So from last week’s post you understand the 10 stages in a media publicity campaign.
You start by identifying newsworthy story angles from the book to develop for interviews, reviews and editorials. Authors usually need some help here. When you’re so close to your material it is trickier to see the key messages clearly. Try and find someone with a good ‘nose for news’ to help, who can see how your book links in with what is making news.
It’s important to spend time identifying your target media in the publicity plan. Look for magazines, newspapers, radio stations, TV programs and online media (blogs, e-zines and e-newsletters) that may be interested in what you have to say. Then go an extra step and see if you can visualise them reporting on your book. It is critical that you can picture your story fitting in with their usual format. If you can’t, then remove them from your list.
Here is what you should include in your media kit:
Media release – about the book launch, identifying newsworthy story angles
Backgrounder – about the book and author
Biography – author
Sample Q & A – for interviews
Images – front cover, author and sample pages as high resolution JPGs
If you need help developing these items, let me know and I can point you in the right direction.
Then go ahead and pitch your story ideas to key target media – only after you can imagine them being of interest to and relevant for that particular media outlet’s audience. Be sure to follow up by email or phone to secure your key target media’s interest in receiving a copy of the book to review.
Don’t send the entire media kit on first contact. Its purpose is to have supporting information ready for when you need it. Next, if all goes to plan, you will be setting up interviews and supplying media with images and further information as needed from your media kit.
You can monitor media coverage manually but you could miss something. You can’t be across all the media all the time. If you are launching a widespread campaign it is a good idea to use a media monitoring service so you have all bases covered and can see your results.
Yours in book publicity
Chelsea McLean
