MEDIA
RELATIONS
Fly
VISUAL
GUIDE

This is the main mistake
in media relations Machine gun Fly

Most brands use outdated tactics
to reach out to media. This is does more harm than good, giving the profession a bad reputation. Machine gun Fly

In this presentation: Ban spray
& pray media relations Get to know your contacts Create a rich story Send multimedia pitches Measure results 0 1 2 3 4 prezly Why to: How to:

Why do I care? I’m
a fulltime designer of tools for PR professionals Follow fritsbits Follow my company prezly

My clients are PR agencies
prezly

And external communication teams at
brands prezly

And external communication teams at
brands prezly Check a recent case study

Many brands are facing the
same challenges prezly

prezly There’s an increasing imbalance
in media relations

prezly Many journalists are leaving
newsrooms to work in corporate communications roles at brands.

prezly News writers now are
outnumbered five to one by PR people trying to get media attention. source 〉

They get pitched over twenty
times per day about brands. source 〉

prezly Email has made it
simple for PR pro’s to pitch many news writers at once, hoping that something sticks.

prezly Although writers are flooded
with pitches, only one in ten often write a story based on a pitch. source 〉

In other words: most pitches
are spam.

This is the S.O.S approach

Sending Out … Stuff

What do news writers say
about it?

“Make sure it’s relevant. I
get so many that I have to be ruthless. Mail Online prezly

“Die in a fire TechCrunch
prezly

How not to do it
Real example, keeping brand confidential Subject: Press release: Airline brand opens a base in Location ! Dear journalist, Attached you’ll find a press release about the arrival of airline brand in Location. If you’d like more info feel free to contact me.

How not to do it
Real example, keeping brand confidential Noooooooooo!

How not to do it
Real example, keeping brand confidential Irrelevant for journalist that received it No personalisation No clear value proposition for the journalist All recipients in CC Press release in heavy PDF attachment (1.5MB) Media assets via Dropbox link at end of 5-page press release

It’s time to stop this
spray & pray approach

There are more effective ways
with less collateral damage

1 2 3 4 prezly
Here’s a 4-step approach Get to know your contacts Create a visual social media story Send multimedia pitches Measure results

1 Get to know your
contacts A rolodex prezly

This is how 70% of
media lists look like Not much different from a rolodex Oftentimes it’s just an email address with a beat

It’s called media relations for
a reason Turn your email addresses into people

Do it as you go:
Inbox profiles via Rapportive prezly

Follow them on social media.
Read their updates every day. prezly

Enrich your Excel list automatically
with social media accounts with Prezly Now you can add them to a Twitter list. prezly

Also read the articles of
your contacts prezly subscribe to updates of digital articles in Feedly

Now you can keep tabs
on your media contacts in 10 minutes per day

2 Create a visual social
media story prezly

Think visually. Enrich your stories
with images and videos to increase interest and engagement. prezly

Press releases with multimedia get
viewed a lot more + 7.4x + + 4.3x 1.8x = Attachments, soundbites, charts, interactive,… prezly 9.7x

prezly 9.7x ! 79% of
journalists say news releases accompanied by a good image are more likely to be picked up than those without photos. source 〉

The more you can give
journalists what they need to be successful, the more coverage you’ll get. prezly

Read our complete guide to
visual press releases prezly Creating visuals can be daunting

Think beyond journalists. Tell stories,
not just for the traditional press, but for consumers, bloggers, social media influencers, and anyone who’s interested. prezly

email pitch + social prezly
+ web Publish stories on your online newsroom. Having social media press releases makes it easy for people to share your stories and for people to find them via search engines. Traffic distribution on social media newsroom

An example social media press
release prezly ✔ High resolution photos ✔ Infographics ✔ Low resolution image previews ✔ One-click visual downloads view ✔ Easy to share on social, A PR CRM like Prezly automatically including detects visuals the social profiles of your media contacts. ✔ Works well on mobile devices ✔ Optimised for search engines

Don’t reinvent the wheel get
a free mobile social media news template Download

3
Send
multimedia pitches
prezly

Publishing a your story online
is just the first step. You should still pitch to relevant influencers to make sure they know about it.

Use a pitching tool that
integrates with your newsroom This way you can easily share your stories in multimedia and get integrated analytics Try my PR pitching tool Prezly

An example multimedia pitch prezly
A PR CRM like Prezly automatically detects the ✔ Personalised intro ✔ Multimedia previews

4% 59% 37% 2-3 sentences
2-3 paragraphs 500 words 1,000 words prezly The perfect media pitch according to 25k journalists What is your ideal pitch length?

Lack of personalization Too lengthy
Bad timing Confusing subject line Large attachments 2,9 10,4 15,4 21,9 28,7 Aside from irrelevant subject matter, what factor is most likely to make you immediately reject a pitch? prezly source 〉

prezly Keep it short and
personalise. Include media assets.

6 prezly more tips for
sending better email pitches

From: 1 A specific ‘from
line’ Frederik from Prezly prezly This tells you who the email is coming from, as well as which company I work for… all before you even open my email.

Subject: 2 A short and
clear subject line Relevant, timely & inspire curiosity 33% open email based on subject line alone. Keep it to 50 characters or less. list of best practices drawn from analysing 200 million emails prezly

Body: 3 A brief &
relevant introduction I saw your tweet about Gen Y employees and thought you might like to learn the surprising results of a new study. Who you are and why you’re reaching out. Tie it to something personal. prezly

Body: 4 A value proposition
Your latest article about Gen Y got a lot of buzz. Sharing the results of this study could be a great follow-up for your readers. What’s in it for them? prezly

Body: 5 Multimedia previews News
with multimedia gets viewed up to 10 times more prezly source 〉

Body: 6 A clear next
step I’d love to answer any questions you have about the study. Can we talk for 15 minutes sometime next week? frederik@prezly.com +320472656889 All contact info prezly

There’s more: Read our 5-part
email course on pitching prezly

4
Measure results
prezly

Email usually is a black
box: you hit send and don’t know what happens next. Or do you?

Stop emailing in the dark
Track your email pitches to see who’s interested in your stories. prezly

There are many services that
let you track your emails Sales tool for Gmail All-purpose newsletter service PR pitching tool

Measure to get better at
media relations in two ways Learn which content works Learn which contacts like your content

Learn which contacts like your
pitch

Learn which content your contacts
like

Use these insights to get
to know your contacts better. Make it a habit to review the email behaviour of your contacts regularly. If your contacts aren’t opening and clicking on your pitches anymore, please, stop spamming them.

prezly There’s more: 4 PR
metrics you can start using now

Ban spray & pray media
relations Get to know your contacts Create a rich story Send multimedia pitches Measure results 2 3 4 5 prezly Recap 1

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