#AskJon: How do I prepare for a big media hit?

If you’re fortunate enough to know that a big media hit is coming, here’s a couple of things you can do.

If the goal of the media hit is to drive traffic to a website, and you know it’s going to be big — you’re going to be in the New York Times, you’re going to be on a big online outlet, you’re going to be on the Today Show — make sure that your website has the capability to capture all of that traffic that’s coming.

We’ve had the blessing and curse of having clients on The Today Show, and we knew that the traffic was going to be big, and we told the client to be ready for it. And their website crashed and they lost a great opportunity to share expertise and to sell product on it. So, make sure your website is ready.

And, then, make sure all your promotional channels are ready. Make sure you can capture, if it’s a print hit, that you can make prints right away. If it’s online or video, that you have the ability to share on social channels. And make sure you do it right away, because that news in this 24-hour, seven-day-a-week news cycle is fleeting, so you want to make sure you can leverage it as much as you can, and as quickly as you can, in as many places as you can.