Get Featured in The Indianapolis Star

Ask any owner who has emailed a local newsroom about a grand opening: a reply is far from certain. The Indianapolis Star has a whole community to cover with a finite staff, and a pitch from a stranger is easy to set aside. A guaranteed placement works differently: it is arranged with the publication before any writing starts, you sign off on the draft, and it goes live on indystar.com within a window stated in writing, 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 The Indianapolis Star covers

Every community has stories that never reach a national outlet: a new clinic, a restaurant changing hands, a nonprofit campaign, a planning decision, a team’s season. Local news publications exist to report them. The Indianapolis Star is one such publication, serving readers in Indiana, and its coverage, published at indystar.com, is built around what is happening in its own area and who is involved.

Local publications favor concrete detail over big claims. Where is it, when does it open, who runs it, what does it mean for the neighborhood. A story that answers those questions plainly reads like news. That applies equally to a family business, a medical or legal practice, a charity, a festival or a company arriving from elsewhere, and it is the standard a feature should meet.

Who reads The Indianapolis Star

People read a local publication because it is about their own streets, schools and businesses. The audience for The Indianapolis Star is that kind of reader in Indiana: homeowners and renters, parents, shop and restaurant owners, professionals, civic and nonprofit leaders. These are the same people who choose a local doctor, lawyer, agent, contractor or place to eat.

For a local business or practice, that makes an Indianapolis Star feature a way to be seen by the people most likely to become customers, clients or patients. It is also a credential you can show: local news coverage tells prospects, partners, lenders and landlords that your work is known in the community you serve.

Why coverage in Indiana matters

Local trust is built close to home. When The Indianapolis Star covers a company, readers in Indiana see it in a setting they know, alongside news about their own communities. That context helps with customers who prefer to buy nearby, with partners who want to work with established local names, and with anyone in Indiana who checks your background before reaching out.

Demand comes mostly from businesses with a physical presence in Indiana: shops, clinics, firms, studios and venues that want more people nearby to know them. It also comes from entrepreneurs raising their profile ahead of a local launch, and from companies headquartered elsewhere that are hiring or opening in Indiana.

The question every local reader asks is simple: what does this have to do with here? A good feature answers it in the first lines. That can be an address, a hometown, a local client base, a community project or a new service for residents. Everything else in the story builds on that connection.

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.