5 Tips for PR Firms and Startups Looking For Coverage

It can be challenging for a newly formed, unknown startup pr firm to grab the media attention. The budgets might be tight, relationship with journalists may not be that strong and also there are chances of facing difficulty in explaining the new concept. In the infancy stage, the startup firms usually employ few people focused on product and developments. Therefore it is very necessary for the startup firms to take the right approach to Public Relations (PR), marketing and advertising in the early stage to attract interest from venture capitalists.

As PR companies in Delhi are being contacted by hundreds of companies, they have developed a taste about what works and what doesn’t works for the startup firms. Below are the tips for the newly formed firms looking for coverage.

PR is a process

It is important to know that PR is a process not an event. In the early stage startup firms should not do PR around milestone. Public Relation is a continual process. It needs months or even years to build good relationships with the journalists. Firms must help journalists on stories, act as a source, develop real and healthy relationships, read their stories and eventually when you have news they are more willing to have a conversation.

Get to know your target media and journalists

For startup firms it’s very important to identify their target media outlets and journalists. These firms should keep in mind that instead of pitching everyone and anyone, it’s good to go for few media outlets of their top choices. Take some time to identify the journalists who write for these media outlets, read their work and follow them on social media.

Develop your pitch so it’s newsworthy.

Firms should make sure that their pitch angle is newsworthy, not only they are required to highlight a unique selling point, but also need to draft a pitch that can relate to the targeted media. This can find a newsworthy angle for virtually any outlet if they just get a little creative.

 Never send a copy/paste generic pitch.

It’s very important for journalists and editors to spot out the copy/paste generic pitch. If they suspect your pitch is copy/paste, they will immediately delete your mail. So make sure that your pitch is completely personalized and specific around them and the outlet which they work for.

Follow reporters and journalists on Twitter

It’s very important to build good relationship with the groups of reporters and journalists that covers your firm. Best way to do is follow them on twitter. Virtually every journalist is on twitter and many of them prefer using it as their main communication source. Besides that, meeting up for lunch or drinks is always the best option when it comes to keeping the conversation alive.