How I got my iPhone app on the news
February 21, 2025It was the evening of November 9th, 2023 and my iPhone app had just gone live in the App Store.
I also had a Volo kickball game that night so I brought a bunch of $2 bills to the bar after the game and offered anyone who downloaded the app $2 off their beer.
This method worked pretty well, but I was only in one kickball league so I couldn’t recreate the effect.
During my time at UCSB I had gotten on KEYT news twice, so I decided to try the same in San Diego! Let me walk you through the steps of how I got on 11 news stations all over the country.
It started small and then snowballed.
1) Search “San Diego news stations” on Google
2) Find the “contact us” page or email address
3) Add the info into a google sheet
4) Write a short message to each station and wait for a response.
Here’s what I wrote:
“I have a positive/fun news story to share. A tip for figuring out holiday gifts! With a little bit of magic and your iPhone. Cheerful is a simple iPhone app that creates super personal gift guides in 30 seconds based on the recipient’s interests and your budget. My name is Ben Revzin and I am the co-founder of Cheerful. I would be happy to share more about Cheerful with your viewers! -Ben”
The first station to respond was CBS8 and their response was sent on Wednesday November 22, 2023.
“Ben would you be able to explain to us how this works?
We are thinking Friday.
Mario”
That’s when I learned how quick their turn around times are. If they want to fill a time slot with your story you better be ready for it.
You can see that story here: https://www.cbs8.com/article/news/local/gift-giving-app-ai-technology/509-3d1cfdd1-37cd-407f-b1bc-d7819f96e67d
Once that story was run we saw a nice real-time bump in downloads, so I started to use that video as an example in my outreach.
I asked ChatGPT to “Give me a list of all local TV news stations in California” and then I added those to a spreadsheet, found their contact emails and reached out to each one. Then I went state by state.
It was a LOT of work. Over 500 initial emails and then follow-up emails. Phone calls with news station producers, reporters, etc. and then I filmed B-roll to send to the stations.
The furthest one was all the way in Albany, NY. https://wnyt.com/top-stories/13-investigates/new-ai-app-can-help-you-find-last-minute-christmas-gifts/
So the formula is:
1) Ask ChatGPT for a list of local news stations
2) Put them in a spreadsheet
3) Find their email addresses
4) Send a short, to the point email.
5) Follow up!
If you’d like to know more about the app, you can visit our website Cheerful - personal gift guide. Perfect for last minute gifts
