Creating an impactful media list

In today’s fast-paced world, gaining media visibility and establishing authenticity is crucial for organizations. And at the heart of any successful public relations (PR) strategy lies a powerful tool – the media list

With a well-curated and up-to-date media list, you can effortlessly pitch your brand’s message to journalists, bloggers, influencers, and other media professionals, and boost your brand’s credibility.

But what exactly is a media list? 

It’s a comprehensive database of carefully curated contacts, including journalists’ names, email addresses, phone numbers, and social media handles, along with the publications they represent. A well-structured media list allows you to disseminate your organization’s announcements, press releases, and other news to the right media professionals, increasing the chances of your news getting coverage.

In this article, we’ll delve into the ins and outs of creating and maintaining an impactful media list. We’ll explore how to curate a media contact list, why it’s crucial to keep your list up-to-date, and how to measure the effectiveness of your media list. Accordingly, buckle up and get ready to unlock the power of media lists to supercharge your PR strategy!

Before we dive into our article, let’s get the overview of topics covered in the article:

Media List

What do you mean by Media List? 

An effective media list, also known as a journalist database list, or media contacts is a comprehensive database of journalists, bloggers, podcasters, and other media professionals who give a space to your story in their media outlet. A press list includes; contact name, email addresses, phone numbers, and social media handles, along with the name of publications of journalists.

A well-structured media sheet helps you to effortlessly disseminate your organization’s announcements or press notes to the right journalists and other media professionals, increasing the likelihood of your news getting coverage. With a well-crafted press list, it will save your time and resources, streamline your outreach efforts, and build strong relationships with key journalists and influencers in your industry. 

Why is a press distribution list important for a business?

A solid media list enables you to send your release to thousands of journalists in a short time.   

Distributing a press release individually at a wider space is quite time consuming and confusing. To overcome the confusion, this structured press list acts as a savage way to easily send your press release to the media. 

Read the article further to understand the benefits of making an effective journalist database list. 

The vital responsibility of PR firms and Press Release distribution platforms is to establish connections with the media to get good coverage of press releases. 

However, a well-structured journalist database eases your workload. It helps you to pitch your release to a factual database in a quick manner and secure potential PR coverage. 

Merits of compiling a media list: 

  1. A media list enables you to reach out to your journalists effortlessly. 
  2. While making a media list you get a chance to approach high-quality connections personally. 
  3. Through this list we engage with the journalists and have communication. This list enables us to give frequent insights into your company. Any information given by you can be useful for the media. 
  4. If your news story does not gain media visibility, then you can send press release again to that media list. The list is savage for the future. 
  5. One more advantage of making a press list; you can make changes to the list anytime, anywhere without any access.

To make it more understandable let’s give a detailed look to topics to be covered in this article:

How to Curate an effective Media list? 

STEP 1: Target Journalist of your Niche 

To search media contacts, you need to have a knowledge of your niche. For this, conduct in-depth research to find out the media contacts as per your need.

Being active in the media field, you get familiar with the names of journalists, writers, freelancers, organizations and influencers. 

Position your news at the right time and place, ensure the material you’re delivering is to authentic media contacts. To deliver your message to the correct journalist, you need to research them. There are ways to find them accurately.  

While making media lists more meaningful remember the following points which will help you in future; 

How to search for Journalists? 

  • Research for publications to whom you want to pitch your press release.
  • If you do not know anything about journalist, you can search on Google for additional information. 
  • How often does a reporter publish the news or report on a website?
  • Use Google, hashtags or tools to find the email-id of the suggested profiles or publications. Some effective tools that help to find contact in more effective manner  

Tools – The automated applications of sites which find the person for you in quickest mode. Here are some free tools that help you out to search the details of media contacts. 

  1. Find that Lead – This site enables you to search 50 emails on a monthly basis. 
  2. Rocket Reach – This application only provides 3 reach per month.  

Although they are paid applications and many more apps exist which give you unlimited search access but are quite expensive. 

STEP 2 – Build Your Press List

After in-depth research, create an excel sheet to organize your contacts. Fill the details of relevant media outlets and journalists on the sheet. To avoid any mistake, proof read the details once again.

How to make your first media list? 

To create a solid media list, use the insights provided below.

  • Create an Excel Sheet and make the media list that includes;
  1.  First and last names of the contact
  2. Name of publication/ media outlet
  3. A website or social media profile link
  4. Beats / niches
  5. Contact details
  6. Notes (any extra information you need to be compiled for future)

Download a sample sheet here

  • Fill in the relevant information – Fill the sheet with the information you derived from research. To simplify your media list, make an excel sheet of every niche. It will be helpful to send your releases accordingly.  

Example: You have lifestyle news to disseminate to journalists, then you will send the release to the lifestyle media contact list.

2. Why is it important to keep your media list up-to-date?

Media industry is very dynamic. Creating a media list is not enough, you need to keep it up-to-date constantly with time. You never know when a journalist changes his beat or leaves the media industry. 

