By Sentara Jones
In my last post, I took guys through the grueling process of updating TV schedules. The experience I would like to discuss this time is somewhat similar. I believe creating media contact lists are similar to scheduling because they both possess the research factor.
I actually enjoyed creating media contact lists because it made me feel as though I knew a lot of people. But the truth is I didn’t know any of them! Nevertheless, it still made me feel important. The simple part of creating media contact lists is gathering the names of people you are targeting. Then comes the hard part but you may know it by the name research. It was my job to enter 60 names into a spread sheet and fill in the contact info. The contact info included names, email addresses, phone numbers, and websites. Because I worked for WKNO, I was targeting independent schools. The purpose of the contact lists was to have an avenue to reach these schools about educational TV programs and fundraisers that PBS/WKNO were involved in. the goal was to get them involved as well.
Originally, I searched the schools’ website for contact info. I ran into several problems here. Most independent schools have more than one branch of students, so they have more than one principal. And they are all separated according to grade level. For each school, I had to figure out who was the best contact because I only needed one. Another problem I encountered was the lack of updated information. Some of the websites had no contact info at all which made me dig deeper. I imagine that the creation of this list would have been much more difficult if I had to find personal contacts that don’t have a company website! I don’t know why the media contact list made me feel so important. Then again, maybe it’s because they actually are important. How could we do business with anyone without contacting them?!
Follow Sentara on Twitter @PR_Perfection
In my last post, I took guys through the grueling process of updating TV schedules. The experience I would like to discuss this time is somewhat similar. I believe creating media contact lists are similar to scheduling because they both possess the research factor.
I actually enjoyed creating media contact lists because it made me feel as though I knew a lot of people. But the truth is I didn’t know any of them! Nevertheless, it still made me feel important. The simple part of creating media contact lists is gathering the names of people you are targeting. Then comes the hard part but you may know it by the name research. It was my job to enter 60 names into a spread sheet and fill in the contact info. The contact info included names, email addresses, phone numbers, and websites. Because I worked for WKNO, I was targeting independent schools. The purpose of the contact lists was to have an avenue to reach these schools about educational TV programs and fundraisers that PBS/WKNO were involved in. the goal was to get them involved as well.
Originally, I searched the schools’ website for contact info. I ran into several problems here. Most independent schools have more than one branch of students, so they have more than one principal. And they are all separated according to grade level. For each school, I had to figure out who was the best contact because I only needed one. Another problem I encountered was the lack of updated information. Some of the websites had no contact info at all which made me dig deeper. I imagine that the creation of this list would have been much more difficult if I had to find personal contacts that don’t have a company website! I don’t know why the media contact list made me feel so important. Then again, maybe it’s because they actually are important. How could we do business with anyone without contacting them?!
Follow Sentara on Twitter @PR_Perfection