Using News Alerts for Publicity and Promotion 

What are "News Alerts" and Why Are they a Pubicity Power Weapon?

You probably don't even know about them. Few people do.

Even fewer people realize how many differ ways you can take advantage of them to get free publicity.

I'm talking about "news alerts."

A number of search engines offer news alerts as a free service.

Google offers Google News Alerts . Look in the column to the left of the page.

Yahoo has a similar service, as do a number of other web portals and news outlets.

These free services are nothing short of a Godsend if you want to get publicity by positioning yourself as an expert with the media.

You can sign up for news alerts for free. Then you fill out a form with keywords of your choice.

You’ll get an email whenever there’s an item in the news almost anywhere in the world related to your keyword. The email contains a link you can click on to be connected to the story.

News alerts allow you to identify and contact the journalist who did the story to suggest a follow up, offer another angle, etc. on the
story they've already done.

You can even set up news alerts to find out when your competitors are getting coverage. That gives you an opportunity to contact the reporter who wrote the story and position yourself as a future resource for similar pieces.

You can also set up your news alerts so that every time your name appears in the media, it sends you an email notification.

It’s a great way to find out when your press releases, tip sheets, or articles have been published. This can be extremely valuable since people who print your stuff don’t always let you know they’re doing it.

Furthermore, when you find out that something by you or about you has been published, you can get copies or reprints to use in a multitude of ways to further establish your credentials with the media.

For instance, can print out stories you may want to include in your media kit, or even mail to journalists to reassure them that your topic really IS newsworthy--and that you indeed ARE an expert in your field.

Few resources match the publicity-generating potential of news alerts. They're easy, versatile, valuable, and best of all--free.