Get Featured in Journal & Courier

Journal & Courier is a local news publication, and local newsrooms tend to run on small staffs with more story tips than they can follow. Pitches from businesses usually lose out to public meetings, breaking news and school sports, however good the story is. With a guaranteed placement, the outlet is confirmed first, you approve every word, and the article publishes on jconline.com inside the window written into your scope, usually one to two weeks. It is a real article on the site that you can put in a proposal, a deck or a profile.

What Journal & Courier covers

Readers in Indiana have plenty of national and international news to choose from. Journal & Courier does a different job. Local news publications concentrate on a defined area and report what is going on inside it, from civic affairs and the local economy to community events, schools, sports and the arts. The common thread is place: each story matters to someone nearby.

Local reporting treats a community as a set of people and places with names. In that setting, an opening, an expansion, an award, a new hire, a charity drive or a new service is news, provided it is told with facts. Owners, professionals, nonprofits, event organizers and creative people with a local tie are all familiar subjects of this kind of coverage.

Who reads Journal & Courier

A local audience is small compared with a national one, and far more relevant to a local business. Readers of a publication like Journal & Courier live, work, shop and vote in the community it covers in Indiana. Many of them are deciding where to spend money, whom to hire and which organizations to support close to home.

That matters for anyone whose work depends on local reputation. Real estate agents, advisers, physicians, attorneys, contractors and restaurateurs all win business through familiarity and word of mouth. A story in Journal & Courier adds to both, and it can be shared on your site, in your office, in proposals and across your social profiles.

What local coverage in Indiana does for you

A business that serves Indiana benefits from being seen where people in Indiana already get their news. A feature in Journal & Courier places your name in front of nearby customers, suppliers and referral sources who can act on it without leaving the area. It also adds a local reference point for anyone in the state who researches you before making a call or signing an agreement.

Coverage in Indiana is commonly sought by service businesses, restaurants, medical and legal practices, real estate professionals, contractors and nonprofits that depend on local customers. It also suits companies from other states that are opening an office, a store or a franchise location in Indiana and want to introduce themselves to the community.

Out-of-area companies and longtime locals face the same test: is there a reason for people in this community to care? For a newcomer, it may be jobs, a new location or a service not offered nearby. For an established name, it may be growth, history or community work. Either way, specifics carry the story.

Before drafting, we identify the strongest of the angles below. Owners often overlook the story behind the business, such as why they started or whom they serve, and it is frequently the one readers remember.

What weakens a pitch

• Nothing new. A local story needs a reason to run now, such as a date, a change, an event or a recent result.
• Missing details. Without a location, a description of what you do and a clear timeline, a feature reads as generic and local readers move on.
• Claims that cannot be supported. Local readers know the area and will notice exaggeration, and we only write what is accurate.
• A story with no people in it. Community news is about neighbors, so a feature needs an owner, a team or a client perspective.