Five top media pitching tips for getting more and better quality press coverage:

1.) Search editorial calendars – Editorial calendars are a great way to get quality coverage. Why? We search the editorial calendars thoroughly  for topics that are in line with our clients’ expertise because, this way,  the publication has already dedicated a number of pages to that topic and needs to fill them. You are then pitching something you know for a fact they have an interest in, not something out of the blue. If you were in sales, I’d liken this to a warm call versus a cold call.

2.) Research the outlet and the journalist – It is important to know the outlet and journalist and the kinds of pieces they do before picking up the phone. Our specialty is media relations and you can bet it is not good media relations to waste a journalist’s time. Know what they like and what serves their audience and be able to quickly cut to the chase with what your feature will do for them.

3.) Use common courtesy - Journalists are extremely busy and inundated with pitches. If you are calling them, always be sure to ask first off if you’ve reached them at an okay time. That way, if you have caught them on deadline or in the middle of something, you can ask for a better time to get back with them, which shows respect for their time. A pitch will fall on deaf ears when someone is too buried to hear it.

4.) Use media feeding frenzies to your advantage – You may have noticed that there are some stories the news channels run and keep following for days, even months. They’ll do this when it is a story of ongoing concern to their audience. If you have a company expert that can speak on any aspect of the story they are covering, you can ‘tag on’ to that media feeding frenzy with the right pitch.

5.) Pitch far enough out for the media outlet

Every type of media outlet works in a different time frame. If your pitch is to be successful, you must take into consideration how far out the outlet works. Here’s some general guidelines:

• Magazines - as a rule, work way out. Many national publications work 6 to 10 months out, and the more local and regional ones may work within tighter time frames like 3 to 6 months out.
• Newspapers – Because newspapers are looking for hot and timely news, you can let your beat reporter know about an upcoming news item as much as a month or two out, but they usually won’t work on it it until the week of the news event.
• Business Journals - Business journals are usually weeklies and I like to pitch them about a month out.
• Television - I would pitch a local TV producer 4 to 6 weeks in advance, and national shows further out. However, if you are pitching your company spokesman to a news show as an expert source on a timely news item, you are back to a very tight timeframe of days to hours, as they can bring your spokesman into a local affiliate and interview them remotely.
• Radio Interviews – I’d recommend pitching radio at least 2 weeks out.

As you can see, media pitching is very involved and time consuming. That’s why many companies leave it to pitching pros like me. But, the results are well worth it. For instance, Bloomberg TV reaches 200,000+ homes worldwide — be sure to watch Venture, their show on successful entrepreneurs, this Friday. One of my clients, Antonio Swad will be featured. And, feel free to contact me for further guidance.

Honorees must always get one of my custom-made pizzas, so I present to you the “Out-of-Bounds” Ham and Cheese special. This will be a deep dish number that’s coming over the edges with lots of canadian bacon and gruyere.

As laid out in the letter from the PRSA to its members, here are the key points:
The new ‘guides’, as set out in the FTC’s notice, make three key departures from previous guidance:

• The FTC advises that “endorsers” as well as advertisers can be held liable for false or unsubstantiated claims or for failing to disclose material connections between the parties.
• The Guides no longer offer the “safe harbor” whereby testimonials can be qualified by a “results may vary” disclaimer.
• Regarding endorsements, the Guides specify that celebrities should disclose relationships with advertisers.

While the FTC will approach each potential violation on a case-by-case basis, the new guidelines will impact how professionals should approach some common practice scenarios. Here are some applications of the guidelines:

• Bloggers who receive cash or in-kind payment (including free products or services for review) are deemed endorsers and so must disclose material connections they share with the seller of the product or service.
• Any firm that engages bloggers by paying them outright to create or influence editorial content or by supplying goods or services to them at no cost may be liable if the blogger does not disclose the relationship.
• Advertisements or promotions that feature a consumer who conveys his or her experience with a product or service as “typical” should clearly disclose what results consumers can generally expect or specify how the results were unique to the individual circumstances.
• If research is cited in an advertisement or promotion, any sponsorship of the research by the client or the marketer should be clearly disclosed.
• Celebrities who make endorsements outside the context of traditional ads, such as on talk shows or in social media, should disclose any relationship with the advertiser or marketer.

I’d be very interested to get your opinions on these new rulings!

Although it was the gorgeous honoree, it was once again the backdrop for showcasing people. Johnny Mathis performed hits like “Chances Are” and “It’s Not For Me To Say” in top form. He not only sounded great, but he also looked amazing. As soon as I got home, I had to hit Wikipedia, because his appearance and performance did not seem at all possible when I kept adding up his years on the scene. I’m not giving away your age, Johnny, but I’ll just say he passed for 15+ years younger than his chronological age, easily. Marvin Hamlisch was equally impressive, affable and intimate with the audience. Besides performing The Way We Were, he and the DSO treated the crowd to the overture he wrote for A Chorus Line that was never used – a slice of history you can’t hear on the streets for any price.

