Media Relations for Craft Chocolate Makers: Industry and Unexpected Outlets for Your Media List
by David Nilsen & Melinda Guerra
Welcome to our Media Relations for Craft Chocolate Makers series! As a food and beverage journalist, I have communicated with thousands of breweries, distilleries, restaurants, chocolate makers, and other businesses, and I’ve seen ones who maximize their relationships with media members and outlets, and ones who are leaving opportunities on the table. Additionally, my wife and business partner, Melinda Guerra, is a freelance PR professional helping brands tell their stories and connect with media. In this series, the two of us will be sharing what we’ve learned over our careers to help craft chocolate companies of any size identify their stories, communicate them to media members and outlets, gain new customers, and keep the ones you have curious.
In part 1 of this series, we talked about why media relations is so important no matter the size of your chocolate business, and why you need to have a strategy for it.
In part 2, we talked about identifying stories and creating a story list.
In Part 3, we looked at how to begin building a media list.
Today, we’re going to talk about how to reach out to craft chocolate-specific media, and how to identify media outlets and journalists from outside craft chocolate that might seem, on the surface, to have nothing to do with our industry, but can be fantastic outlets for the right stories.
Craft Chocolate Media
Now that we’ve established the basics of creating a media list and how to begin populating it, let’s talk about craft chocolate industry-specific media.
First, let’s be frank: the craft chocolate media ecosystem is not robust. We don’t have any dedicated craft chocolate news outlets, and little in way of publications focused on craft chocolate from a journalistic standpoint. Go ahead and make note of Chocolate Professor, as they do cover the industry in a piecemeal way. We don’t have a dedicated print outlet in the wake of Cacao Mag’s demise, though in full disclosure, it’s an idea that continues to come up around Bean to Barstool headquarters.
What craft chocolate does have is a robust grassroots media landscape. This refers to outlets that tell stories to the public outside of a traditional, professional media establishment. This includes podcasts, blogs, newsletters, and social media accounts. We tend to roll our eyes a bit when we hear the word influencer, but that’s the fault of only the worst examples of these types of creators. Craft chocolate has a lot of folks filling this type of role, and is lucky to primarily have pretty conscientious folks sharing stories rather than doing so in an exploitative, manipulative, or artificial way like the worst examples of influencers.
Because the craft chocolate world is relatively small, it doesn’t take a huge following to reach a pretty significant portion of the scene. Bean to barstool’s download stats and Instagram follower numbers aren’t setting any records, and yet I’m consistently surprised when I’m at industry events to hear how many people are following along.
So for the industry section of your media list, look at the podcasts, blogs, newsletters, and Instagram and Facebook accounts that are dedicated to sharing craft chocolate news and stories, because besides being run by nice people you’ll probably enjoy getting to know, those can be really great places for getting a story out to an audience who is predisposed to caring about what you’re doing.
To start out, add all of the ones you can think of or find to the list, and then you can check out their content and if there are any that don’t feel like good fits for you, you can always remove or just deprioritize those later.
I would strongly encourage you to prioritize this. When we’re looking at media coverage, it can be easy to be seduced by the promise or illusion of big numbers when it comes to exposure. But for a small craft chocolate company, there can potentially be as much or more value to your business in 300 dedicated craft chocolate fans reading or hearing your story as 300,000 members of the broader public.
Non-Chocolate Media
The next thing to look at is that vague “Other” category on your media list. This is media that isn’t dedicated to our industry and isn’t local to you, but you could potentially have a story that fits for them. When you think back on the story list we talked about in an earlier post, a lot of those ideas would be potential fits for these outlets. This is a broad category that includes magazines, podcasts, websites, zines, and whatever else you find that doesn’t cover craft chocolate, but might find your story (or one of your stories) compelling.
These are primarily freelance-based publications in which journalists like myself pitch stories. They typically aren’t running off assignments, but accepted pitches. This shifts where you should be focusing our attention away from the outlet itself and onto the individuals journalists and other media members who write for them.
In the case of craft chocolate, this creates an overlap with industry media, because while we don’t have much in way of dedicated media outlets, we do have a number of freelance journalists who cover craft chocolate, usually among other food and beverage focuses. I’m in this category.
You want to get the attention and interest of these journalists, and then see where they can take those stories, whether that’s for current or future craft chocolate publications, other food and beverage outlets (the most likely), or even further afield. Building relationships with journalists is a worthwhile use of your time, because they will do the work of getting that story to a media outlet.
So under “Industry” on your media list, make a list of all the chocolate writers you know. This will include everyone who has published articles or books or done reporting on craft chocolate.
In food and beverage media broadly, very few of us only cover one industry. If we find one artisan food or drink interesting, we’ll probably find another compelling as well once it’s introduced to us. So as you’re reading stories about any kind of food or beverage, if you appreciate a writer’s work, add them to the list as well. Check out some magazines or websites dedicated to coffee, alcoholic drinks, food, cooking, and travel, and pay attention to the articles you enjoy. If you like how a writer covers a topic, add their name to your list, and then you can work on finding their contact information. Letting them know you enjoyed their article is a great way to make an introduction.
Beyond food and drink, the same basic principles apply, but will just require a little more creativity. If you find a story anywhere interesting, or enjoy any journalist’s writing, add them to your list, even if you’re not sure if it’s a fit. Then you can take a look at your extensive story list and see if anything on there might potentially get their attention. Remember, chocolate itself doesn’t have to be the connection.
In the next post, we’ll talk about how and when (and how and when not) to send a press release to media.
Media Relations for Craft Chocolate Makers series
Podcast Episodes
Why You Need a Media Plan
Identifying Your Company’s Stories
How to Build and Manage a Media List
How to Write and Send a Press Release
How to Maintain Media Relationships and Communicate New Stories
How to Get Started, and Common Pitfalls
Blog Posts
Why You Need a Media Plan
How to Identify Your Stories
How to Build a Media List (you’re reading it!)
Industry and Unexpected Outlets for Your Media List
How to Write and Send a Press Release
How to Maintain Media Relationships and Communicate New Stories
How to Get Started, and Common Pitfalls