Media Kit
Definition
A media kit is a sales document for attention. Publishers, newsletters, podcasts, conferences and individual creators all produce one, and the contents are much the same: a description of the audience, measured figures for reach, a breakdown by geography or job title where that exists, the available formats with their specifications, a rate card, past sponsors, and a contact. The figures need to be real and dated, because a buyer will compare them with whatever third-party numbers they have. The overlap with a press kit is where the confusion comes from. A press kit gives a journalist the material to write about you; a media kit gives a buyer the case for spending money with you.
Why It Matters
Sponsorship conversations stall on missing numbers. A buyer with a budget and three options in front of them moves on the one that answered the questions, and a kit that leaves the rates out simply pushes the conversation a week later. Keeping the kit at a fixed address also solves the recurring version problem: rates change every year, and a file sent in January is still being circulated in October. Publishing rather than attaching means the version somebody forwards is the version you are currently selling, not the one you were selling three rate cards ago.
How It Works
Take the figures from whatever actually measures them — the newsletter platform, the podcast host, the site's web analytics — and put the date of measurement next to each one. Set out the formats with their specifications: pixel dimensions, file size caps, character counts, lead times. State the rates, or state a range and say what moves it. Publish as a page or a compact PDF, and use password protection or a lead capture form only where the rates are genuinely negotiated rather than listed. Update the file in place each quarter so the address in your email signature never has to change.
Real-World Example
A newsletter writer publishes a kit at fieldnotes-media.99helpers.site showing subscriber count, open rate and the two sponsorship slots with their prices, each figure dated to the start of the month. A prospective sponsor forwards the link to a colleague, who checks the artwork specifications and sends files the same day. When the rate rises in the new year, the writer replaces the file at the same address; the old figures stay in the version history, and nobody is quoting last year's price from a saved attachment.
Common Mistakes
- ✕Publishing reach figures with no date against them — a buyer cannot tell whether the number is from last month or three years ago, and will assume the less flattering answer
- ✕Leaving the rates out to force a conversation — some buyers will book that call, and the rest will quietly pick a publisher who published theirs
- ✕Reusing the press kit and adding prices to it — the tone is wrong in both directions, and neither audience gets the document they came for
Related Terms
Press Kit
A press kit is the material a journalist needs in order to write about you without emailing to ask: a description of the organisation, logos, photographs, biographies, and a contact who answers.
Price List
A price list is the document that states what each thing costs. It is short, it changes often, and it is the page customers check before they pick up the phone.
Lead Capture Form
A short form shown in front of a hosted file or site: the visitor gives a name and an email, the content opens, and the answer lands in the owner's dashboard.
Web Analytics
Measuring who visits a site and what they look at. The two methods — a script running in the visitor's browser, or counting each request as it is served — produce different numbers, and neither of them is wrong.
PDF Hosting
Publishing a .pdf at a web address so it opens in the reader's browser rather than landing in their downloads folder. The header the host sends decides which of those happens.
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