USING SOCIAL MEDIA TO NETWORK WITH TRADITIONAL MEDIA

Whether you’re an entrepreneur establishing a name for an early stage company or a fully mature company looking for new avenues to promote your business, integrating social media and networking into your public relations strategy makes good sense.

Why? Social media is the wave of the future in mass communications, as sites like Facebook and Twitter command more and more attention from consumers. Recent studies show that 20 percent of online ad impressions come from social networking sites. We are already seeing successful marketing and public relations campaigns that utilize social media as a key component.

Even traditional media are realizing that they must embrace social media now in order to remain competitive. As a result, social media has become an efficient way to establish new relationships with reporters and strengthen existing ones. Already, we have been successful at pitching reporters via Twitter. By adding reporters that we know as friends on Facebook, we are able to get to know them better.

Three of our favorite social networks that we use effectively for our firm and on behalf of our clients are ReportingOn, Help a Reporter Out and PitchEngine, each with unique attributes and all worth knowing about.

ReportingOn is a media tool that PR professionals use to identify and pitch stories to reporters. ReportingOn gives a reporter the capability to discuss their beat, or seek expert sources or information on stories they’re preparing to write. As PR practitioners, we use ReportingOn to pitch stories to targeted audiences, network with reporters to establish valuable relationships, and at any given time see what member-journalists are writing about, which provides us with ideas on stories and trends. www.reportingon.com

Help a Reporter Out (HARO) is another social media network that is an outstanding resource for journalists looking for story sources and PR types looking to place stories. Once registered, you will receive three daily emails from the source-site (Peter Shankman, self-proclaimed entrepreneur and adventurist) each with anywhere from 15-30 queries per email. www.helpareporter.com

Lastly, we have PitchEngine, which is best described as an evolved wire service. PitchEngine provides a platform for creating social media releases that enables PR strategists to effectively package stories and share them not only with journalists, bloggers and influencers worldwide, but also directly with their audience via the Web. Social media releases can include images, video and tools for sharing news via social sites such as Twitter and Digg. www.pitchengine.com

For an entrepreneur with a new or recently-funded product or service, getting the word out to the right audience, with the right call to action, is critical. Now’s the time to embrace the new media options that are right for your company and gain that competitive edge.