How Do I Turn Survey Results Into News?
Your organization just spent months collecting data, surveying customers or stakeholders, or polling your audience on trends related to your industry. Congratulations. You now have something incredibly valuable.
Now what?
How do you get journalists, stakeholders and your industry to actually pay attention?
Here’s the reality: numbers alone do not make a news story. Unlike Field of Dreams, just because you build it does not mean the journalists will come. Or cover it.
If you expect meaningful media coverage and engagement around your findings, you need a strategy to maximize opportunities not just on launch day, but for months afterward.
Here are a few ways to make your data work harder.
Start with the story, not the spreadsheet. Review the data for trends, surprises and takeaways. Ask yourself: What would someone who has never seen this survey actually care about? Capture those insights in an executive summary that is easy to read and easy to share.
Lose the jargon. Industry terminology may make sense internally, but journalists and the general public want plain English. The easier your findings are to understand, the more likely they are to be used.
Create a news release that highlights the headlines. Share the biggest findings while linking back to the complete report on your website. Make it easy for reporters, bloggers and stakeholders to access the full data set.
Don’t hide the report. Avoid password-protecting your survey whenever possible. If attribution matters, simply request that anyone using the data credits your organization and links back to the original report.
Think beyond one news release. Your survey should become a bylined article, an op-ed, a blog series, speaking points, media interview messaging and future thought leadership. The best data reports continue generating value long after launch day.
Put your leadership front and center. Record short videos with executives discussing the key findings. Offer downloadable clips for media, post them on your website and share them across your social channels.
Build a long-term social media plan. Too often organizations post about their survey once on LinkedIn and never mention it again. Instead, create weeks or even months of content by highlighting different statistics, trends and takeaways over time.
Give others the tools to share it. Develop sample social posts and graphics for board members, partners, employees and industry allies so they can help extend your reach.
Feature it in your owned channels. Include the findings in newsletters, email campaigns, blog posts and presentations. Every audience may find a different takeaway meaningful.
Show the data visually. Infographics, charts and short videos often communicate insights much faster than paragraphs of statistics ever could.
Take it on the road. Encourage leadership to incorporate the findings into conference presentations, webinars and keynote speeches. If appropriate, provide attendees with easy access to the full report through a QR code rather than a thumb drive.
Turn it into more content. Consider recording a podcast episode, hosting a webinar or creating a Q&A around the results. One survey can fuel dozens of pieces of content if approached strategically.
Use it where it strengthens your brand. If the findings support award nominations, grant applications or other organizational recognition, don’t overlook those opportunities.
Think locally as well as nationally. Hyperlocal media often appreciate locally generated data and trends. Don’t forget to tell the story in your own backyard while pursuing broader industry coverage.
The best surveys don’t generate attention because they contain numbers. They generate attention because they tell a story that matters to the people reading it.
If you’ve invested the time and resources to collect meaningful data, don’t let it live and die in a PDF. Give it a strategy, give it a voice and give it a long shelf life.
Need help turning your survey into a year-round communications strategy? We’d love to help.
