Play It Cool – How Media Pitching is Like Dating

(Guest post by Brandon Burbank, Intern)

Recently, I read an article illustrating the similarities between media relations and dating. How true this can be, especially for new graduates just entering the professional realm of PR. Not knowing what to say, worrying if you’re coming on too strong or playing it too cool, the fear of rejection … one might wonder how the pros in this industry manage to do it every day.

Pitching media can be an adrenaline rush that is reminiscent of asking someone to prom. We’re never sure what the response will be, even when we’ve planned ahead and put our best foot forward. We just hope the response will be a resounding “yes” or even a “maybe!”

There will be times your story will be picked up. Other times, a reporter will decline for any one of many reasons: the story isn’t right for that audience; lack of unique ideas has your pitch being looked over; or bigger news bumped your story. When journalists pass on a story, one breakup cliché comes to mind: It’s not you. It’s me. It might just be your story is missing an element that is attractive to reporters.

Here are some tips to help make media pitching go a little smoother:

Find common interests – Identify how your idea will relate to the reporter’s audience. What do the readers you’re targeting care about most? What makes your pitch newsworthy?

Avoid being a wallflower – What makes your pitch unique? Presenting noteworthy facts or data will grab a reporter’s attention. Stand out or be left unnoticed.

Don’t use the same pickup line – Pitch different aspects of your story to different reporters. Fresh angles will help to avoid your pitch being overlooked.

Eyes forward – Pay attention to how your pitch relates to overall trends and emerging issues. Show reporters how you’re connected to larger trends arising through statistics and anecdotes.

Arrive on time – Your pitch needs to be timely. Reporters have deadlines; stick to them. Journalists are more willing to work with you if you help make their jobs easier.

Dress to impress – Stories with interesting photos, videos or graphics are appealing to journalists. Visuals can add a new dynamic to your pitch that otherwise weren’t there before.

When need be, compromise and adjust – Breaking news will forever bump other stories. Know how to evaluate when this will happen, and find a way to tie your idea into the breaking news.

Be yourself – A personal story makes for some of the best news stories. These descriptions give new life to the story, adding color and depth.

Bringing Credibility to Your Content Marketing

In the last post (http://wp.me/ppqb5-sA), we discussed how Gartner’s Three Cs of Content Marketing – Creation, Curation and Cultivation – hinged upon what we see as the fourth, and most important, C – Credibility.

Ultimately, if your content is not credible, it could end up ineffective … and your effort wasted. But how do you gain credibility?

Because credibility is in the eye of the beholder and because it is earned, not manufactured, it can be HARD to come by.

But there are ways you can help your company earn it. Consider that credibility has two key components: trustworthiness and expertise.

You or your company earn trust by proving your integrity and worth over time through your performance. You perform. You do what you say you’re going to do. You demonstrate you can be relied upon. And you keep at it. Every time. Every day.

As you start to win trust through your performance, there are ways you can enhance and extend it by demonstrating your expertise using some “traditional” PR and media relations approaches, such as:

• Conducting research that will benefit your target audience and sharing the results with them, demonstrating your company is willing to go the extra mile to understand the environment in which your audience must operate;
• Pro-actively reaching out to reporters, analysts and bloggers who follow your industry to volunteer as a source of information, insight and perspective;
• Taking (and promoting) advocacy positions and offering perspectives on industry trends and issues that are bigger than your company;
• Speaking at key industry forums and events – and focusing on your audience’s concerns, not your own key messages;
• Working to generate media coverage in the outlets and platforms that your audience already uses and trusts. No need to reinvent the wheel — the implied third-party endorsement that comes with positive media coverage in trusted media is invaluable. (For example, one story in BusinessWeek magazine generated a C-level meeting and ultimately millions of dollars of new business for one of our clients.); and
• Leveraging opportunities to secure and share endorsements, testimonials, likes and shares throughout the various media platforms that your audiences uses,  to harness the amazing power of endorsement.

Credibility doesn’t come quickly … or easily. And that’s exactly why it is invaluable to your content marketing and your customer relationships.

The Missing “C” of Content Marketing

In a recent blog post (http://tinyurl.com/pnu7erq), Gartner research director Jake Sorofman – an expert in digital marketing strategy, trends and practices – introduced The Three Cs of Content Marketing:

• Creation—is the collaborative, often distributed process of generating original ideas and creative output in the form of text, images, video, infographics and the like.
• Curation—is when marketers find, filter, organize and annotate third-party content to advance their storyline by adding value to someone else’s point of view.
• Cultivation—is the practice of inspiring your audience to contribute content back to your storytelling efforts, often in the form of comments, gamified or contest-driven contributions.

