The Bailey Blog

I recently blogged about some basic media training tips to which everyone should adhere. A colleague who is on the other side of the interview said it would be nice if reporters had some rules to follow, too.

Hey, they do! Don’t be afraid to be a good source that isn’t a push-over.

3. Journalists are busy in offices that are understaffed and they have too much work to get done on too tight of a deadline. Sound familiar? If I just described your job, then you get my point. Journalists have a deadline and we should work with them as best we can. If it’s impossible to get them the information before their deadline, you need to be up front with them. Tell them you need more time to collect that kind of data or your boss simply isn’t available to drop everything to come running to talk to them. After awhile, good reporters learn not to leave things to deadline unless it’s an emergency, and then you’re usually more willing to help anyway. And what about those reporters who don’t get good interviews because they wait until the last minute for all their stories? Well, everybody has a boss.

 4. Journalists may call looking for your boss as the know-it-all in the office, but don’t be afraid to help them out, even if it’s not for attribution. (And often, that’s the only way you can talk to them.) It will save them and you a headache if they don’t end up on the phone asking mundane background questions that they could have gotten answered at a Web site you directed them to. Reporters who insist on talking only the top person in an organization won’t land good stories. And when you don’t land good stories often enough, well, everybody has a boss.

5. And, finally for this shortened list of rules – it’s ok to say “I don’t know.” And it’s ok to keep saying “I don’t know,” even when the reporter asks the same question in 10 different ways. If you don’t know the answer and you can’t find it out, say that. Be honest! If you don’t know and you can find out, then do so. Good reporters will understand that if the answer is complicated it may take some time. Because you’re working on your own deadline headaches – and everybody has a boss.

“They are idiots.” “Bold and sometimes stupid.” “We want nothing to do with them.” “They are nincompoops.”

If you were the subject of a survey and those were some of the comments, it sure would make you pause and wonder what the heck you’ve been up to, wouldn’t it?

The ironic thing is that the first two comments were made by legislators about the media, while the latter two comments were made by the public about legislators.

Seems as though both groups have some public relations work cut out for them.

The public comments were made during a focus group about some commercials. The legislative comments were made during research for a recent story by MIRS, a capital news publication in Lansing, Michigan.

Given the legislators’ own abysmal review by the public, they don’t have much of a leg to stand on when griping about the media. But what’s more important is that legislators and others still haven’t learned how to work with the media.

Reporters can be your nemesis or your friend, and it’s much better to be friends with people who buy ink by the gallon!

Here, then, are a few tidbits from a media training program I use for clients and my students at MSU:

1. Be open – never lie. Hopefully, I don’t have to explain this one.

2. Be cooperative – journalists are people trying to do their job, just as you’re trying to do your job. They are going to get the story somehow from someone. Why not make it your story with your input?

3. Develop contacts – it’s about networking, just as in any other sector of your business.
Take good stories to the media – it’s not all bad news out there, but good news doesn’t leak out or have a court case started over it. If you have a good-news story to tell, go tell it.

4. Respond quickly – reporters are on deadline. They call it that for a reason. If you miss it, the story is dead. If you want to be in the story, which is generally better for you than not, you need to respect that reporters are often on a time crunch.

5. Never say “no comment,” – it’s about learning to say something to get your key messages covered.

It’s ok to say, “I don’t know” – but if you can get the answer the reporter will appreciate it and that helps you develop a good contact. (See numbers 2 and 3 above.)

There’s plenty more where those came from and, coincidentally, I happen to know a PR firm that offers media training as a service! But this is a start, so think about it the next time you have to deal with “The Media.”

As I’ve always said, “If the pen is mightier than the sword, imagine what a printing press can do!”