Morton H. Meyerson

As I work my way backwards through this wonderful event, the thing that probably left the biggest impression on me was the filmed presentation, preceding the orchestral performances. It took the attendees back through the difficulties and sheer acts of will that made the institution possible. Morton Meyerson’s words were most touching when he talked about going to Ross Perot, whose financial contributions made the center possible, to see how he’d like the center named. In asking which family member Ross would like to name the building after, Meyerson’s genuine surprise and awe still registered deeply when he relayed Perot’s answer “I want it to be the Morton H. Meyerson.” Most Dallas-ites are unaware of Perot’s financial generosity in helping give the city this amazing structure, or, more impressively, that he chose anonymity as a way of honoring Meyerson’s tenaciousness in bringing all the pieces together, literally.

As a branding and PR person, I must applaud the organization for an event done immaculately. Even though we celebrated a building, the finest human traits were showcased – good will, the most exceptional creative talents (musical, architectural, entrepreneurial), perseverance, and selflessness, all in a warm and intimate setting. Fantastic!

The number of people who utilize visual tools online continue to grow as people become more and more entrenched in technology, and more and more pressed for time. Consumers are more particular about what they view and how long they take to do so. Businesses must stand out in the crowd and adding visual aids to content is the key. It attracts eyeballs, makes difficult material easier and quicker to grasp and gives your content uniqueness and more interest. Additionally, in this day of information overload, I find people are scanning more. Breaking up a longer article with visuals increases the potential of keeping the reader to the end. A long post or article with no visual breaks is sometimes seen as too daunting to even start for the time-pressed professional.

This photo is in honor of three clients who are all new or expectant fathers!

 The Huffington Post, with a Nielson NetRating of more than 4.2 million, and Boing Boing are ranked in the top ten most-popular blogs on the Internet by Technorati. One reason for their high ranking is they always have a unique or different photo that is more interesting than other news or blog sites. Boing Boing, with a Nielson NetRating of more than 765,000, also has an entire page devoted to videos. Post Secret is ranked as number 11 in popularity by Technorati, with approximately half of its content being visual. The point is: People respond to visuals. According to an article by Patricia Vakos on Phschool.com, 65 percent of the population consists of visual learners. A report on “Presenting Effective Presentations with Visual Aids” by the U.S. Department of Labor noted that three days after an event, people retained 10 percent of what they heard from an oral presentation, 35 percent from a visual presentation, and 65 percent from a visual and oral presentation. Visual aids can deliver your message quickly, as well as help the viewer remember it better and retain the information longer.

Below, is an example of a video we put together for one of our clients, The Élan at Bluffview, a mixed-use development comprised of retail space and luxury apartments in Dallas.  For the opening of The Art of Élan gallery, the apartment complex hosted an art contest where local artists could enter an art piece and compete to win six months of free gallery space in the new gallery and a $1,000 Visa gift card.  The video allowed us to spread the word about the First Annual Élan Art Gala Mix and Mingle event as well as draw attention to the artsy community. In addition to getting the video out in all tradional and online PR, we were also able to share the video on social networking sites such as Facebook and Twitter, thus gaining exposure to our target audiences and building excitement for the event in less than 60 seconds per view.

If you want to get more business you have to make yourself visible to your potential customers. By supplementing well-written content with visual aids such as videos and photos, you can gain positive attention from your audience, enhance your “digital footprint,” and better communicate your message in a clear and concise manner. Consumers are actively searching for information and they expect to find the content they need; it’s the company’s job to make sure the content, be it visual, oral or written, is in the right place at the right time.

“Some 69% of all Americans have used the internet to cope with the recession as they hunt for bargains, jobs, ways to upgrade their skills, better investment strategies, housing options, and government benefits. That amounts to 88% of internet users.”

It also emphasized that 52 percent of Americans have been hard hit by the recession. What this means is, if your company has a service or product that can help consumers through this hard time, now is the time to optimize content about that product or service and make sure it is well distributed throughout the Internet. Your customers are searching for you. Whether you are a financial planner, bankruptcy attorney, headhunter, realtor, training or education provider, or a fictional writer, you most likely have an offering that can spell relief to some niche. For instance, you may have a small boutique PR firm that can provide major relief and value to companies who are paying large-agency retainer fees. This is a message (and yes, shameless plug for us) that you would want to get out there.

