It’s seven years since the Brexit referendum, and since then all of us working in PR have seen a the fading of what was referred to as ‘silly season’ - the period in late summer when Parliament isn't sitting, and notoriously a good time for PRs to place fun, lighthearted stories in the media.
Nowadays, news is non-stop - just like the football season, some might say. And with news outlets slashing jobs but raising engagement targets, the thought of journalists twiddling their thumbs over the summer months, with nothing to work on, is laughable.
So what does this mean for your media coverage during the summer? How can you maximise your success at landing stories for your brand in national and regional outlets, when editors and writers are being bombarded with news and PR stories?
At GingerComms, we’ve been selling in stories to newsdesks for eight years, day in, day out - whatever the season (silly or not).
As the news agenda has become ever more heavy, the content we produce has had to evolve, as has the way we sell in to media.
So here are our top three tips for landing coverage this summer - and if you’d like to know more, we offer free news clinics which give more information about the media landscape and how to get cut through.
TOP THREE TIPS FOR LANDING PR NEWS COVERAGE THIS SUMMER
1) LIGHT BRIGHT STORIES: Silly season is dead, but the media is craving light and bright stories from PRs, to counterbalance all the doom and gloom. Think heartwarming, relatable stories that celebrate and comfort, rather than trying to newsjack a hard news story (unless your brand is already saying something in that space.) The media loves nostalgia, trends returning - and list based stories that are relatable and bring a smile to your face - for example, the Sky Stream research story about the most puzzling questions in life (how do you pronounce Worcestershire sauce being one of them), that got blanket coverage.
2) WEEKEND PAPERS: If print is your primary goal, consider the weekend papers. There is more space in them for lifestyle stories, and we find that angles around food, travel and leisure do particularly well for weekend outlets. Also, if you’ve sent your release to daily news editors, and it’s not got the attention you expected, sending it to the weekend news desks means they’ll be seeing something new, and will give you a second bite of the cherry.
3) NEWS CONFERENCES : the usual tactic for a sell in to national newspapers is to hit the news desks and wires early in the morning, before the daily news conference when stories will be discussed (usually the conference is around 9.30am). However, online and lifestyle outlets run their conferences at different times of day - for example the Mail Online has its picture conference at around 10am, then a lunchtime conference at 1.30pm ish - and another around 5pm. So knowing the time of the conferences for your target media is key for getting content to them at the right time (not too early, not too late - ideally about an hour before they go in).
GingerComms is a specialist agency, working with PR agencies and brands, to produce consumer research based content for media coverage, across national, regional and broadcast outlets.