Increase visibility by Pre-briefing Industry Journalists
When planning on a new product launch, it's always a great idea to include press briefing into the strategy.
A 'pre-briefing' is a public relations process that involves speaking to an industry journalist about your news before you officially announce it. It’s sometimes called a “pre-announcement briefing.”
To understand why it is important, one has to get a sense of the overall flow of events that occurs between a company deciding it wants to make an announcement and actually getting press coverage of that announcement. The latter is what we are discussing in this blog.
Although a lot of effort might be put into writing a press release, also known as an “announcement”, the act of distributing it through a wire service such as PR Newswire is generally not the most effective way of getting reporters to write articles about your news.
Reason is most of us need to work pretty hard at getting journalists to pay attention to our news. Big name brands and those with very interesting news to tell can get picked up in the press. But that’s not most companies.
Therefore, an important PR strategy is to brief reporters on our announcement to get them interested in covering it.
So How Can One Go About In Getting the News Covered by the Media?
First of all, we understand that editors' time is valuable and so is yours and in order to get their attention, we need to be able to answer their questions, either in person "virtually" or on the phone. For major news, some companies might even hold a press conference.
However, as most of us understand, reporters are busy, so unless you’re already a well-known brand, most reporters won't be come knocking. You need to reach out to them personally, which is typically done today through an email or phone call that asks if the reporter wants to hear about your news in advance of it being distributed on a wire service. This gives the reporter some time to write the story before you make your announcement. Reporters usually don’t like to write about news after the announcement. Soon, it’s old news and not relevant.
Then, we need to respect the fact that reporters generally need some time to write an article about your news. Most reporters are busy and they can’t write a story about you the same day you make your news. It’s helpful to tell them what you are going to announce at least a couple of days in advance of your news actually going out.
When you show a reporter a press release in advance, it is known as giving it to them “under embargo” – with an understanding that they will not write about your story until the press release goes out on the wire service.
Pre-briefing is common in corporate PR. Note that there is always a risk that the reporter will leak your news in advance of the announcement but that is rare as they wouldn't want to tarnish their reputation and have every good reason to retain a positive relationship with companies.
Reach Out and Make a Difference!
Seasoned editors are recognized within their industries and they generally have an established online presence with a strong social media following. Leveraging on their readership becomes the key for ensuring a wider audience reach for an effective product launch, and an essential step not to be overlooked.
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