The Trouble With Pay for Placement

There are firms that charge per placement. In other words, you do not pay for the media until they place a story. This sounds awfully attractive, but in my experience, it is not the way to launch an effective brand-building campaign. Look at it from the perspective of the media relations firm. If they are only going to get paid for the media they place you in, chances are they are going to try what they consider will be their easiest placements. If those magazines or TV programs pass, what is the company's incentive to take time, do some grunt work and launch an effective campaign? There is actually very little incentive. Chances are what they will do is move on to another client and hope that they can land him or her some quick placements in order to pay their bills. And so the process goes. It sounds attractive, but in actuality it's a horrible PR business model. You may end up with placements, but most will be reactive. Chances are you won’t have a campaign focused on delivering your message, but one focused on grabbing as much quick media as possible.

What you want in a media relations firm is a company that is actively working for you when things are tough, when there are no hits coming your way. You want a firm that is mining the stories, calling the media, pitching new ideas, making sure that eventually there will be big hits. A company that is paid based solely on their placements simply cannot afford to take the time to build and nurture a client. You may get some hits, but you won't get a campaign.

Many such firms base their fees on the ad rates of the particular media they are placing. In other words, if they were to place you in a local paper, they would base your fee on what a same-size ad would run and charge you a percentage of the ad rate. I have seen the percentage vary from 20% to 50%. If you are dealing with small, local media, this could be affordable, but once you move up the media ladder, you'll find that the costs rapidly become prohibitive. Strange as this sounds, one of the reasons I refuse to work on a per-placement basis, is precisely because I feel we will be too successful. It sounds great to the client at first 1he or she doesn’t have to pay unless there’s a placement. But score one good placement and suddenly their looking at the reality of paying a pretty hefty bill. Many never built the payment into their budget, because it didn’t seem real to them One client in the fashion industry tried and tried to convince me to work with him on a pay-per-placement basis. I refused. Eventually he agreed to the retainer fee and signed with my company. The second story we placed for him was a three-page article in Vogue. If I would have agreed to the fee structure he had suggested, he would have, based on Vogue's ad rates, owed us over a years worth of retainer fees for that one story alone - and I would probably still be trying to collect my payment.

Copyright© Anthony Mora 2008

Should I Handle My Own Public Relations Campaign?

Should you handle your own public relations campaign? No, not if you don't know the process or truly understand the intricacies launching a PR campaign. Can you? Yes, at least to a point.

Effective media placement is a full-time job. It takes skill, know-how, persistence, and contacts. The art of effective PR entails more than writing releases and putting together press kits. If you do it haphazardly or incorrectly, you're better off not doing it at all. The last thing you want to do is alienate the press, which is usually what happens when well-meaning but inexperienced individuals try their hands at running their own media campaigns.

Media placement is a skill that needs to be learned and understood. None of us would suddenly decide to give open-heart surgery a try, or to overhaul a car transmission - well, at least most of us wouldn't, but every day people decide that they can handle their own PR without any prior knowledge or training whatsoever. An effective media placement campaign is well strategized and thought out. It is a cumulative process that builds day by day and month by month.

If you are thinking of launching a media campaign for your business or career, you basically have four options: hire a media relations firm, hire someone in-house to do your media relations for you, hire a media relations consultant, or launch your own media relations campaign.

If you decide to handle your own media relations, you have a big learning curve ahead of you; you want to learn the hows and whys of putting together a successful campaign.

If you are looking to hire a company or consultant to do it for you, you still have homework. You need to learn the right questions to ask in order to hire the right firm. PR is not a one-size-fits all service. But the greatest mistake businesses owners make is thinking PR is a luxury, not a necessity. Those are the businesses owners who generally wonder why their competitors keep being featured in the media.

Copyright © Anthony Mora 2006

For further information visit:
www.AnthonyMora.com

Viral Marketing vs. PR

According to a recent study, one in twenty Internet visits went to social networking sites during September 2006, which was nearly double the traffic of the previous year. Social networking is no longer focused solely on the social, but is quickly entering the realm of the business world. Facebook is doing an about face and is transforming itself into a powerful marketing site. For some time now companies and marketers have been launching campaigns on MySpace. But knowing that there is an audience there and capturing that audience is not the same thing.

Another report states that viral marketing is not the end-all online marketing tool that many would suppose. Their findings showed that only fifteen percent of viral marketing campaigns truly paid off. What a company is looking for with an effective viral marketing campaign is an exponential positive word-of-mouth explosion and, overall, that has not been the result of the majority of the campaigns.

The word-of-mouth effect is not nearly as easily tapped as one would expect. One of the major upsides of traditional PR, is that when done consistently in a systematic targeted manner, it can generate an amazing amount of positive word-of-mouth. The positive effect comes not only from the media exposure, but from the media venues themselves. To gain coverage in the Wall Street Journal or CNN, or Newsweek is to instantly validate yourself and or your product or service. If you're smart, you'll utilize your media coverage in your overall marketing strategy and maximize on the power of the media coverage.

