Ahhhh the media list, it’s like your address book in your phone…so much so that you even have your favorites! You know exactly what I am talking about (the starred numbers in your phone that is)!
Interested in garnering media attention? You first need to reach the right people. Reaching the right people requires some research – yes, time and effort.
There are many tools available to efficiently build a media list, but we’ll save the tools for another day.
Let’s start with the basics… some fields you’ll want to identify on your list:
1. Outlet: Name of the outlet
2. Contact Name: Reporter/editor name (please address people by their name and send individual emails)
3. Beat: Focus area. If you’re pitching a story on Men’s Health Month, for example, you’ll likely want to identify the health reporter for a specific outlet (of course, if it’s for a local event for Men’s Health Month then a community or local reporter might also be interested and should be featured on the list)
4. Contact Email: Email is your best bet. Some stations have news tips emails or news desk email aliases that reach multiple reporters so you can include them as well
5. Contact Phone: While phones are used much less than they used to be, if you’re pulling a list, you might as well recognize phone numbers as well in the spirit of efficiency just in case a phone call is requested
6. Social Profiles: Keeping up with stories on social media is another great way to stay up to date with recent stories and can also be another method of contact
