A media kit, or press kit, is a website page that makes it easier for influencers to understand and share your story. If you want to attract publicity that isn’t purchased, you’re ready to enjoy the benefits of an online media kit.
- Your media kit can build credibility. It’s like a friendly press release working for you 24/7, sharing condensed, polished messages for any visitors with a platform, including reporters, bloggers, podcasters, etc.
- Your media kit makes it easier to control (or suggest) the screenshots or photos of you and/or your books that will be used when others are telling your story.
Craft it.
Media kits are as unique as the people and businesses that create them, and you can always “edit” a kit, adding or subtracting material as your career changes. Your complete media kit could include some or all of the components described below.
- Headshots and/or photos of you at work, such as speaking, writing or coaching.
- “Photo credit: [photographer’s name]” can indicate a requested – or required – caption.
- Consider adding download buttons for high-resolution and low-resolution versions of your best photos.
- If you’re offering only color photographs, have you tested these as black-and-white images? Get photo optimization tips in my related article, Be News-Ready.
- Links to any recent press releases as well as articles you’ve written or features that mentioned your work or quoted you as an expert.
- Short guides, overviews or excerpts of your work, curated to answer common questions from media or influencers vs. typical website visitors.
- For example, a press kit aimed at potential advertisers or event sponsors could offer a colorful “lookbook” as a PDF, with statistics, including demographic data, about website visitors, newsletter readers, event attendees and more.
- A speaker might include a “one-sheet,” a single-sided flyer with a brief biography as well as what the speaker offers audiences, from featured titles to presentation styles. (Is your style interactive? Are you an entertainer, teacher or both? Do you work primarily with large audiences from a stage or do you enjoy speaking to a variety of groups, small to large?)
Building your media kit is a great opportunity to reconsider your website as a whole, as well as your social media properties. The core messages and “voice” in your media kit should match the core messages and voice throughout your website and other resources. Consistency is your goal, not redundancy; it’s a balancing act.
After completing your media kit, revisit your About page. Your About page should be short, describing the experience of working with you, not just who you are or how you work. Think “invitation,” with links for information.
Now that you have a media kit, you might want to revise and even shorten parts of your website, since an audience member or coaching client would probably want different material than someone writing about you.
Place it.
A media kit is designed to be pulled, not pushed. This resource is ready and waiting when someone wants to consider hiring you, writing about you or featuring you as a guest on their podcast or other media outlet.
To share your media kit without any extra effort, make it easy to locate. Depending on your website’s architecture and content strategy, you could place a link to the media kit page (or a list of links to individual contents) on your About page or Contact page. A Press page highlighting or linking to articles and posts about you could also contain your media kit as a single link or a list of links.
Candace Schilling, publicist, offers PR Communication and Training to spiritual teachers and faith-based communities. For more inspiration as well as tips about marketing and strategic communication, check out her articles or find Candace on LinkedIn.