Business/Communications Issues
Thought Leadership
Five Steps to Capitalize on Breaking News
News breaks at lightning speeds these days. We are at war. We are in a recession. Banks are failing. Homes are foreclosing. We lost nearly 600,000 jobs in January. Peanuts are harming our children. Scandals abound in our government and financial institutions. We have a new President, our first-ever African-American president in the U.S. We inspire the world. We disgust the world. The list goes on and on.
In fact, mainstream media has a lot of its own news to report. Plummeting advertising revenues, online competition and substantial changes in consumer reading habits have wounded the media industry, causing massive layoffs and, in some cases, Chapter 11 filings. Recent reports claim that nearly 30,000 people in the media industry were laid off in 2008 and journalists make up a hefty portion of that number.
In the mist of such turbulence, reporters have more and more information to cover in less and less time. The pressure to deliver timely and interesting stories has increased exponentially. Social media and user-created content tools (YouTube, Twitter, etc.) provide a medium for anyone to report the news, which means traditional reporters literally have minutes to break a story and then just hours to follow up with a more in-depth feature article. For example, when a U.S. Air flight recently landed in the Hudson River, the initial facts spread through Twitter so fast that by the time mainstream media reported the first story most everyone online new the details already.
So, what does this mean for public relations practitioners? It means that just about any media relations program must have a breaking news strategy. Here are five steps you need to know to capitalize on breaking news.
- Read the news. It sounds so simple, but many PR professionals do not read the news. You must read news that is relevant to your clients. The only way to determine if relevant news is breaking is to follow the beat on a daily basis. One good way to stay on top of breaking stories is to identify a few relevant publications and then set up email alerts with those outlets.
For example, we work with the experts in the Retail and Consumer Product Practice at BDO Seidman. Between earnings announcements, recalls, holiday sales, bankruptcies and much more, retail is an especially fast-paced industry. To be a part of the constantly breaking news, we have to be just as passionate about retail as our clients are … and just as diligent as the retail reporters who are following the big stories.
- Have a conversation with your clients. If you think that a breaking news platform makes sense for your PR program, it’s important to have a candid conversation upfront about expectations, time commitment and topics that they can cover with insight and confidence. Breaking news is fast and unexpected, so spokespeople have to understand that they may have to drop everything to do a last minute interview. It helps to identify a team of experts so that the burden is not placed on any just one person.
- Know your experts cold. You should be able to read a headline and know right away if your client organization can add to the conversation and who the best expert would be to cover the topic. If you have a team of experts, it is a good idea to identify loosely which experts will handle different topics that are likely to arise. For example, the BDO Retail team now has five practiced experts who cover general retail news, but individually, each is also expert on a specific topic area, such as product recalls, supply chain, inventory management, bankruptcy, sustainability, consumer sentiment.
- Be helpful, not “pitchy”. Breaking news is not the time to “pitch” a reporter. If you want to be helpful all you need to do is identify the news, state what your expert can offer, include credentials and move on. If your expert is qualified and a good fit, the reporter will let you know right away.
- Close the deal. Once you have successfully teed up your expert and the reporter wants an interview, the clock starts ticking to make the connection happen. Get your expert on the phone as soon as possible in order to brief them, provide any guidance and/or research and schedule the interview. If you are late responding back to the reporter, you will likely lose the opportunity.
Ultimately, breaking news not only provides value in immediate media placements, but it is also important reputation builder for experts with both the media and their clients. For the experts on the BDO Retail team, coverage generated off of tough, high profile issues provides another layer of credibility for them, which bolsters their reputation among their clients and prospective clients. In fact, for one of the experts in the practice, news coverage in the Wall Street Journal led directly to a new business assignment.
For public relations practitioners, breaking news is an excellent way to build meaningful working relationships with the media because you will be providing them with the information that they need, when they need it. When the timing is right and the stars align, the results can be outstanding for everyone involved.
-- PH
