The coverage gained from exposure in the established media (both TV & Press) is far more wide-reaching than the exposure gained just by “walking” and talking to the people who I meet along the way. So when it comes to raising awareness, exposure in the established TV & press is always being sought.
To date, previous walks have been covered by:
STV (the national TV broadcaster in Scotland):
Sunday Post (the second-biggest Scottish Sunday newspaper):
Arran Banner (the weekly newspaper on the Isle of Arran)
The article is not available online, but an image of the printed article (February 25th):
Ayrshire Post (the biggest-selling regional weekly newspaper in Ayrshire – my local newspaper).
Not only was the story featured on the inner pages, as expected, but the Ayrshire Post editor obviously recognised the “local/human interest” value of the story – and splashed a large photograph on the front page!
The article has now made its way onto the online version of the Daily Record (the biggest-selling Scottish daily tabloid newspaper):
http://www.dailyrecord.co.uk/news/local-news/brave-ayr-man-wont-ataxia-8949553
Ataxia Magazine Ataxia UK highlighted the walk through Spain in Issue 196 (page 4):
https://www.ataxia.org.uk/news/ataxia-magazine-196
Like Riding A Bicycle (Travel Blog, written by Danielle Ditzian, who highlights the difficulties of travelling with a disability in her “Inside the Enabled Mindset” series):
http://www.likeridingabicycle.com/ataxia/
Grand Lille TV (the local daily TV News channel in Lille/northern France):
Video clip is unavailable.
Gazzetta di Parma (the local daily newspaper in Parma, Italy).
The article was printed in Italian (for the local audience):
And there’s more….
If this was the sum of the exposure that these walks receive, then I would already be a happy man.
But this is just the icing on the kiltedwalker.com cake.
I take a lot of photographs as I “walk”, and broadcast these, including links to sponsors’ websites/social media pages, “live” (or within a few hours) to my social media audience that now numbers in excess of 23,000 followers. Mainly on Twitter (@ataxiascot).
A new website?
Yes, www.kiltedwalker.com is now www.ataxia.scot (now that a wheelchair has become a bit of a necessity, the “walker” part of Kilted Walker seemed a wee bit redundant).
The kilt will still be worn though (it was rather popular, and when it comes to raising awareness, the kilt is unbeatable).
Great range and scope there.