Leveraging Social Media to Get Major Publicity

It was a warm sunny afternoon in December when I first met Ken Colburn.  Since we were in Pheonix, it came as no surprise to me that Ken pulled up in a red convertible 68 Camaro.  He was wearing sunglasses and trying every bit to play the movie star. We sat down at a great Thai restaurant that Ken had recommended and had a great meal where I learned all about how he has built a massive data recovery franchise with stores all over the country.

“How do you get so much publicity?” I asked Ken, knowing that besides having a weekly show on CNN he was also regularly quoted and interviewed in major news publications all over the country.

“With budget cuts, they’re under-staffed, overwhelmed and in need of fresh content almost daily.  Especially nowadays, they don’t have time or money to look for sources, so you have to do is make their job easy.”

“And how do you do that?” I asked curiously.

“For starters you need to check out http://muckrack.com/ – an awesome site that aggregates the Twitter messages of journalists all over the world.”

With just that link I have been able to start conversations with multiple journalists.  Muckrack aggregates Twitter messages or “tweets” by BEATS.  World, US, Politics, Sports – really whatever you like.  Think of this as a cocktail party attended by every journalist you could ever hope to meet.  Now you just need to say something interesting enough to get their attention and join their conversation. This may be no small task.  Perhaps you could tell them your child has flown away on giant balloon?  (I wouldn’t recommend that approach.)  It is your job though to figure out ways to engage them, or answer questions that they are asking.  Monitor the conversations, and sooner or later you can find an in.

Now that I have monitored http://muckrack.com and started conversations with journalists, I want more.  I have asked Ken to come on this Friday’s conference call and share 4 Tips to Getting Major publicity.  During this call you will learn how Ken got on CNN, and a number of other pointers to help you build your online reputation.  Perhaps in the next call after that we can find out where he got his muscle car and sunglasses.

1.  Use Twitter & MuckRack.com to see what is trending & to pitch story ideas as they are looking for you.

2.  Subscribe to services like HARO (http://helpareporter.com) & Pitchrate (http://pitchrate.com)

3.  Follow-up but don’t be a pest; the media lives moment to moment & if your story isn’t in that moment, it won’t get picked up.

4.  If you want to be on TV, start building a library on YouTube, Vimeo, etc. for practice and exposure.

This Friday morning at 10:00 AM EST, Ken Colburn, will be joining us on the Weekly Voir Dire.  CLICK HERE to sign up for the free call.  Spaces are limited, so be sure to call in at least 5 minutes early.

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