DIY Media Relations

Why hire me when you, too, can plug directly into what national reporters and journalists are looking for?

Why, indeed. I’ve always said that there was no magic to getting press coverage. Just old fashioned shoe leather. If you want to pay me the big bucks to do the legwork for you, I won’t argue. And sometimes, just sometimes, I’ll be able to see a story where none existed before. But most of the time, as several people who aren’t flacks for a living have proved, a little diligence and question-asking will get you, well, maybe not into The Wall Street Journal, but close to it.

Trumpets, please. Now you don’t have to lift a finger. Self-described CEO, entrepreneur and adventurer Peter Shankman is doing all the heavy mental lifting for you. HARO is now making the rounds. At least a dozen clients have breathlessly emailed me this week. Have you seen THIS, they ask?

Have you? This is media relations for the great unwashed. Not the wine of the week/ diamonds for a dollar feeds of yesteryear when companies like Bacon’s charged folks like me a gazillion dollars for precious (and useless) queries from marginal “journalists.” Shankman and his HARO (which stands for Help a Reporter Out. Cute, huh?) have trumped them all. You can subscribe free to his daily feeds which contain real reporters looking for real sources on a wide variety of real stories. It is worth reading because he is very funny, seems to travel the US faster than a speeding bullet, and he has gained the respect of journalists and media groupies alike.

Who knows, you might just find your fifteen minutes of media fame.

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