Top Tips to get Your Media Strategy up and Running

• Build your media team – or assign media roles within your group or organisation.
• Ensure you have someone who is in charge of dealing with the media.
• Ensure you have a spokesperson who is across all your organisational issues and is comfortable filling that role.
• Refer to the Help Sheet Building a Media Team.

• Build a media contact book. Start by contacting journalists at certain publications and asking if you can send them information or media releases.
• Expand your contact book by continually adding contacts to it, as well as updating the details as media contacts change roles or move around.
• Refer to the Help Sheets Creating a Media Contact Book and Using Your Media Contact Book.

• Be "involved" in the media – study the newspapers, listen to the radio news and watch the TV bulletins.
• It's a great way to learn more about what the media consider newsworthy, how these stories are presented and what you can do to make your stories more attractive.
• When you see another non-profit group featured, ask what it was that made them newsworthy. Was there strong colour and movement? Cute pictures? Case studies or human face? Research results? Strong statement? Impressive speaker? Big crowds? Unique element? Link to other current news?  
• Refer to the Help Sheet Knowing When What you do is News.

• Think about preparing a media release template on your computer.
• That way it's ready to use when you need it and has prompts for all the basic details and other necessities such as headline, date, who it's targeted at, your contact details, organisation logo .
• Another option is to refer to the upcoming Basic Media Release Templates link at the Media & Marketing Centre.

• Practice writing and compiling media releases.
• This will help you and your media team develop a technique that is not only effective but one which your group is comfortable with.
• Make a list of what you consider the most interesting facts that someone outside your organisation might want to know.
• Refer to the Help Sheets Writing a Media Release and Sending a Media Release.

• Put together a guide on organising your group's media conferences or events.
• Like any event, practice makes perfect and a list to practice by, makes perfection more likely.
• List everything you need – speaker, running sheet, backdrop or props, media release or media kit, media alerts, speech or notes, contact book to check who's coming, case studies or examples to reinforce your story, graphs or findings (if it's research) etc etc.
• Refer to the two-part Help Sheet Holding a Press Conference or Media Event.

• Prepare and practice sound bites so they are ready for use and adaptation in television, radio and newspaper interviews.
• Refine your message. Bring it down to a short, sharp phrase that gets your message across and can be used and re-used. Listen to other speakers and see how they come back to two or three key phrases.
• Refer to the Help Sheets Preparing for an Interview and Creating a Tasty Sound Bite.

• Make sure you have plenty of photo or visual opportunities on stand-by to complement or improve the coverage or your group's event.
• Often a good visual or photo opportunity can make the difference between your story getting a little coverage and a lot. How can you find a visual image that can sell your story – and your organisation.
• Refer to the Help Sheet The Importance of Pictures.

• Express an opinion.
• Consider writing letters to the editor, opinion pieces for newspapers or magazines, or contacting talkback radio to have your (and your organisation's) say.  Look at your media release or organisation's newsletter and see if anything could – or should – be refined as an opinion piece.
• Refer to the Help Sheets Letters to the Editor and Becoming an Opinion Leader.

• Constantly review and refine your plans.
• Have in place a procedure which helps your group can review its media strategy so it can be refined or improved on.
• Consider what worked and what didn't after every media contact. Look at what you might have said if asked the same question again. If you didn't get your point across, try, try again.
• Many of the Help Sheets at the Media & Marketing Centre can help you review what you are doing.