While we at M Communications Inc and M Com Publishing deliver results when it comes to public relations campaigns for both authors and business owners, we wanted to share information on how to maximize your business exposure through conference PR, by offering up a couple of tips and tricks. If you do not have a publicist, these are a couple of marketing techniques you can utilize on your own.
Tip # 1. Obtain the Conference Media List. There are a couple of ways of doing this. Sometimes the actual conference media attendee list is available when you are a sponsor or if you have signed up as a stop on the media tour. This is the most targeted way to reach the actual media in attendance. Other ways to obtain media contacts would be to research what outlets were in attendance from the previous year and contact the outlets direct prior to the conference to see if you can find out who will be in attendance. A quick way to obtain direct contact information, is to purchase a media list (and you can do this just for general PR for your company, not just if you are attending a conference). How? Ask a PR professional who has access to a database, such as Cision.
Tip #2. Walk the Floor. This may sound pretty obvious, but many people miss out on this opportunity. If you are not able to secure a media list prior to the conference, simply grab a program when you get to the conference and plan a time to walk the floor. You should have a media kit/product sample (if possible) in hand with mention of where your booth is located and your contact information. Visit the media booths/press area while attending the conference, give your information to the reporter on site, and ask what stories they are looking for.
Tip #3. Invite the Media to your Booth! If you are able to get your hands on a media list, it is key to email the contacts direct a couple of days before the conference and at the conference inviting the attendees to stop by your booth. You are going to want to have an incentive here – i.e. stop by for a demo and some type of goodie bag. Trust us …. this works. For one of our clients we were able to secure 2 magazine interviews, 2 podcasts and 2 newspaper interviews onsite simply by using this process, pretty cool right? This was all accomplished by a simple email invite to reporters who had downtime during the event itself (probably while in their hotel room checking email).
These are three simple ways to make the most of any conference from a PR perspective and your business will definitely enjoy the media results.
