How to get coverage in the press right now

The never ending story of Covid19 is still dominating the news agenda, as it has done for the last 12 months. But it doesn’t mean that there aren’t any opportunities to get brands impressive coverage in print, broadcast and online. 

We’ve had a look at the editorial output of different publications and this is what we think is working right now for editorial coverage (earned media).

Although it feels like Groundhog Day with national newspapers and that not much is happening, in fact newspapers are in a fortunate position that there is actually ‘too much news’.

The media landscape is swamped right now and ever changing – we don’t know what huge global events are going to break from one moment to the next. It is an unprecedented time in the news agenda.

A story that might have been a front page leading story a year might only make a small nib now. The many tentacles of Covid19 are far reaching and we’ve seen USA election, & inauguration, and social related issues in the UK fighting to take centre stage in the media. These are all big serious issues based news items. 

Unless you have a serious news angle to contribute give a wide berth to piggy backing on these sorts of stories. 

Where we recommend engaging with media is bringing ‘light’ to complement the dark. Nationals are really looking for light and fun stories right now. We categorise ‘light’ as being funny, light hearted, striking imagery, glamour and triumph over adversary. The Tik Tok trend essentially captures this sentiment with silly, catchy, home-made video set to music. 

News outlets are capturing the imagination of their readers with feel-good stories featuring good Samaritans, delicious foods and innovative gifting. 

One product that we’ve had tremendous success with is www.cocktail-hour.com – these are beautiful themed cocktail boxes delivered to your home with accoutrements, music, food and drink guides. It has really captured the imagination with its emphasis on luxury, quality and treating yourself well. Bloggers and journalists alike have snapped up imagery and samples generating a good result in terms of return on investment for the business.  The Cocktail Hour has been featured in, to date, The Evening Standard, The Sun, The Mail, The Telegraph amongst others. 

Exclusivity can help win you bigger coverage. Rather than blanket coverage try and consider delivering an exclusive with one publication to secure stronger key message delivery, and potentially more space. 

While page space is squeezed in national newspapers online is essentially infinite! There are infinite opportunities for coverage online and in the same media brands, just their online versions. 

While print is limited by space, online publications are technically infinite, it is still not a case of  ‘slapping it up online’. There are huge pressures on online journalists to not only create a huge amount of content but achieve huge clicks too. The news agenda online still remains quite different to their print counterparts and that is driven by their readership number and targets. 

Celebrities are I’m afraid universally popular so anywhere you can attach talent to the story then all the better. 

I love a survey but sadly they are increasingly disliked by many editors. If you do a survey make sure that you have a significant number of respondents (2k+) and ideally work with a reputable survey company