Media in Public Relations

Writing a media plan is tougher than doing an advertising or marketing campaign. You don't typically have an advertising budget, and there are no hard numbers on sales, because you're not selling anything. What you are selling is an idea. So how do you write a plan to sell an idea, and how do know whether it worked or not?

What kind of media mix should you shoot for? You only have so much time, energy and staff. It's hard to know where you should be focusing your efforts in public relations, especially when you're talking about earned media rather than paid. We can take guidance from hard numbers of advertising spending. Learn how to find the right media mix for you.

In public relations, you have to rely on earned media instead of paid advertising. So your media plan can't be as surgically exact as what the marketing people can do. They can target women over 35 in specific zip codes with a direct mail piece, or advertise on sports radio stations that cater to blue-collar men. Learn how to write a media plan for earned media.

Social media is different than earned media. When you send press releases or opeds to newspapers, they decide whether to run it, and they've got a ton of other folks pitching them stories and opeds. The same thing is true with TV and radio producers. With social media, you can reach a mass media-type audience directly. Right now.

There are five reasons to monitor your media, learn what those 5 reasons are and how to monitor what the press and public are saying about you -- or your organization.

With every piece of your presentation, ask yourself how the media could use it. And if they can't use it, why include it? Here's a quick list of some things the media looks for with any presentation:Headline ideas, ways to frame the story, pithy quotes and audio clips, stunning photos, great video, amazing facts or numbers, charts that make...

A media availability -- journalists will say "media avail" as shorthand -- is a much simpler affair than a press conference. You see these every night on ESPN, with coaches and players dressed up in suits instead of jerseys and taking questions from reporters after the game. Public officials often have weekly media avails in their office.