Nothing legitimizes your business more than having your products featured in the media.  Unfortunately for many small business owners, getting noticed by reporters is one of the toughest marketing challenges they face.   “The media” is seen by many business owners as an exclusive, obscure club of people who only talk to PR folks and politicians.  The reality is “the media” are just normal people who are looking for interesting stories to tell.  They want to talk to you and they want to hear about how your products improve the lives of people and their pets.   It’s up to you to give them a reason to want to talk to you.

The key thing to remember is getting featured in the news is less about who you know and more about what you do.  

Simply having a business with nice products isn’t usually enough to grab the attention of a reporter.   Reporters are looking for something that is new, innovative and impacts a mass audience.  They are looking for business owners who are involved in the community and are leaders in their field. 

While it sounds like a tall order, there are a couple of things you can do to increase your visibility with reporters and to make your company more attractive as a news feature.

The first thing you can do is network.  Networking opens doors to marketing opportunities like partnerships within the community and access to business events.  By networking within the business community, you can affiliate your company with other companies that have well-established media relations.   For example, if another company hosts an annual golf event that always attracts media, look for ways to sponsor or get involved in the event.  That way, the host company does your media outreach for you.  

Another important step in earning media coverage is authentic community involvement.  Every small business should look at holidays as opportunities to give back, and whenever possible, use their product or service to benefit the community.  For pet product small businesses, animal shelters are a perfect place to channel your community outreach.  By donating samples of your products or services, you create a newsworthy awareness message for the media and demonstrate your dedication to pets to your target audience.

The combination of networking and community involvement are two simple, cost-effective ways to earn media attention and establish your company as a valuable contributor within your community.  Remember that reporters need a reason to call, so give them one.

This entry was posted on Thursday, December 23rd, 2010 at 5:07 pm and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.