The best things in life are free
Published: Giftrap magazine, September 2009
Want to increase consumer interest in your products but don’t know where to begin? In the homewares industry, there is no better avenue than PR – particularly if you have a tight budget. Public relations expert Julia Nekich shows how to tailor your message to the media and its audience to ensure maximise media coverage for your brand.
Is your business feeling a decline in consumer spend? Or are you a start-up with no customer base as yet, and next-to-no marketing budget? You could cut your marketing to counteract a decline in income. Or you could see this as an opportunity for your brand to stand out from its competitors through PR.
When compared with its returns on investment, PR is one of the most affordable promotional methods available, and media is one of its strongest avenues.
But before you begin picking up the phone to pitch your product to that magazine editor, it’s best to spend a little time planning.
Who are your customers?
The first step in PR is to really know who your customers and prospects are so that you can target them through the appropriate media outlets, and create PR messages that will grab their attention.
Don’t know who purchases your products? There are ways to find out. For instance, if yours is an online business, you could ask your customers to fill in their details (such as gender, age and geographic area) when making their payment. If you have a store, you might ask buyers to join your mailing list and do the same.
This first step is important in PR. In your research, for instance, you might discover that your products are mostly purchased as wedding gifts, or by at-home mums – something you may not previously have known. If you have this information, you can target this market more effectively.
Why the media?
What every brand needs is maximum exposure among its customers. One of easiest ways to reach customers is through the media – magazines, newspapers, TV, radio and online. When you compare media coverage to other marketing avenues such as events, or eNewsletters, there’s no argument that media can really hit the largest number of prospects possible. When you send an eNewsletter to your customers, you might reach 1000 people. Sunday newspapers, on the other hand, have readerships of around 750,000 each. A best-selling interiors or women’s magazine has up to 350,000 readers.
Which media avenues do you target?
There are two questions to consider for public relations: Which media outlets do your customers read, watch and listen to? And will those outlets cover products such as yours?
To answer the first question, the most obvious places to look are the media kits of each media outlet. These describe who, and how large, the audience is. The size of the audience is important – you’ll reach more people if you get your product into a magazine with a readership of 300,000 rather than one with a 50,000 readership. Media kits are available through a media outlet’s website, or call their advertising department and get one emailed to you.
The answer to the second question requires a bit of legwork. In the giftware and homewares industry, interiors magazines are obviously a strong avenue. But the competition to get exposure in these is fierce, simply because there are a limited number of magazines and available spaces, and so many PR consultants and homewares brands are pitching products and news into them. Spend some time browsing through magazines in a bookshop or newsagent to see which other magazines cover giftware products. Wedding magazines, women’s magazines, e-zines, men’s and health magazines might have sections for your products. Many of these have readerships in the hundreds of thousands.
How do you develop your PR message for media?
Now that you know who you’re targeting and through which media outlets, you can create PR messages that will maximise your ‘hit rate’.
Here are some important considerations when developing your PR pitch:
1. Pitch new products. Media want the best and latest. If they find out you’ve pitched a product from a two-year old catalogue, they probably won’t be keen to publish it.
2. Promote the product’s benefits. Does the product improve people’s way of living? Does it save energy, add ambience to a room, or is it similar to a designer product 10 times its price? Add these ‘hooks’ to your press release.
3. Make it timely. Are recycled materials the latest trend? Or natural colours? Take note of what the media is covering, and pitch those types of products to them if you have them.
When drafting your press release, take the focus off your business, and write the release with the audience in mind – both the media and readers. Start off by developing a catchy heading that promotes a major benefit of your product. The first paragraph should expand on that benefit and cover the most ‘newsy’ part of your pitch. Use the next three to four paragraphs to include any other benefits and details. Include specs such as colours, prices, sizes, stockists. Your press release should have everything covered so that the media doesn’t have to call you for more information – make it easy for them. Make your press release no longer than a page, and end it with your name and contact details.
How do you package your pitch?
When it comes to giftwares and homewares, sending products and samples to media will maximise your chances of getting exposure for them. The large magazines will want to photograph the products themselves – these are the publications you will need to send product to. Stylish sample bags with a press release, your latest catalogue (if you have one) and a product sample will be adequate. When these magazines have your product sitting there beside their desks, it’s no trouble at all for them to add it to the collection of products they are already shooting in their studio that week.
Publications with smaller readerships often don’t have a budget for photography. Rather, they need you to provide them with hi resolution images, which they can simply run. While these magazines would also appreciate a product sample, it’s not essential to send them one. Whether you send a sample or not, be sure to include a CD with hi resolution images (shot at 300 dpi) of a range of your products, so they can include an image in their magazine. Emailing press releases and images is also acceptable, but be careful about the size of your pictures. You don’t want to ‘jam’ the journalist’s email system.
Once you send out your press releases and samples, be available and return any media emails or phone calls asap, just as they do in public relations agencies. It cannot be overestimated how the media appreciates this.
It is also worthwhile following up media yourself through a phone call or email. Ask if they received the samples and is there anything else they require. Do not follow up more than once.
How do you develop an ongoing relationship with media?
If you’re sending the right type of product to the right media outlet, and you meet the PR requirements above, media will begin to rely on you for material that’s relevant to them and their readers. Within each media outlet, seek out the right person to pitch to. For product pitches, it’s usually the stylist or market editor. If in doubt, pitch to the deputy editor.
Pitching good material once every two months is a good strategy – and keep it consistent. Sometimes it’s worthwhile asking particular journalists or stylists what types of features they’re working on at the moment to see if you have anything other news or product to offer them.
Julia’s top 10 requirements for ensuring media coverage
1. Send the right products – simple, stylish products with clean ‘lines’ tend to get snapped up by media first.
2. High resolution images – media will only consider images that are 300dpi and large in size. It’s worth spending the money on good photography. Find a photographer who specialises in ‘still lifes’ rather than portrait shots.
3. Company profile – Develop a paragraph-long profile and use it consistently in every press release.
4. Product samples – publications with large readerships will want to photograph your product themselves. They need samples.
5. Correct media contacts – ensure you have the correct journalists’ names and contact details at each publication.
6. Fact sheet – if you have complex product specifications, don’t clog press releases with them. Create a separate fact sheet for them.
7. Low resolutions images for emailing – if you can’t send product samples, you can email media low resolution images just for viewing. Don’t clog their email systems with hi res images.
8. Attractively packaged media kits – ensure you products get noticed; simple but stylish is best.
9. Media releases with all the details. Make it easy for media by including stockist details, all necessary specs, prices and your contact details.
10. Return calls and emails asap. PR consultants do this, and it’s one of the many reasons they get such great results.
Of course, there are always exceptions to the PR rules above. Taking note of the above factors however, will increase your chances of successful media coverage.
Julia Nekich is principal of The Ideas Suite. A former journalist, Julia has written for major media such as Belle, Vogue Living, House & Garden, Home Beautiful, Australian Good Taste, Sydney Morning Herald and Sunday Telegraph.
