I’m making a point to keep from making free advice blog posts until after a hard launch. However, upon seeing this, I decided to make an exception.
Brian Gross is one of my peers. When I was in the art department at AVN, he was Vivid Video’s publicist. He tweeted this today.
It’s a funny start to your day if you’re reading a British international news site. The journalist, Kate Mossman, is typically known for editorial content on entertainment, and politics. One of her latest pieces was in the science section. It was regarding fears of returning to normal after Covid. I’d say more, but of course, I hit the paywall typical of high end serious news sites.
So, what does that have to do with your adult oriented company? That’s the problem. Notice in her piece on Gross, she’s been ignoring his e-mails for six years. As publicists, we can tailor the press release for more relevancy to an outlet. We can pitch directly to journalists. We can, do, and should maintain relationships with mainstream writers whenever we can. None of this guarantees your press release hits a mainstream news outlet.
I hear you saying, But! She’s reading and writing about his press releases here and now! She’s reading off a few releases from over the years. Clients come and go.
What you have to seriously consider when hiring a publicist for mainstream is the uphill climb that goes into it. I used to think it was so easy sending out one e-mail to a mountain of contacts. I’d shotgun it out proudly. For better odds, releases need to be sniper fired at targets. We need to dial it in, but even that is not a guarantee.
What do publicists like Brian do that’s so successful? He’s not so much using a shotgun, but instead kissing a lot of frogs. For every time he got a prince, there’s a swamp full of frogs who just skipped his release and moved on. That’s what we all do. The master fails more than the fool tries.
What really works is to keep going. We keep sending adult stuff to the adult press. We keep the momentum going. We keep the word out, and we still send to mainstream. And mainstream does read and keep up with adult press. It’s the hard work, dedication and commitment to the long run that eventually gets you out there and recognized.
Go Baby Go!
Jay
