a single source, nothing corroborates it

Write the headline first, then build to it

Settle the sentence you want journalists to write, then reverse engineer a product or campaign until it is true. One team fixed the headline for a novelty confection with something hidden inside, billed as a world first, and built backwards from it. If you make the thing first and go hunting for the angle afterwards it is already too late to add one.

The method

1. 01

   Decide the headline you want written about you before you build anything, then work backwards until that headline is true.

2. 02

   Don't build the idea and go hunting for the angle afterwards; if there is no hook by the time you are finished it is too late to add one.

What it returned

• For a sex toy startup at Easter, the team settled the headline first - a chocolate Easter egg with an adult toy concealed in it, billed as a world first - and reverse-engineered the product from it.

Sources

• A crash course in getting press and building linksHarry Dry · Marketing Examples · Another example · undated