5 Digital Marketing Tactics That Lead to Free Traditional Media Coverage

With the fast and ruling rise of social media, the debate remains as to whether digital marketing is overpowering traditional marketing. For the most part, digital marketing has taken over due to its influence over Millennials and its more affordable execution. However, what if we told you that digital and traditional marketing could work together; that by investing in one could lead to fruits in the other?

Media companies that offer traditional marketing services, like print ads and radio time, also use and engage in digital marketing strategies. These companies are always on the look out for a great brand story to share. When you strategically invest in key digital marketing tactics, your brand has a greater chance of getting noticed; newspaper, media outlets and magazines are then more likely to run your featured content on their channels.

Maximize your opportunities for capturing the attention of traditional media providers by implementing these five digital marketing tactics.

1. Engage Your Audience With Storytelling.

Don’t: Focus your messaging and content on the selling. While social media is primarily a digital marketing tool for brands, using this platform to primarily sell won’t get you very far.

Do: Focus on storytelling through your messaging and content. Stories are part of human nature. They’re how we’ve shared our history since the dawn of our existence. People turn to social media networks to read stories, be amazed at exciting features, and gain knowledge from uploads and shares. Engage your audience with storytelling and watch your following grow; traditional media companies looking for news and stories will begin to take note and look to you for content for their own storytelling needs.

Check out of how these brands use storytelling to naturally capture attention from third party bloggers and publishers.

2. Invest in Ongoing Video Content.

Don’t: get stuck producing only text-based content. Our online browsing and socializing habits are getting lazier with every passing year. Users are skipping over text-centered social messages in preference around the ease of watching and engaging in visual content.

Do: Queue in the video. Videos are gaining more views and engagement than traditional social media posting. Video is more accessible, less expensive, and more shared today than ever. Harnessing the power of video will help lead to maximum exposure for your brand and current offerings.

See how this promo video tease for Baldy Mountain Resort performed; Baldy fans shared this content more than any other social message. It captured the attention of local media outlets and proved that Baldy is in fact, back.

3. Plan and Participate in Ongoing Events.

Don’t: be of the mindset that if you build it, they will come. Simply having a website and a Facebook page is not enough to capture and keep the attention of your target audience in today’s noisy, crowded digital space.

Do: extend outside your own promotional sphere and partner with online and offline events that compliment your brand and business offering. Events bring dollars and excitement to a community, plus media companies are continuously scouting our events to cover and fuel their own content needs. The Banff YWCA received a significant brand awareness boost after partnering with the 2016 Banff Marathon. Participating in large-scale events that compliment your business can vastly boost your marketing and financial success for the year.

4. Cater Your Content for Different Channels.

Don’t: post the same kind of content to all of your social channels – you’ll fail to deliver the unique user experience that an audience expects on each social platform.

Do: tailor-fit your content for each channel as each social network tends to focus on a particular demographic and social user category. For example, reporters and sales team spend much of their networking and engagement on Twitter whereas Facebook and Instagram draw more time and attention from publishers and editors.

5. Get Creative With Contesting

Don’t: think that by simply giving away some of your products, you will capture the ongoing attention of your target audience and turn them into brand advocates.

Do: involve your targeted audiences directly in your promotional activities. Contests are perfect for driving your audience’s interests while soliciting their participation. Making use of sharing and other viral components available in your social network can bring more exposure for your business as more online users join in, thus increasing the opportunity that these promotional activities get picked up by third party publishers and media sites.

Check out Vans’ ongoing custom culture contest and the buy-in and involvement from participants. It gets shared.

As digital marketing continues to dominate, what you do with your online accounts and social media channels are more important than simply being online. Try implementing the five suggestions above, test which ones work best for you over time, and begin to bask in the light (and promotion) that will come from outside media attention and coverage.