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WORKING WITH THE MEDIA

WORKING WITH THE MEDIA. Building Your P.R. Toolkit. Presented by: Lori Greiner, Communications Manager College of Agriculture and Life Sciences. Virginia Cooperative Extension. Why Bother ?. Communication is a scarce resource. Expensive Limited opportunities to engage

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WORKING WITH THE MEDIA

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  1. WORKING WITH THE MEDIA Building Your P.R. Toolkit Presented by: Lori Greiner, Communications Manager College of Agriculture and Life Sciences Virginia Cooperative Extension

  2. Why Bother ?

  3. Communication is a scarce resource • Expensive • Limited opportunities to engage • Short attention spans • Competing messages

  4. Noise “The average American is exposed to more than 3,000 marketing messages a day.” Dawn Hudson VP, Strategy & Marketing Pepsi-Cola Fast Company, April 2002

  5. Why us? • Awareness and education • Advocacy and positioning • Accountability

  6. Awareness and education • People need reliable information. • Programs benefit from publicity. • News can educate — to a point. • News can help set the social agenda.

  7. Advocacy and positioning • We need to be an advocate: for science, for our discipline, and for our institution. • Strategic communications effects change and helps you reach the people you care about. • Reputation counts. Media can help brand your program.

  8. Accountability • Public’s right to know • Impact

  9. Crisis Catastrophe Crime Conflict Change Corruption Color (human interest) What is news?The compelling C’s

  10. What is news? • Timely, immediate — not history. • Affects many people in some way. • Innovative — what we can do now that we couldn’t before. • Interesting — unique look at life or new angle on an old story. • What journalists decide as news.

  11. Who are journalists? • Short on time. • Friendly people who are not necessarily your friend. • Smarter than you think. • And less knowledgeable.

  12. What do journalists want? • A good story — as many of the elements as they can capture. • Good quotes. • The feeling that they understand the issue after 20 minutes as well as you do after two years.

  13. What do journalists want? • Your respect, not necessarily your affection. • Recognition. • You to be open and honest. • To catch you if you lie.

  14. What do reporters really want? NEWS

  15. What’s not news? • Most grant and award stories are not news. • Agency cooperation and people working together are not normally news.

  16. What’s our best news? • A good land-grant news story positions the expertise of the institution or the individual to address a topic of public interest.

  17. What’s your news? • Write down what you are an expert in. • Describe in a sentence why someone should care. • Try to tie it with a newsworthy issue.

  18. How do we get in the news? • New releases • Pitches • Reporter queries • Periodicals • Video Releases • Radio spots

  19. Earned vs. paid media • Earned media • Paid media

  20. Getting in the news • Helps us with our land-grant mission. • Isn’t easy — we have competition. • Positions the organization as a source of expertise.

  21. Get to Know the Media

  22. Why build relationships with reporters? • It’s an exchange of value. You want a mention in their publication or broadcast; they want news from someone they trust. • Good relationships = better communications with your ultimate audience.

  23. Do your homework • Make yourself media savvy — listen, watch, and read. • Find out what stories are being covered so you can offer related stories. • Read the paper and identify special sections or columns you can tap. • Learn the names of local reporters and the subjects they cover.

  24. Who is the reporter? • Don’t assume reporters know the background. • Agriculture may be covered as a beat or by the science or business writer. • Get to know other reporters.

  25. The first meeting • Find out how a reporter likes to get news and tips • Tell reporter how you can help them • Bring resources. • No agenda (story pitching) the first time.

  26. Follow up • The best gift: call with story tips. • Invite reporters to an event where they can make contacts or get story ideas. • Comment on a story they’ve written/produced.

  27. What reporters want is pretty simple… • They want their calls returned. • They want a quote for their story. • They want to do their job and go home. • Don’t make your relationship more complicated.

  28. Seven positive pitching actions • Think beyond your own news. • Target the right reporters. • State the facts. • Time it right. • Offer photos, charts, and other resources. • Follow-up. • Get excited.

  29. Products that add value • Provide a list of contacts in each county office with areas of expertise. • Offer fact sheets with basic background. • Provide photos or ideas for illustrating the story, especially for TV.

  30. Professional courtesies • Offer story ideas, rather than waiting for reporters to come to you. • Learn the best time to call: newspapers, TV stations, and radio stations differ. • Honor exclusivity or advance notice agreements. • Consider all remarks as “on the record.”

  31. How local news becomes a national story • The Associate Press sends its stories to news organizations worldwide. • Gannett owns local papers as well as the USA Today. • Stories often get picked up from the newspaper and reported on the radio and TV.

  32. Third party resources • Virginia Tech News Bureau • Bacons • State-by-State listings • ProfNet • Burrelles Clipping Service • Online resources

  33. Successful media relations can pay off

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