Before you pitch an editor or blogger, you want to make sure that you have the following in place:
– professional-looking photos of every individual product, as well as group product shots on a white/transparent background AND in a lifestyle format
– your own website – magazine editors and bloggers will want to link back to your site and they’ll want to see your branding before they mention you to make sure that it’s a good fit for their audience. If you only have an Etsy shop, for example, it’s hard for them to get to know YOU and YOUR STORY.
– product available and ready to ship – the media will often request a sample of your products to test, try or take photos of. You have to have the product available to ship to them as soon as they need it
– patience – publicity is not a one-time thing. It’s an ongoing effort that requires persistence and patience.

Unfortunately, we are not able to take a look at your email pitch and make suggestions/changes, but you will have access to a few sample pitches that worked in the past

At this time, we only accept entrepreneurs whose business has a presence in the United States and Canada. This is because sometimes you will have to overnight samples to editors and this is quite expensive to do if you are outside of the US or Canada. Also, editors and bloggers are more likely to write about products that their readers can get shipped from the US  or Canada (to minimize shipping charges), so your chances of being featured are much higher if your business has a presence in the US/Canada. Also, we don’t currently have a lot of relationships/access to media outlets outside of the US/Canada.

The underlying idea is similar to that of HARO. However, there are quite a few differences:

– HARO is overwhelming for both entrepreneurs and reporters. With over 130,000 subscribers to its service, competition is quite high. Reporters often get 100+ pitches for each query (and I can attest to that because I’ve used HARO as a reporter and the amount of responses was overwhelming!). On HARO, it’s a lot more difficult to get noticed.
– HARO is not product-focused. Most of the queries on HARO are for services and experts, not products. There is a gift bag request email, but most of those require you to send a ton of product to an unknown event.
– HARO is time-consuming. You have to look through more than 150 queries each day to see if one is a good fit for your brand.

Please note: I think HARO is a great service and I’ve personally used it to get my products and services featured in the media, bit it’s not geared towards entrepreneurs with a product.

It takes a few of us HOURS each day to find these publicity opportunities, upload them to our database, communicate with the media and let you know about them. This is an extremely time-intensive service on our end and we would go broke if we didn’t charge a monthly fee. Our fee is minimal compared to what a traditional PR agency charges (anywhere from $2,000 to $10,000 per month).

Plus, we want to work with entrepreneurs who are committed and willing to invest in their success. We found that only about 20% of people show up and take action for something free, but over 90% show up and take action when they have paid for it. We want MEDIA LEADS to be a hub of success and investing money and time in your business is one way to hold yourself accountable for your own success.

We also understand that not everyone is able to invest $99 per month for this service right now. While we get that, it’s important for us to work with clients who are willing and able to invest in their business because those are the clients who often see success with publicity. If you are not yet able to invest money for PR right now, we hope that you will be able to in the near future.

You can pay with Visa, Master Card, American Express and Discover. Unfortunately, we are not able to take PayPal.

You’ll find queries from National Magazines (like Real Simple, Martha Stewart Weddings, Fitness, Self, Time, etc.), Regional Magazines (like Time Out NY, San Diego Family, Miami Magazine, etc.), Trade Magazines (like Gift Shop Magazine, American Spa, Museum Stores, etc.) and Influential Bloggers. We also have a few queries from TV shows and podcasts, although this is not our main focus right now.

You’ll find the magazine’s monthly circulation numbers listed with each query. Where available, we also list the blog’s unique monthly traffic. We also strive to work with bloggers whose Alexa rating is below 100,000 (the lower the rating, the more traffic/popularity a blog has). You can go to www.alexa.com to get each blogger’s rating.

We strive to get requests for a variety of products, including:
– apparel
– accessories
– jewelry
– baby & kids
– bath & beauty
– eco, organic and natural products
– home decor
– stationery
– home & garden
– parenting
– general consumer products
– women’s products
– men’s products
– outdoor gear
– gifts
– food
– pet

We don’t cover books, CD’s, video games, apps, or services.

We receive queries on an almost daily basis and will update those as soon as they are available. As soon as something new is added to the membership area, you’ll be notified via email.

We want you to succeed! If you need to get in touch with a specific editor (for example, the Accessories Editor for Pregnancy & Newborn magazine), but they don’t have an active request in the database, you can use the contact form here and let us know. We will do our best to find their contact info and share their email/phone # with you. It’s another way we help you take charge of your own publicity.

Unfortunately, we cannot guarantee results because we have no control over what editors and bloggers ultimately choose to write about. Actually, no PR firm or service can guarantee results, unfortunately. Publicity is often a numbers game and the more pitches you make the more likely you are to get your products featured. For example, if you only pitch one opportunity per month, your chances of getting featured are much smaller than if you pitch ten opportunities per month. The more “shots” you take, the better your chances are of being featured.

Not at all! We actually envision PR firms as being members as well. We started this to help entrepreneurs who want to take full control of their PR efforts and who might not have a monthly budget of $2,000-$10,000 to pay for a PR firm.

We value the hard work that PR agencies do and our goal is not to put them out of business. Our goal is to make it easy for EVERYONE, whether it’s an individual brand or a PR agency, to get access to the media.

No, unfortunately. Right now our focus is on working with individual brands and entrepreneurs who might not have access to these resources.

It depends. Some editors and bloggers have asked us not to share their email address. In that case, you’ll be able to pitch your products via an online form that goes directly to their email inbox. They will still get your message, but you don’t have access to their email address unless they respond back to you.

I always recommend that EVERYONE have their own website in addition to their Etsy shop, but, at the same time, I don’t want you to lose out on publicity opportunities because you don’t have your own site. I have definitely seen some magazines that mention products from Etsy and a lot of them even have a handmade gifts as a theme for their holiday gift guide.

You should sign up and start pitching and at the same time work on getting a site up, even if you’re not selling products directly on there (but you can direct people to your Etsy shop from your site).

While we don’t have a definite number set, we want everyone to be as successful as possible so we are going to limit the number of members at certain times throughout the year. We don’t want to have 200 jewelry designers pitch for the same feature at once. The number of members depends on the product categories that we have pitches available for. For example, if there are no apparel designers as members but we have queries from editors looking for apparel, we’re going to be actively recruiting apparel entrepreneurs. And if we have 100 baby & kids products, we might also temporarily close membership to anyone who has baby & kids products. This is to ensure that each member has a fair chance of getting their products featured.

Absolutely! You can cancel your membership any time and your membership ends on the day you cancel. However, there are no refunds on unused membership, meaning that if you cancel your membership two weeks after you start and there are still two weeks left in your membership, you won’t receive a pro-rated refund on the unused weeks.

Yes, your membership is automatically renewed based on the original membership length, unless you decide to cancel.

You can cancel any time by logging into your account and going to the MY ACCOUNT tab. There, you’ll see a link to cancel your membership. Your access to the members area will end on that day you cancel. Please note that there are no refunds.

If you still have a question, contact us and we’ll get back to you right away.