Essential Items in your Media Kit
Media Kit
In order to conduct your publicity campaign in an effective manner your company needs a media kit. Whatever your field, a media kit can prove truly effective. If you are an author you will want samples of your writing. If your business sells things, you will want a sample of your product.
In any case, you will need two versions: your print media kit and your online media kit. Some business owners and professionals only need an online kit.
Essentials for a print kit:
The first thing you will need is a company fact sheet. This can be one or two pages and will describe your company, when the company was founded, and give company history. It will also describe your key products or services. It should list any special awards or achievements. It should list key personnel and have their contact information. You will also want your headquarters address, contact information, website, etc.... Include a listing of your company’s financial information which includes revenue as well as the number of employees you have and all of your locations.
In addition to this you will want your company backgrounder. This may include additional information on your company, on the principles of your company, or information about the industry (especially if your company exists in a new industry or one which is rapidly changing).
Include biographies for key personnel including the CEO and president. The biographies should be limited to one page and be written in either text form or bullet form. They should include the name and title, the responsibilities of the individual, their education, any awards, their professional affiliations, their community involvement, personal information if they want, and something of interest that makes that person stand out to the media.
Lastly, you will want press releases. Press releases give the media important information featuring an angle that would be of interest for the media to cover, such as a new product, a new business, extreme growth for a business, new study findings, etc...
Online Press Kit
Online press kits can be used by bloggers who want to interview you on their blog or feature you, by feature writers who are preparing stories in which you/your company may appear, book reviewers, or reporters working on your subject area or you. You may, for example, receive an award and the others will look at your website for information required to do a story on the award.
An online media kit can be available at all times and can include files that a writer may need to reproduce on short notice. You place these kits on your website so they can be accessed anywhere. The first thing you need is a press release which you can use for multiple variations including a new launch, an upcoming product, a big endorsement, a review, etc... You want to also include your bio which will emphasize your authority and target your market. Include testimonials that aim high and influence all potential viewers.
If you are launching a new product or service, include photos that are both sized for web use at 72 dpi as well as print use at 300 dpi. If you have an interview, include it. If you don’t, get interviewed. Then include it. Include your market demographics as well as some product information.
It may be in your best interest to include articles which were written about your company or key personnel, which have been published on websites that receive high traffic.
Hosting Your Online Media Kit
There are different methods for hosting your online media kit. The first is to collect every item including documents, photos, audio files, and compressing them into a zip file which can be downloaded by guests in one click.
The second is to insert text links which link to every piece of your kit so that users can download the pieces that they need in lieu of the entire thing. You can alternatively place your files together into a PDF and offer a link to view/download the PDF.
If you cater to a multitude of audiences, you may want to include all of the aforementioned formats.
