If your website is like that of most B2Bs, your “News” or “Press” section is somewhat of an afterthought. It’s like, “OK, finally we got all the important (product/service) content done; now what can we throw in under ‘News’ so we can get this puppy launched?” Too often, that ends up being simply an archive of moldy press releases and clippings.
But in his excellent RainToday article, David Meerman Scott argues that your “News” area can – and should – be so much more. As for the “should”… marketers need only remind themselves that journalists are a relatively trusted voice reaching large numbers of your prospects; so anything you can do to make it easier and more enticing for them to write about your firm is clearly worthwhile.
Build an online media room, and they will come …and stay.
How to do this? David discusses 10 best practices in his must-read piece; we’ll simply summarize about half of those here…
Provide content for all stages of the media consideration cycle – from basic information to extensive detail. Just like your prospects, your journalist visitors will do some major research before committing to spend substantial time writing a story on your firm. That means they’ll eventually need everything from company history, through client case studies, to product/service info – though not so much how it works as what it does and why that’s good for your customers’ business.
Do use images; don’t use jargon or acronyms. Journalists often deal with a variety of industry segments, so they simply can’t be as “up” on your content domain as you and your prospects are. Pictures and diagrams make your story both easier to understand and more compelling; but unexplained terms or insider jargon can easily frustrate the interested but non-specialist reader.
Encourage browsing by defining appropriate self-select paths. Of course, you know to do this on the rest of your site; so now that “News” isn’t going to be merely a press-release graveyard, you’ll need to do it here as well.
Push content to media using email and RSS. “Nurturing” emails for journalists?? You bet; remember, they’re just not going to parachute into your site and then write up your company later that day. But when a journalist subscribes to your email newsletter or RSS feed, you can be pretty sure they’ve taken the hook; now you simply need to reel them in.
List all executive appearances at industry tradeshows/conferences. Journalists are people-to-people types who believe in the give-&-take of live interviews. As such, they attend numerous events and will seek out interviews with execs of companies they’ve developed an interest in. Then, of course, it will be up to your people to heighten that interest with some solid info and memorable quotes.
I would add just one more thing: be sure to do a press kit. Everyone – prospects, investors and journalists – likes a pdf they can print out and read on a plane later.
Create a real online media room, and see if it doesn’t help get your company more ink over time.