While these are all key to a successful content marketing campaign, think about a diamond. There are four factors that affect a diamond’s value: color, cut, clarity and carat weight.

Similarly, if you want your content to be highly valued, there’s a fourth C you should be focused on, as well: Credibility.

If your content – your message – doesn’t have credibility with your audience, all the blood, sweat and dollars you put into the creation, curation and cultivation of content won’t really matter.

In a world where we are bombarded with thousands of marketing messages and claims a day,  and where technology has turned anyone with a smartphone or a laptop into a publisher or “citizen journalist”, it’s harder than ever to know exactly WHOM to believe.

The philosopher Aristotle studied the credibility of speakers and found that an audience was more likely to be convinced if the speaker was seen as:

– Being competent – having a good knowledge of the subject

– Having sound character – being honest and trustworthy, and

– Having goodwill toward the audience – that is, having the audience’s interests in mind.

There’s the rub: Credibility originates with the receiver of the message because it is based on the receiver’s perceptions.

You can’t create it by yourself. You earn it, just like trust and reputation, over time.

As Gartner’s Sorofman said, content marketing is hard work. Make sure that while you’re working on the creation, curation and cultivation of content, you work even harder at earning the credibility needed to get your content seen and believed.

We’ll offer some thoughts on building credibility in our next post.

Want to be a successful marketing storyteller?

Many marketers approach storytelling backwards.

They create their story based on the facts, features and benefits they want to convey to the audience … they focus on what they offer, what their expertise is, how their product or service works … they select or create a platform they’d like to use to tell that story … and they hope they’ll find and engage their audience.

Then they wonder why it falls flat.

Why?

The simple truth is: Your target audience really isn’t interested in you. They ARE interested in themselves.

So, the best way to be successful at storytelling is to start with listening to your audience. Identify who you really want to reach and what makes them different. Uncover what’s important, interesting and engaging to them. Explore and ask them:

• What do they want and need?
• What problems, issues or concerns do they have?
• Who do they identify with or relate to?
• Who do they believe or find most credible?
• What point of view are they operating from?
• Where do they get their information?
• What will make an emotional connection with them?
• What is their personal payoff from your story – that is, what’s in it for them?
• What format, vehicle and media do they prefer to receive their stories in?

To be a successful storyteller, build your story around your audience’s preferences … not your own.

Tell it in a way that meets their wants, needs, desires and interests … not your own.

And tell it in the form, format, media and channel that they prefer to view, listen to, read and/or follow … not your own.

Before you start creating your story, put yourself in their shoes. And remember, it’s NOT about you or your product, it’s about them.

To succeed, make their story yours.

Networking Do’s and Don’ts for College Grads

(Guest post by Intern Witney Withers)

One of the most valuable skills no matter what field you work in is the ability to network. In a world where, as the old saying goes, “it’s not about what you know, it’s about who you know,” networking is vital for new opportunities and advancing your career. 

Although public relations is a field that revolves around communication and making connections, networking can be intimidating even for experienced professionals. Yet, done correctly, networking will bring valuable connections for years to come.

Here are some tips to help you be a more effective networker:

• Do research: If you are attending a specific networking event, research those attending. Find out if it will be new professionals in the field or more experienced people. Research some of the attendees and their companies. Find things that could be potential conversation starters.
• Do set goals: Before attending any type of networking event or opportunity, decide what your goals are. Are you networking to find a job, build relationships with others in the PR world or just for fun? Setting simple goals will make networking more beneficial. 
• Do follow-up: The single most important thing to do after a networking event is follow-up. The main purpose of networking is to build meaningful relationships. Exchange business cards, use social media such as Twitter and LinkedIn to stay connected. If you made a significant connection with someone, e-mail them and include a memorable point from the conversation. Following up also includes staying in touch on a periodic basis.
• Don’t talk more than you listen: People love to talk about themselves and even more, they love someone who will listen. Take advantage of this by being an attentive listener and asking quality and open-ended questions. You never know what types of things you could find out, especially if you are surrounded by more experienced professionals.
• Don’t cling to one person: The main purpose of a networking event is to meet new people. It’s okay to attend events with a colleague or close friend to reduce nervousness. However, it’s not okay to talk to them the entire time. You can miss out on valuable connections. Move around and work the room. 

What networking rules do you follow?

