Noteworthy News –
How to Keep Track of Your Submissions and Publications

Congratulations! You’ve learned how to write, direct, and distribute your press release for maximum exposure in any medium you see fit. What comes next? Well, in order to see how effective your press release campaign has been, you have to monitor the market for your message.

Don’t worry, you won’t have to pull out your phone list and dial up every editor or staff member to whom you submitted the document. There are two simple ways for you to oversee your campaign without resorting to bothering your contacts. After all, you may need them again in the very near future, so you want to stay on friendly terms.

The first way you can keep tabs on your news is to do it yourself. Watch every program, pick up every edition of each publication, and listen to the radio at all times. Not very feasible?

Maybe if you only have one or two outlets, but if you distributed your press release to more than one media contact, and even worse, more than one type of media, you have a problem if you intend to try to monitor all of those avenues single-handedly.

Your client will be checking with you shortly after you distribute the release to see what the results have been. If you want to keep working for them, you’ll need to show how effective you’ve been in garnering their company or organization a piece of the media pie.

If you do have the luxury of only monitoring one target, you’ll still have to work hard to make sure you catch any mention of your work in their publication. It might be easy to monitor a written publication, but if you sent your release to a radio or television station, it’s virtually impossible to listen 100% of the time.

Therefore, the best option you have in keeping track of your press release is to hire someone to do it for you. There are hundreds of services that do nothing but watch, listen, and read the media reports for any remote mention of your company or organization.

Yes, it costs money. But actually, it’s a nominal fee when you compare the cost of tuning in 24 hours a day, or worse, losing your client because you couldn’t prove how beneficial you’ve been in obtaining press space for their needs.

Some clipping services specialize in local area coverage. For instance, www.gnusman.com caters to those who want to monitor Santa Barbara subscription-based media publications. They provide their clients with a mailed or faxed clipping packet every Monday and Thursday that contains all of the clips within your target subject matter. Their subjects include:

• City and/or County Government News
• Environmental News
• Marine News
• Oil & Gas News
• Water News
• Court and Crime News
• Education News
• Local political races
• Custom

Many cities around the country have a personalized clipping service (or more) at their disposal. The subject headings may change, but the point is, you have access to local clips regarding your information.

What does something like this cost? Gnusman.com has a monthly fee that ranges from $50 to $85 per month. Not bad for complete coverage of the entire Santa Monica area, including Santa Barbara, Ventura and San Luis Obispo County newspapers.

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