Over the last 25 years, I have worked on hard-hitting campaigns for leading brands. Government, charities, and NGOs. In that time, I have learned what will grab consumers’ and journalists’ attention, what makes a headline, and what will deliver results.
But while it’s one thing to develop a compelling story, it’s another thing to make time-poor, deadline-driven media take notice.
I want to share some of the techniques I’ve learned over the years to help you secure stand-out coverage.
The basics
A story lives or dies depending on the quality of your press release. Get it right and your story will fly. Get it wrong and you’ll be met with deafening silence.
Journalists are busy and can receive up to a thousand pitches and emails daily. You need to deliver them everything they need to write up the story. Ideally, you want them to be able to take copy directly from the press release – so write it in the style of the publication you are pitching to.
Make sure your press release covers all of the essentials: who, what, where, when, and why (and remember that the “who” shouldn’t be you. Journalists aren’t interested in self-serving puff pieces, the focus should be on their readers and the impact your work will have on them). Keep your press release short and punchy and follow a clear hierarchy of information – the most important and interesting details first, everything else after.
Include quotes from your key spokespeople but keep these pitchy. Avoid corporate speech or jargon. The quotes need to add flavour to the release and should make sense on their own, rather than needing additional context or information. Try to make them as interesting as possible as this is the bit that will get the chop first!
Selling in
Even after 25 years, I still get a buzz from selling in a strong story. Remember the 3 Ts – targeting, tailoring, and timing.
Targeting
Don’t send a press release to a journalist unless you are sure it is relevant to the topics they cover. If journalists sense you are spamming them or sending irrelevant content, they’ll just ignore you, or worse, block your email address. Your pitch should show that you’re familiar with what they write about and know why your story is something that they and their readers would be interested in.
Establishing good relationships with journalists is crucial – take them out to coffee and find out what sort of stories they cover. This is especially effective with journalists who are just starting out: a junior reporter today could become an editor in the future.
Tailoring
Think of how you could slice up your story into multiple stories. Do you have polling data or case studies that would allow you to create regional variations of your press release? What other filters or cross-breaks could you use to filter the data – are there male and female skews to the story? Could your story be relevant to different trade titles or niche audiences? By creating different angles, you can maximise your chances of getting coverage and reaching a wide range of people.
Timing
Even though we live in an era of 24-hour news, print media still runs to a strict daily routine. Timing is crucial if you want print coverage. You have a window between 8.30 am and 9.30 am to sell your story in before journalists go into conference – where they decide what stories to cover. This is your best chance to secure coverage in print. Later in the day can work if you are lucky, but journalists might have already started writing up their stories and don’t always take kindly to being disturbed if they are working to a deadline.
Leveraging your spokespeople
Ideally, anyone quoted in your press release should be available for an interview. This isn’t always possible – you may have a celebrity ambassador who has only committed to giving a quote and is too busy to talk to the media. But your own spokespeople should be willing to do interviews and diverse case studies or human interest stories (people with real lived experience and an emotive story to tell) are a firm favourite with the media. They all need to be fully briefed and charity and NGO spokespeople media trained.
Getting your point across
Once you’ve managed to get your spokesperson in touch with a reporter, it’s vital to ensure they give lines that effectively communicate your campaign.
Identify three key messages ahead of the interview. These are the facts, insights, and arguments that your spokesperson should emphasise throughout the interview. Three key messages are enough so that you don’t sound like you’re repeating yourself, but not so many that what you say risks getting lost.
You don’t have to wait for the perfect question to make your point – use bridging phrases like “What matters is…” or “It’s important to bear in mind…” and then say what you want to say.
The author and raconteur Quentin Crisp gave a perfect example:
“You arrive at the studio with a wonderful anecdote about your mother. When you get there, some fool says, ‘How’s your father?’ This gives you a few seconds to reply, ‘My father’s worn out coping with my mother who…‘“
As he says: “In other words, you say what you’ve come to say, no matter what the question.”
That’s the number one piece of media training advice I could give to anyone: work out what you want to say and say it.
Go forth and conquer
Engaging with the media is essential to all organisations – whatever their size. It allows you to highlight your work, bring attention to pressing issues and demonstrate your impact on the world.
Want to maximise your local and regional press opportunities? Join us for our next PR Network in September.
You may also want to read:
- How to create stories with real media appeal
- Charity campaigning for impact
- How to maximise impact from your charity’s new research
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