing your key dates and holidays is a simple way to create a product or activation to tie with an annual day. To get a feel for annual stories, continuously monitoring the media is the key.
Finding a genuinely relevant angle that creates a newsworthy story and avoids a promotional or sales focused nature will make journalists much more likely to run with your pitch. Remembering these tips the next time you are pitching to the media will help you successfully Create Your Own PR!
