When looking for opportunities for additional brand mentions and impressions, one of the first things that you need to determine is how to find the media outlets, brands, or companies speaking about your brand.
Depending on the scope of your brand, there may be a variety of outlets to choose from. If your brand targets specific consumers, you may want to seek coverage from web-based publications, such as The Huffington Post or Reddit. If you’re primarily focused on the B2C industry, you may opt to focus on online retailers like Amazon, Walmart, Target, or Macy’s.
If you’re focused on the B2B industry, you may wish to reach out to companies looking for marketing opportunities that fit with your product or service. Additionally, if you have a particular topic that you’re an expert in and have been published in the past, or you can be requested to speak on the subject in the future, this would be a great way to get additional mentions in the press.
Once you have identified the media outlets or individuals/companies speaking about your brand, you should determine how to contact them.
There are several ways to do so. The first is simply by writing to the publication directly.
While this method works for many, others may not be in the business of accepting pitches.
If a publication is specifically interested in hearing from you, they will likely respond. If they don’t, then you’ll need to move on to the next option.
The next method is to submit a request through a third-party firm, such as the Submission Direct Form (SDF). This allows you to get in touch with the specific individual or company in charge of the article to provide them with valuable feedback.
The next option is to find a list of publications that are relevant to your brand. You can find this list using any number of search engines or by doing a Google search.
In the SEO world, the best thing to do is get involved in communities that discuss your industry, especially those focused on SEO or digital marketing. In this case, one place to look is the Social Media Examiner.
You can also go to industry blogs or any number of niche or trade magazines that cover your industry.
When finding the specific article and an organization responsible for it, keep in mind that the publisher will have some information available on the company or publication and the article itself.
Additionally, be sure to provide any specific information that may help the publisher determine the best place to focus their coverage.
Once you have the media outlets and publications that you wish to monitor, you will need to keep tabs on various platforms' activity. This will allow you to know when articles have been written and any positive or negative sentiment in regards to the media outlets.
While there are many different ways to track your media coverage, here are a few of the most common options.
Google Analytics is a highly accurate method for tracking media coverage for your brand. When Google Analytics works well for your brand, you can quickly get to the article that generated the most traffic, see how long the article was viewed, and even find out the current ranking.
If the ranking is high, then the article will likely receive a lot of attention.
In the SEO world, there are tools that you can use to create a media monitor, which will track all of the top search engines and social media platforms. You will then be able to see which articles have been the most successful for your brand.
Depending on how much time you have, you can also do a content analysis for each story. This will let you know the title and the URL of each article and how many views the article had about the title.
These services work for tracking and reporting on media coverage, but they can also help you develop content and make a smart writing strategy for your social media and SEO.
To make the most out of your media monitoring tools, be sure to provide the media outlets or individuals with the information they need to best position your brand. This includes who you are and why your brand is relevant to them.
The final step in the process is to utilize content marketing as a whole. Instead of simply publishing content on your blog, you should also make an effort to write in-depth pieces.
These types of articles will make the most impact on search engines.
On the blog, you should make a few different types of posts.
In-depth articles are a great way to provide valuable information to your audience. In these types of articles, you should focus on topics that are relevant to your industry.
This helps the reader better understand what you are talking about to help lead them to purchase or lead them to your website.
Content that addresses a specific topic in your industry can also be a great way to generate sales. These articles can be used to create ongoing content that will help your brand attract new readers.
Lastly, it would help if you also utilized guest blogging to generate more traffic to your brand. When you publish content on your blog that other companies have published on their website, you will likely earn a lot more traffic than if you posted your own content on your own site.
These steps will help you to take the first steps in branding your business. These steps should take you from your company’s name to branding your business, which means a lot more than simply paying someone to create your brand's logo.
