http://edbisquera.com Digital Marketing Consultant Portland, OR. (360) 597-8283 Publicity: getting reporters and news outlets to cover and publish stories about your business, can help brand you as an expert in your industry niche, as well as gaining more exposure for your business. Offered up are some tips on how to connect with the media and reporters, to increase your chances at getting free publicity for your small to medium sized business, using social media, video and content marketing.

1. Top Ways To Make Your Business
Newsworthy and Publishable
By Ed Bisquera
PUBLICITY – Getting an article or news report published about your business,
doesn’t just magically happen. For small businesses to stand out in an era of
information overload, with wall-to-wall news and media coverage, you need to
be ingenious, creative, think like an editor/reporter/news producer and really
have something that will get you and your business noticed - like establishing
yourself as a local authority on within your field of expertise.
Here are a few marketing ideas I’ve assembled, that could put your business in
the spotlight, attract reporters and make your business more newsworthy:
Build Relationships Up With Reporters
A number of journalists have been known to complain how annoying it is to be
inundated with irrelevant press releases from small businesses that they have
never had previous contact with. They also complain about how the press
releases are nothing more than vaguely disguised advertisements, with very
little helpful content to their readers and/or viewers.

2. You can understand their situation. They receive hundreds of press releases
per week, all of them vying for attention and trying to get some column inches
for their own business. But one way to stand out is to build relationships with
writers and reporters, to get help in what the publications are looking for and
what business owners can provide to help reporters understand their
expertise.
Using social media makes it much easier to get connected with reporters and
build up a relationship with them, and it is an avenue that most businesses
overlook.
For example you could easily start making a Twitter list created around your
local and national journalists who cover small businesses. You can build a
relationship with them in a traditional, conversational way. By talking about
common interests, and responding to their queries that are not necessarily
work-related, you are using your exchanges to build up a relationship that will
grow over time. Try and monitor your list, keeping a close eye on it throughout
the day to make sure you are the first to respond to any of their queries for
information in your area of expertise.
Help A Reporter Out
Alternatively you can literally help a reporter out by answering their requests
for information instead of trying to get your press release published.
HelpAReporter.com (HARO) is one of the best ways to start getting press
coverage and incoming links from online media sources.
It’s very easy to get started, as it is free and simple to sign up. All it takes is an
email address and some basic contact information. Once signed up it won’t
take long before you start receiving emails from reporters looking to connect
with experts for interviews. While not all of the interviews or contacts might
not actually transform into anything, it is simply too good an opportunity to
pass up - it is free and easy to do. All it takes is one good story and it will give
your business the promotion it deserves.
Go Visual
Don’t just focus on text. In fact, your next viral marketing content might not be
text at all. With the popularity of YouTube, Pinterest, Instagram and other
social media, statistics indicate your chances of gaining explosively publicity
are much higher if you use visual content.

3. • A report by SEOMOZ, a well-known and respected Internet marketing
site, said that posts with videos attract 3 times more inbound links.
• SimplyMeasured.com also found that since the introduction of the
timeline feature, visual content results in 65% higher engagement on
Facebook than text alone.
• MarketingSherpa.com found that website visitors spend a huge 100%
more time on a webpage that contains video, and videos attract 300%
more leads.
These statistics show that it certainly makes good business sense to use more
video and images in your marketing.
You may start to become convinced at this approach to reaching the media.
You may even see the wisdom in trying to get free publicity for your business.
What you might not actually have is the time or the confidence to do it.
That is where businesses such as digital marketing agencies, content marketing
consultants or social media management companies can help. They can look
after your digital marketing campaigns for you and turn your business into a
market leader, beating your competitors and attracting brand new clients to
your business, utilizing time-tested digital marketing strategies.
Contact one now, to see how a well thought out digital content marketing
plan, with video, can help to attract new leads, as well as attract reporters
seeking out your expertise for articles and news reports within your industry
niche.
=== About the author ===
Ed Bisquera is a well-known digital content marketing consultant, with
experience in social media/video marketing, strategy and development as well
as a background in social search, SEO and online reputation management. He
can be reached at (360) 597-8283 or connect with him at
http://about.me/edbisquera.