This is not to say that a savvy viral marketing campaign can't reach your target market, but it's tougher than most think. If you want a truly effective word of mouth campaign, it's really not an either/or decision that you want to make, marry a well targeted viral approach to a comprehensive PR campaign and you'll end up with the best of both worlds.

Copyright© Anthony Mora 2008

www.anthonymora.com

Staying on Target

Keep your message targeted and focused. You may be well versed on a number of topics, but believe me, you don’t want to pitch the media a Chinese menu. Generally when people assure me that they can discuss everything, I find they have real trouble focusing on anything. Generalists tend to remain just that. The media wants an expert. They want someone who is an authority, someone who is well versed on a certain topic or in a particular field.

Be specific. Sharpen your story. You may have numerous talents, you may have several stories to tell, but don't try to tell them all at once. You don't want a one-note campaign, but you do have to play each note individually. If you slam all of the piano keys down at once, you get noise. What you're looking for is melody, music. You can tell your stories, just tell them sequentially.

Come up with five or six different topics or hooks that you can honestly address. Now put them in order. Prioritize them. Don't pitch them all at once. Not only can it lead you away from your goal and into fantasyland, it can also alienate those around you, including the media. Be realistic. You're not doing this to satisfy your ego needs, but to build your business. Don't worry about not being able to discuss all the various topics that are near and dear to your heart. If you keep at it, chances are you'll get to them, eventually. Right now you're developing hooks, story ideas. Eventually you can broaden your scope and move the focus to other topics. Be patient. Develop your stories, outline the particulars, be specific, and don't be a master of everything. Otherwise you'll be left alone up there in genius-land with no one to talk to.

Copyright© Anthony Mora 2008

What the Media Wants

The media wants stories, but beyond that, not even the media knows what they want. They are constantly searching, trying out new stories, coming up with new ideas. You have to study the various media outlets, review the different formats, study the types of stories they've run in the past. No one knows what the media wants because what they want is constantly changing. Don't take for granted you are some kind of media maven and that you know more than everyone else does.

Remember, you're going to succeed by learning how the media thinks, not by assuming you think they know what they want. You have to prepare, do your homework, study the various media outlets. The bottom line is a good story, but don't assume because you find a story of interest, the media will like it as well.

Nine times out of ten, you're going to be wrong. Think like an editor, think like a producer. Once again, work backwards. Look at the particular media you are targeting. Who is the audience? What is the basic age range? Does it appeal to primarily men or women? What type of stories does it generally run? Now put yourself in the place of the editor or producer - how could you fit a story on your business, product, or talent into the format of that media outlet? What story would work? What would the focus be?

For example, let's say that you are a fashion designer of men's clothing. GQ and Esquire would be natural media outlets to approach. You would need to come up with a hook that makes you and your designs special, but you know that with a little persistence and creativity you should be able to place a piece in those publications.

What about Vogue? Why not? You could pitch a piece on yourself as the new up-and-coming designer who is reshaping the future of men's fashion, or a piece, aimed towards women, on how to dress the man in their life.

Let's say you wanted to go to The Wall Street Journal. Okay, pitch a story on dressing for success in the 21st Century, or an article on the business of fashion, or the inside workings of the fashion industry. Pitch the media according to its needs, not according to yours. Assume that the story you are dead-set on telling isn't all that interesting to anyone besides yourself. Now, be creative, give it a spin. Give it a makeover. Make it newsworthy.

Copyright © Anthony Mora 2006

For further information visit:
www.AnthonyMora.com

Yes You Do Need More Media Training

Studies show that 93 percent of what an audience reacts to has to do with the messenger, and only 7 percent has to do with the message itself.

Have you had a few media training sessions? Good. Take some more. If not, have you practiced conducting mock interviews? Have you done some media training, even if it's only with a friend? Media training is pretty much what it says, training to appear on the media. Effective media training helps you refine your message, how to deliver sound bites, how to best frame your story to fit the appropriate media outlet, how to dress, what to say, and the type of body language to use.

Ann Convery is our media training and communications expert. I cannot impress on you enough the importance of effective media training, and, having worked with several, I can attest to the fact that Ann is one of the best. She has trained politicians, CEO's, authors, physicians, attorney's and professionals in nearly every field to appear on a wide range of media including 60 Minutes, Time, Newsweek, USA Today, CNN, People, Vogue, The New York Times and hundreds of other media outlets.

In a nutshell, Ann coaches clients on how to present themselves and their message. Her sessions, are video-taped, which allows clients to take the tapes home, review the information, and study their presentation. She is a pro and can guide a client through the possible mine fields, preparing them for interviews with anyone from Bill Moyers to Howard Stern.

Once you've reached the point of being interviewed by the media, even if you have hired a media relations firm to handle your campaign, you and you alone have to take over. How you look, how you sound, your demeanor, these are now what become important. Remember, you are the messenger and the messenger must sell the message.

Copyright © Anthony Mora 2006

For further information visit:
www.AnthonyMora.com