Want to learn how to newsjack?

23 October 2024

Newsjacking might be a term you’ve not heard or done before but when done correctly it’s an effective, cheap, and simple way to get your business, brand, or charity in front of your key audiences. Here’s how…

What is newsjacking?
Newsjacking focuses on jumping on news stories that you can use and turn to your advantage. Whether it’s a major weather event, something a celebrity has said or done, or new government legislation that may have just become law.

How to do newsjacking?
You can use someone else’s news event by responding via your own social media post, writing an article for your website or customer newsletter, or even reaching out to journalists who have written the original story to see if they are interested in writing a follow-up but this time adding a quote from you or some interesting statistics or data you provide them.

Another tip is monitor on a daily basis Google Trends, conversations on social media called social listening and keep an eye on national awareness days, weeks and months as these could also be topical for news stories.

The good news and (slightly) bad news
The good news is it can be free to do unless you are creating special graphic design assets then you might need to pay for that or in the case of some big businesses who perhaps go one step ahead and create billboard style advertising campaigns.

The slightly bad news is you need to make sure you are reacting sensitively to the original news story and be quick. The whole idea about newsjacking is you are responding to news rapidly, ideally on the same day or latest the next day otherwise the story becomes too old and irrelevant. Start your stopwatch…