Nonprofit Radio for August 10, 2018: Your Media Relations Strategy

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Peter Panepento & Antionette Kerr: Your Media Relations Strategy
Co-authors Peter Panepento and Antionette Kerr want you to have a plan for earned, paid and owned media that’s G.R.E.A.T.: Goal oriented; responsive; empowered; appealing; and targeted. Their new book is “Modern Media Relations for Nonprofits.”

 

 

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Oppcoll hello and welcome to tony martignetti non-profit radio big non-profit ideas for the other ninety five percent. I’m your aptly named host. Oh, i’m glad you’re with me. I’d endure the pain of tacky fajita if you made me swallow the idea that you’re missed today’s show your media relations strategy co authors peter panepento and antionette car. I want you to have a plan for earned paid and owned media that’s great goal oriented, responsive, empowered, appealing and targeted they’re new book is modern media relations for non-profits i told you, take two millennials versus boomers we’re sponsored by pursuant full service fund-raising data driven and technology enabled tony dahna slash pursuant wagner see piela is guiding you beyond the numbers regular cps dot com bye tell us turning credit card processing into your passive revenue stream. Tony dahna slash tony tello’s and by text to give mobile donations made easy text npr to four, four, four, nine, nine, nine. What a pleasure to welcome peter panepento to the studio and his co author, internet kurt to the show by phone. Peter welcome, welcome back. I’m excited to be back on tony martignetti non-profit radio back to the show. First time in the studio, though first time in the studio, we’ve done it by phone. We’ve done it on site at conferences, but never in the studio. So it’s pretty cool to see you in your native habitat. Thank you very much. Peter’s cofounder and philanthropic practice leader of turn to communications, a pr in communications firm working with non-profits and foundations, he has deep experience in the media and non-profits he was a journalist for more than twenty years, most recently as a managing editor at the chronicle of philanthropy that’s where i first met him even before he was managing editor. He’s at turn hyphen, too dot ceo and at peter panepento internet car welcome to the show. Thank you for having my pleasure. Internet is the founding ceo of bold and bright media, a multimedia publishing company helping non-profit writers tell their stories. She also works as a non-profit leader and a journalist. She contributes a weekly column for the lexington dispatch in north carolina, that’s where she started in journalism, she’s been a ted ex presenter and is a contributor to non-profit marketing guide that’s, a friend of the show give you the room, miller she’s been on a few times. Internet is at bold and bright media dot com and at the right folks w r i t again. Welcome, antionette. Look. Thank you. Welcome from north carolina. Now i have two homes in north carolina, in pinehurst and emerald isle. Where is lexington? I think it is somewhat north of finders. But finders is beautiful and it’s a lovely place. Not like to go and visit. Great place to go. Yes, it is. I’m not. Yeah. I’m not a golfer. A lot of friends say that’s a waste of a house in pine er’s. Because it’s actually on a golf course. But i just watched them thankfully. It’s. A nice, quiet sport and i don’t know too much about sports. But it’s a nice quiet one. It goes by in the backyard. I don’t hear them. No golf balls in the kitchen, windows xp. Fine. Where so we should get together sometime. We definitely should have written for a pine straw, which is a beautiful publication there in-kind okay, so, yeah, you get a chance to pick that up? I haven’t written for them in a while, but it’s really great magazine. Excellent. Pine straw, i’ll look for it together. Peter and antionette have this book new book called modern media relations for non-profits creating and active pr strategy for today’s world antionette let’s stick with you. Why? Why do we need a media strategy? Well, we need a media strategy because i haven’t been on the other side of covering non-profit and then on the executive director side, i was actually exactly director of where q different non-profits i realized that there was a missing element of communication, and a lot of that has to do with not having a media strategy. Most non-profits don’t have a sign media relations coordinator, we we wish we all had the money to do that thing strategy is really a cost effective way to implement some tools. Second make you a media darling that can help you get promoted in larger publications or on television and radio, so that our goal in writing this book was just to help people with, you know, some constant, active and quick ways that they can improve their media relations strategy. Peter, you were at clark chronicle of philanthropy when i first met you. I think you were web. Editor. That guy was probably right. Yeah, i was on your podcast that’s right before i had this show. I’m pretty sure this is very meta. Yeah, we’ve come. Yes. The student has become the teacher. You have to obey me now. We were in the chronicle philanthropy studio. Um and yeah, i think you were web editor. Alright. So through web editor, you became assistant. Was this a managing editor? And they’re managing editor or one of the managing editor’s eye was a system managing editor. Yeah, go right. The point is through that time you had you received thousands of from press releases to enquiries to phone calls, maybe tenth out who knows from non-profits trying to get attention, right? What are i mean, we have an hour together, so we can’t say it all here. Okay? What? What do you what? One or two things you wish non-profits could do? Would do better around their media? Yes. So, it’s interesting. I’ve been on both sides of this equation now, and i know how hard it is to pitch stories that yes, but but, you know, like antionette i had twenty years of experience in journalism, so i got a lot of pitches over the years, and as you noted, the time i had at the chronicle, i got a lot of pitches from non-profits and i think i think the biggest, biggest turnoff for journalists and the biggest thing i wish i could do when i would get a bad ah pitch from a from on organization is give some really basic advice to actually get to know the publication and the person that you’re pitching. This is that of getting blanket pitches that you send everybody, you know, get to know who you’re actually pitching and and know what they cover and and know a little bit about what the reporter editor cares about and taylor your pitch to that to that reporter, knowing what she or he might be interested