Apart from filtration, a record of media coverage and response from publication houses also need to be updated for future. 

To help you speed up this process and maintain a media list properly, here are the STEPS TO UPDATE YOUR MEDIA LIST: 

STEP 1: How to update Media Lists? 

Steps to manually keep up-to-date your list:

  1. Eye on their social media portfolio – Keeping a tab on LinkedIn account, Google search, social media platforms give immense information about their status. Journalists often change their streamline or leave the media industry. Reporters when joining a new place, they update their current work status on their social media platforms.
  2. Regular check their publications – Frequently map their publications to see if they are regularly visible on their website or have left the house. 
  3. Frequent communication with journalists – Basically, when a PR firm communicates with reporters on special occasions and important sessions, it automatically builds the coordination and fosters healthy relationship further. Also, it enables you to give frequent updates about your company.

When you get the updates about the Journalists accordingly refresh the list;

Refresh the list: With time, new media contacts add, some reporters switch publication houses and some leave the media industry. So timely, update the changes in the list. This information is gathered through the above-mentioned points only. 

Step 2: Cultivate Relationships with Journalists

After making a solid press list, we need to build healthy connections with journalists to pitch the release and get media attention. Media persons and influencers decide where to position your news exponentially. 

Here’s the ways to keep in-touch with them;

  • Engage them with Content:

Enquire about new stories, trending topics and some other information to maintain the connection. 

  • Pitch your Releases:

A good PR strategy is to build a rapport with the media. It enhances credibility, and gives you the right kind of attention from them. Kindly and softly pitch your releases to the media contacts. 

  • Nurture the Relationship:

Connect personally to provide value to journalists through exclusive access to make them feel important. 

  • Follow-Ups:

Continuous follow-up with journalists about your press release in a calm tone.

  • Personalized Messages:

Send best wishes on every occasion to maintain communication and make them feel delighted. 

Measuring the Effectiveness of List 

You have nurtured your own media list now it’s apt time to check if your media list is worth it.  

To know the relevance of your press distribution list, disseminate your press release to media outlets and check the response.

To start, follow these steps to track your media coverage;

Write a press release and send it to the media contacts.

  • Next day, track the coverage your press release gained. 
  • After one week, make an analytical weekly coverage report on how much coverage you got?
  • Acknowledge the publications covering your news story regularly with adequate space. Make a report and include the titles mentioned below:
  1. Publication Name
  2. Coverage size
  3. Story published with or without image
  4. Day of coverage 
  • Re-edit your list: After circulating a news story to the same list 2 or more times, you will figure out the journalists do not fit to your lists and the reporters who are not interested in taking your story. After getting inputs, rework on your press list. 

At the end, final report will be quite helpful and useful to gain digital footprints for your brand. 

How NewsVoir can help you in this task? 

Every organization nowadays aspires to explore easiest methods to disseminate their message to wider reach. 

The divergence of media has created a plethora of options to disseminate your message to the audience that includes; Print media, Electronic Media, PR agencies, Press release distribution services and bloggers. 

NewsVoir a single window solution to outreach to journalists, can be a great option for any organization to get guaranteed media visibility. They have a network of journalists and send your press releases to top-tier publications. These platforms assure media visibility to all sizes of brands on national, regional and global platforms. 

Being a press release distribution platform, NewsVoir has established friendly connections with journalists of every niche which pick your news easily and publish on their platforms at national/regional and global level. 

NewsVoir is a cost-effective medium to assist all sizes of brands to reach hundreds of publications with just one press release, attracting millions of potential customers and great SEO management. Media team map the journalists and update every inch of the list on a regular basis.

To exercise interesting PR strategies, reach out to us for exemplary services. 

Expert Tips to curate a Media List:

  1. Formatting of a sheet: The format of the media list is very important.  Keep the format of the media sheet the same as it can create confusion.
  2. Use a collaborative tool like Google sheet to create a media list that can be shared with multiple people. 
  3. To create and manage media lists effortlessly, try the tool; Media Profiler. 
  4. Always check and save the social handles of every Journalist to keep updated. 
  5. Media list should be arranged alphabetically according to publications. 
  6. Try to find the contact number of every journalist to build healthy relationships and maintain good communication with all. 

The End

It’s high time to bid an adieu to old versions of media lists and unleash new updated versions of lists. Media contact list made wisely proven to be a valuable asset for years to come. 

Building press distribution lists is an important element for any PR firm or organization craving for media visibility. It saves your time, effort and money. A media database list keeps you organized and makes it easier to effectively advertise your company or brand.

This industry is very dynamic. Journalists often change media houses, beat or the industry. Therefore, the existing media database sheet needs to be updated with time. To edit the changes, it’s mandatory to maintain connections with people in your media lists. 

You can make this investment fruitful if you treat them in a calm and pleasing situation as in future, they offer you broad media visibility. Making a database sheet has proven to be a useful tool to enhance a brand’s name without involving paid advertisements. 

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