My only warning is this: If your company is considering a blog, know that blogs require constant upkeep in the form of fresh content, and it is better from a brand-image perspective to never start than to start and quit. Several studies indicate that most blogs are abandoned soon after creation (with 60 to 80 percent abandoned within one month), Besides, there are plenty of other ways to distribute your content on the Web.

So, contact your content writer or online PR specialist and make your case on the Internet now while your prospects are looking for all forms of recession relief.

We’ve reached a Darwinian moment in time in which the corporate landscape has dramatically shifted in just a few short years. Let me talk through where we came from to where we are now.

When I first got into PR, everyone, not just practitioners, knew that virtually “all press is good press.” With the exception of really, really Exxon Valdez-ish sort of bad news, we knew that most mentions of a company would be remembered as just that a few weeks out, a mention. People would recall that they heard something about company X, but usually wouldn’t remember if it was good or bad. With traditional print and broadcast media, things came and passed, clearing through our consciousness like a passing cloud. Mind you, I’m not speaking of OJ Simpson-type news which could slice through the clutter of our memories and stick like a bloody glove.

Now, let’s take an OJ-style leap from his trial in 1995 to 2005, when Jeff Jarvis, a single blogger, publicly lamented about poor service he had received from Dell, coining the term “Dell Hell.”  The term resonated with the online community and caught fire on the Internet, resulting in irreparable damage and millions of dollars spent by Dell to shore up their customer service. The result has had some good results for the company. It brought back Michael Dell to the helm and the company now has a strong social media presence. Yet, the term ‘Dell Hell’ still lingers on the net. I just googled it and got more than 30,000 results with the term in quotes and more than 1.3 million without using quotes. As I saw wisely put on Twitter the other day, “Social media is like a tattoo; it can fade, but it’s still always kind of there.”

Jumping closer to date, Dominoes is still reeling from Internet backlash of the two idiot employees who in April of this year filmed disgusting acts with food in a store’s kitchen then posted it to YouTube. Even though the video was taken down quickly, over a million people viewed the video in a matter of several days. Because many people downloaded the video, it can still be found. And, social media-bad press is the yicky fruitcake that keeps re-gifting for Motrin. They still have a headache over an ill-conceived “Motrin Moms” campaign that did not resonate well at all with many mothers.  And, of course, we can’t leave out the ‘United Breaks Guitars’ video that screamed through Twitter and arouund the Web last week. This video says it all:

Back in the early 90′s, I was aware of a printing company that consistently missed deadlines, up charged clients to death and basically delivered poor quality work when mistakes were made and deemed ‘too costly’ to fix.  I use to marvel at how in the world they had stayed in business for so long, 20+ years.  The reason is, back then, we – the consumer – felt too insignificant to do anything, and frivolous law suits over subpar service or quality issues seemed too big a hassle. So, we mostly took our lumps and went on. We didn’t have a social media network with which to share our laments and unite. We do now.

Long story short, ‘All press is good press’ no longer holds what so ever. You can experience a social media flash fire that can do worlds of hurt to your brand. The Internet has a memory and it is where we all reside. Now is the time to become better than you’ve ever been before and for all the right reasons. Here are some things you can do to prepare:

1.) Board of Directors, if you have a CEO who does shady things, let him/her go and replace them with someone of high integrity.  I was talking with the founder of Pizza Patrón the other day who said, “I would never do anything shady in front of my employees, because they would then think it is okay to do likewise.”  There’s a trickle down effect. Your troops take their signals from the top line. Make sure yours is all about delivering value to your customers.

2.) Monitor what is being said about your brand on the Internet. This is easy to do with a number of tools. Some good ones are Google Alerts or Blogpulse, and I love checking Addictomatic each day to see what is being said about the clients we represent. It gives a quick snapshot of the Internet.

3.) Have a crisis management plan in place to deal with anything and everything under the sun.

4.) Be proactive and reach out to your audiences through social media.

And, good press to all…

ABC News slide show - fans worldwide mourn

Today, hands down, Michael Jackson is who’s hot. We may have taken him for granted in recent years. But, with his death, it becomes crystal clear how impactful his life was. People around the globe now mourn the loss of a single man who set the tone for an entire generation. He is and will always be the King of Pop. Michael was a master of many things – song, dance, branding and the creative process in general – and he changed the music landscape forever. Personally, some of my most fun memories have his music as a backdrop. The world mourns a great loss today. May he rest in peace.

Guerra and Glover, I’m honoring you today with a custom-made “Sky’s The Limit” pizza. It will have fluffy goat cheese clouds, fresh basil confetti, and pine nuts (because you had to be a little nutty to pursue that dream). lol