Featuring your company…

Get your message across in B2B magazines by targeting editorial features lists. This simple strategy is a PR business staple that surprisingly few companies use.

Virtually all B2B magazines run a 12-month cycle of editorial themes. This is mostly to benefit the advertising manager on the magazine who wants something to sell ads against, but it gives you a roadmap to plan your public relations efforts.

Which publications to target, which month
Let’s say you are a leading producer of machinery for potato processing. (You are, aren’t you?) So you’ll need to know when Potato Business World is running an article on slicing and dicing. It’s simple. Go to the website and download a copy of the editorial features list. If you can’t find it, there’s a chance it may just be called ‘Features list’ or it may be part of the information pack for advertisers containing rates and deadlines.

Once you have the list, you can look through and pick out the months when the magazine is running a feature that applies to your product or company. If you’re lucky there’ll be three or four opportunities throughout the year for you to present your company to the magazine’s readers.

Reduce your guesswork with a phone call
Rather than writing a press release about what you want to say, why not call the features editor directly and ask what he or she wants? When it comes to features, journalists want examples of trends, quotes from leading manufacturers on current issues, case stories and pictures, always pictures.

Journalists are under increasing time pressure and most are happy to have articles or parts of articles written for them. So you might increase your chances of getting your article in by doing their work too (smile).

Monthly coverage – a reasonable goal
It is important to be choosy, though, and pick only the magazines you really want to be in. If you go for multiple publications, try to choose magazines with slightly different target groups so you don’t send the same information to competitors. With a small list of just three or four publications, you should have the opportunity to get coverage for your company once a month.

And if you don’t have the time, you can always get those nice people from Eye for Image to write the articles for you.

---

Eye for Image's new recruit Andrew Arnold has worked with B2B magazines for 20 years as a journalist and communications expert. He actually has written articles about slicing and dicing in Potato Business World.