The Freshman 5: Tips for Interns

Back-to-school advice for Interns

Bianchi Biz Blog

(Post by Adriana Van Duyn, APR, Account Supervisor)

Just when you thought you would never have to be a freshman again, you start an internship. Here you are, back at square one, feeling a little overwhelmed, but really excited. This is a great opportunity with even greater potential: a job offer.

For some, this will be your first time working in a professional environment. For most, it will be your first practical exposure to your chosen profession.  Either way, it can be pretty intimidating on that first day. To help take some of the pressure off, below are some tips to help interns soar through their first (or second or third) internship. We hope they help!

Learn the Company Culture – while this may take some time, learning a company’s culture will help you assimilate more effectively. Pay attention to how people communicate and interact. This not only exposes you…

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A Guide to Owning Your Career

Do you “own” your career? Do you have a plan or are you taking it as it comes?

Whether you’re just about to start your career, trying to build your career, help someone grow their business or launch your own business, retired PR entrepreneur John J. Bailey has some great advice for you in his book, “The Power of Ownership: How to Build a Career and a Business.” (http://thepowerofownership.com/)  

I have known and admired John Bailey, often referred to as “Mr. Ethics” in Detroit, for 20 years. He has been a competitor, a friend, and perhaps unknown to him, a role model.

Yet, even as someone who has practiced PR in Detroit for some 30 years and had some terrific mentors and clients, I found John’s book highly instructive as well as entertaining.

Finishing this book left me wishing two things:

1) That I would have had the opportunity to work directly with John sometime in my career; and

2) That I would have had access to this book 21 years ago when I first founded my own firm.

You can read the book in a couple of evenings … but you will want to keep it handy for regular reference. It provides valuable perspective and insight from a Midwest PR legend, a PRSA Hall of Famer and one of the most respected and successful business professionals in the Detroit community over the past 20 years.

Part Detroit PR history, part biography of one of Detroit’s business heroes, and part business success primer, John’s book chronicles the trials and successes in his career … and shows how his firm grew into one of the most respected PR firms in the country.

More importantly, it offers some simple, but profound, advice for anyone to looking to succeed in business … as John did it: with honor, honesty and integrity.

Do yourself and your career a favor: check this book out. 

Pay-Per-Hit PR vs. Retainer PR: The Winner Is …

Bianchi Biz Blog

Clients everywhere have heard the pitches … “Don’t get trapped into large PR retainers. Pay only for the media coverage you get with our pay-for-performance model”… or conversely, “PR success isn’t measured in individual hits. If you want to succeed long term, you need to retain a strategic PR partner.”

Which approach wins? It depends on your company’s situation.

When it comes to selecting a PR firm, one approach does not fit all. (Disclosure: Our PR firm operates as a long-term partner to our clients on either a retainer or a service fee basis. This approach has worked for us and, more importantly, as a number of our client relationships have lasted 12 years or more, it is working well for our cost-conscious clients.)

Different companies, different situations require different approaches.

A pay-per-placement (PPP) PR approach may be right for you if:

• Your company is…

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Are You a Thought Leader?

Bianchi Biz Blog

Since the term “thought leader” was coined in business circles some 20 years ago, many business-to-business companies and executives have yearned to be thought leaders in their industries.

By definition, a thought leader is a person (or entity) who is recognized by peers for having progressive and innovative ideas, and who shares these ideas and helps to effect change with those ideas.

Note the key words “recognized” and “share.” 

It’s not enough to develop great ideas. To be a thought leader, you need to be recognized for having great ideas, and you need to share and champion these ideas through effective communication.

Of course, in today’s world, this communication includes a full range of earned and owned media activities – PR approaches such as publicity, social media, speaking and blogging, to name just a few. And ultimately, recognition of a thought leader builds and gains momentum…

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Advice for the PR Student

Bianchi Biz Blog

(Post by Jaclyn Reardon, Assistant Account Executive)

As a recent grad with one year on the job, I’ve found that there’s a lot more you should know about the practice of PR than you learn in college. 

While college PR courses are an excellent source for the basics of things such as writing, programming and communication theory, there are many aspects to the industry that aren’t covered in your typical coursework.

So it helps if you give yourself a head start by building your knowledge base through internships and by attending workshops and meetings put on by your neighborhood PRSA or PRSSA chapter.

Beyond that, here are a few other things to keep in mind as you make your way to the PR profession:

Computer skills

In school, we all use computers to complete assignments. But do you really know how to use the programs you may need on the job?  Enhancing your computer skills by taking courses…

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