How to Prepare Your Brand for a Major Media Hit

There’s more to major media hits than simply getting the placement. 

If you or your publicity team have recently secured an opportunity featuring your product in a top-tier outlet—whether TV, radio, or editorial—congratulations! Now is not the time to sit on your laurels, though. Especially if you’re a small business, the work you do to prepare before the hit goes live, in anticipation of an uptick in website traffic and sales, is going to be KEY to continued success. Ample prep will help you retain the customers you gain post-coverage, leverage the outlet’s audience to the greatest effect, and pave the way for other brand-boosting pickups. 

Being able to leverage your media coverage to translate into ongoing sales is a major element of a successful PR program, so we’ve created a step-by-step guide to preparing your brand for the aftereffects of press with a large reach.

Step 1: WEBSITE & MESSAGING

Doing regular maintenance and updates to your business’ website should be on the agenda every few months to make sure it’s accurately reflecting your stock and brand message. Prior to a big media hit, that refresh needs to be *extra* detail-oriented. Before major coverage goes live, we always recommend that our clients ensure that their website is representing their brand presence and messaging the way they’d like. It might be some site visitor’s first interaction with the company and good first impressions are crucial in the CPG business. 

Ordering and product stock systems need to be functional, and it doesn’t hurt to sweep through for typos and visual aesthetics. Any slight copy/description error or toggle misplacement can lower the consumer’s perception of a brand. The TV segment, radio show, or editorial feature grabbing its audience can lead potential customers to visit the website in a split-second decision, and perhaps just the once. Don’t let an avoidable issue prevent product sales! 

On a more technical level, you want to make sure that the website won’t crash. If you’ve been holding out on a rebrand or contracting out a professional design touch-up, now is the time! Work with your digital marketing team and retarget for the increased web traffic that you will experience in the hours and days after the hit airs/publishes. 

Of course, outages happen. Should you have a huge hit with traffic that jams up your site, be ready to hop on social media to share an update. Be honest and tell followers that your site is down due to overwhelming demand, and ask them to check back later.

Action Item: Create a way to capture customer emails (if appropriate) to build an email marketing list.

Step 2: STOCK 

Ask your publicist or brands who have received similar features about order rates after top tier coverage so you can prepare your product stock accordingly. It’s important to balance your own comfort with investment in your inventory and the potential upside of overstocking. We ask that our clients have a plan in place if they do go out of stock. Will it be to offer a gift card? An alternate product? A waitlist? It’s all about retaining the customer, and if there isn’t an alternative to purchasing that will get them back to the site, those are sales lost. 

On that note, you want to make sure you’re prepared to communicate well about shipping/order delays due to volume...especially during the holidays. 

Step 3: STAFF 

Beyond web and stock prep, we like to emphasize that small business transactions are all about human interaction. It’s essential to have staffing ready to answer all customer service inquiries and any product or delivery questions as they come in.

If you are expecting a national media hit – particularly something on broadcast – we recommend overstaffing for the exact air time of the coverage and for the hours following, as this is when the business will see the biggest uptick in orders. 

Step 4: AMPLIFY

After the hit goes live, the hard work on the business end has been worth it. Now it’s time to let the outlet’s audience base work overtime (and overnight!). We recommend that our clients leverage major media coverage and post about it on their website and on all social media platforms. Beyond publishing it on an “As Seen In” or “Press” section on your site, you’re going to want to boost it on Instagram, LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter etc. for additional passive visibility. 

Action Item: Tag the outlet and reporter if possible! Occasionally the outlet’s account will repost a mention, driving their follower base to your channels.

It’s also helpful to link to the feature in email newsletters or promotional materials going out to customers. Seeing top-tier recognition, especially in an outlet that’s familiar to a customer, boosts brand image and connection. 

Step 5: RETARGETING

We advise most of our consumer clients to have a paid digital marketing strategy in place to complement their PR strategy. Work with your digital ads team to retarget your website visitors after any traffic increase. Ensure they are ready with retargeting ads – perhaps even ads that show the exact media hit that brought them to the site to begin with, or others that complement it. Or maybe you want to offer a deal or promotion to onboard new customers. Have those conversations with your digital team prior to the media hit so you are able to leverage any traffic that doesn’t convert and see long-tail effects from your media hit.