How Does Your Online Media Room Rate?

Setting up an online press room on your website is an important way for you to show the media you mean business. The simple task of dedicating an area of you site specifically for the media can save you the expense and time of using postal mail, help reporters and producers to conveniently meet their deadlines, and impress your target audience and potential clients.

The following is a list of items you should include in an online press room:

*Contact information. Offer specific and accurate contactinformation to make it easier for reporters, producers, and editors to reach you.

*A link to prior press releases. Demonstrate your credibility by posting press releases that either you have written or has been written about you.

* About the company. In the online press room, offer briefly the mission of the company and remind them what it is that your business can do for them.

* Bios. Present to readers background information about you as the owner of the business and mention degrees, accreditations, or awards.

* Company fact sheet. A fact sheet offers the basic information about your business that clients and media outlets would want to know.

*Facts concerning your expertise. Offer findings and statistics to demonstrate and reinforce the importance of your field and how those facts are newsworthy.

* FAQs. Listing frequently asked questions can help address what reporters and clients want to ask about in addition to their concerns without wasting the time of exchanging emails.

* A photograph. A picture can be used by reporters or producers when quoting you as an expert source and also creates a source of familiarity with clients over the vastness of the World Wide Web.

*Client list. Mention clients that you have dealt with in the past. This can reinforce the success of your business with its obviously long client list or it can present known names that generates a boost of credibility.

* Story ideas. Listing story ideas in your field of expertise can give reporters topic ideas to cover. This list is especially helpful when journalists have to meet a close deadline.

*Articles. Including articles that you have written shows and proves what you can do. Also, with your permission, these articles can also be used by media outlets to republish.

Almost as important as the content of an online press room is the way in which the content is presented.

Follow these tips to finalize the creation of a great media room:

1. Make sure your media room is easy to find. Always include a link that is easy to spot. It can be called a 'media room,' 'press room,' or under 'about us.'

2. Use the HTML format on regular web pages. Keep things simple to read and easy to access with a basic format that won't discourage visitors.

3. Include downloadable files. Always offer a link to past articles, photographs, or press releases to be used electronically or for print.

4. Remember that the World Wide Web is global in search. Unless your company is only interested in generating business within the United States, try to use words that are universal so that it can
come up in searches made internationally. Do not include cultural slangs or American terminologies.

About The Author-- Shannon Cherry, APR, MA helps businesses, entrepreneurs and nonprofit organizations to be heard. Subscribe today for Be Heard! a FREE biweekly ezine and get a FREE special report. Go to: www.beheardsolutions.com/pop.html

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