10 tips to improve your chances of coverage in the O.R. Daily

Didn’t see your brand or product covered in the last O.R. Daily? While we strive to offer balanced coverage and include as many brands as possible, there are a few reasons why some companies don’t make it.

Here’s how to improve your chances the next time around:

1. Stay up-to-date on O.R. Daily requests, guidelines and deadlines by reading SNEWS (www.outsidebusinessjournal.com), the outdoor industry news leader and publisher of the O.R. Daily. Typically, we’ll make our first call-out for content three months before the show with numerous reminders. There are many different opportunities for free coverage — make sure to read our guidelines all the way through.

2. Because each O.R. Daily issue contains more than 100 pages, and there are five issues to produce, including Day 0, we have to start coverage well before the show. So it’s important to submit information early, and it’s essential to meet deadlines, which are the same every year — in late November for Winter Market and mid-June for Summer Market for popular sections like New Product Gallery and New Exhibitors. We also draw products from the New Product gallery submissions for our Gear Trend stories.

3. Provide high-quality, high-resolution photography. This might be the most important thing you read here. We recently conducted a review to find that about 15 percent of all submissions (or 200 products) were sent with low-res photography. Those images don’t work for print publications; nor do photos taken with a smartphone. Take our advice: Hire a professional photographer and public relations teams that understand what makes for a good photo.

4. Good words are important.We see bad grammar, a lot of fluff with no substance and plenty of disregard to the word limits. Thankfully, there are a lot of great writers in our industry, and those well-written submissions get preference.

5. O.R. Daily readers are unanimous.They want to read about new products they have yet to see. So any product submitted must be new to the trade market. That typically means that it will debut to the consumer the following year. We’ll make exceptions for new exhibitors to Outdoor Retailer, but, in general, if the product has been shown at a previous Summer or Winter Market, we won’t cover it.

6. You must be an official exhibitor at the show to get into the O.R. Daily. Don’t try to pull a fast one on us. We’re armed with the official exhibitor list.

7. Don’t hold back. Some brands want to make a splash at the trade show with a new product and call us a day before with the details. Because we prepare a large chunk of the Gear Trend pages before the show, we might not be able to get it in. It’s better to give us a heads-up a few months before. You can trust our professional reporters to keep everything under wraps until the show.

8. SNEWS is an independent news organizationcontracted to publish O.R. Daily. We approach news with an unbiased eye and we make no guarantees for inclusion in our editorial pages. Product samples don’t influence our coverage. That’s why many retailers will tell you we’re the best in the business and that the O.R. Daily is a must-read every show.

9.Take it from us — veterans in the daily deadline business — don’t wait until the last day to make your submissions. We have easy-to-use forms to submit both your new products and events for the show, but we all know the power of Murphy’s Law. Tell your scribes and photographers the deadline is a week earlier to give yourself a buffer for any surprises or snafus.

10. Buying an ad is the only way to guarantee inclusion among the advertising pages of the O.R. Daily. But space is always limited, so secure yours early. Ads do not sway editorial coverage. To find out more about purchasing ads, email snewssales@aimmedia.com.