in covering and the angle that they would want to cover. Okay, duitz you get so many, you get so many pitches that really the ones that stand out are the ones that that kind of, you know, they show some research, they show some research, they know what they cover like at the chronicle, we’re not going to come and cover your charity gala. Every every charity in the country covers a charity gala, but i would get, you know, all these news releases from organizations pitching their gala. I’m not going to cover that, but if you tell me something unique about what that gala might teach other non-profits or can identify a speaker, that might be of interest to a broader non-profit audience that might get my attention. So do that little extra bit of research find out what’s unique about what you’re doing and how that that unique thing that you’re doing actually intersects with the interests of that reporter you’re reaching out, okay? We’ll talk more about your advice for press releases specifically, but okay, excellent. So cem basic do some basic research now. I was disappointed to read in the book that newsrooms are no longer like i saw in the movie spotlight. It doesn’t mean it’s not like that anymore. It’s not it’s, not and what’s really interesting about spotlight, too is that that was pretty reese, right? I mean, that was an investigative team at the globe about ten years ago that was doing some major investigative work, some of that’s happening now, but in a lot. Of cases newsrooms have been really cut to the bone, they’ve been commoditized, the business has really changed and and as a result, there aren’t thes robust reporting staffs in these big news holes that you’re going after it’s become a lot more competitive, especially for non-profits who may actually be reaching out to publications that don’t have anybody who actually covers non-profits as a beating the non-profit beat right? All right, we’re going, we’re going toe take our first break, and it is for pursuant your newspaper is pursuing e-giving outlook, they took the latest fund-raising reports and boiled them down to the takeaways you need in a concise content paper. Watch the archive of their related web in or do both it’s, an ensemble piece of paper with matching webinar through the coordination both are on the listener landing page. Tony dahna slash pursuing capital p for please now back to your media relations strategy. So peter what’s the implication of this degradation of the newsroom loss of the newsroom, no longer a non-profit beat reporter for non-profits trying to get the attention of media there, some negatives and positives related to that, i would say the big negative is that it’s a lot harder to identify the people you need to build relationships within news organizations and it’s a lot also a lot harder to get your story place, because there’s there, our reporter now might be hearing, you know from from even more folks who are competing for the limited space and what we’re talking about a newspaper here in this case in the newspaper. But it actually goes across local television and other things, too. There’s just the news hole ott of a lot of news organizations now have less space, or they are part of a conglomerate and there’s some, you know, national coverage in your local newscasts that has that’s eating up time now to that’s kind of mandate and there’s no one devoted to the non-profit beat, right? So the surgeon or the people you’re pitching r r have multiple assignments? Absolutely. Nobody is devoted to your your category of existence that’s, right? And people are turning over quickly too, so i’m so the net result of all of that is is you’re competing with a lot more people for a lot less attention. The upside of that, though, is if you are really good about building relationships with a few key reporters out there, and they start to trust you their time is so short instead of you having to pitch to them, they’re going to come to you probably a lot more regularly when they need an expert on a specific topic. So if you’re able to break through and get the attention of that reporter and and they trust you, um, that becomes really valuable to you and that’s really a key basis of the book to its howto build those relationships and howto break through and get to the point where it’s not just you sending news releases out to reporters and hoping they cover it, but but that they’re actually coming to you when they need an expert on your cause or on what’s happening in the nonprofit sector in your community or, you know, whatever you’re really looking, push, we need our media relations strategy to be much deeper than spread what you caught spray and praise brain provoc press releases, you know, to one hundred outlets, none tailored and just and just hopeful weigh a lot deeper that we’ll get to it, we’ll get to it shortly antionette by the way, i love the name antionette that was my grandmother’s name on my father’s side. Antionette antionette do you do you go by and short or do admonish people know it’s antionette now, it’s just that it’s hard to fail, but when it was hard enough to learn that name, so i think i’ll just go by that name because i noticed you have a n t i o n e t t and i think the more common spelling is oh, i end absolutely catches everything i never yet it’s right on my show sheet. I’ll prove it, peter, i’ll show him i have it spelled right every time because you’re smelling it like a grandmother, but i know i noticed i noticed you spell it differently. I thought maybe you were saying antionette but no, not internet. It’s okay, antionette martignetti was grandma martignetti you spend all the time in the book talking about ethics? Why internet? Why? Why? If we’re approaching media, why do we know about? Why do we need to know what’s the some ethics guidelines basics for journalists? Well, this is an important time in an important environment you’ve been a journalist. So one thing one of my pet peeves is whatever i work on a story non-profits asked me if they can read it, which would cause me to lose my job. I really leave a lot of people don’t understand that, you know, it could be really offensive that crosses the line between advertising and paid yeah versus a really urgent media story. So you know, where you go to a television producer, for example, and working studio you might be ableto see it after it edited and sent you, but you don’t really get to have input in that process, so we wanted people to understand that, and to really it’ll help with your relationship. So we begin our book with some jargon in terms that we use like moon, where the peter just talked about you tell me why someone would want to come to your gala will for a journalist, you say here’s, why they knew where they are, ears perked up so that’s that will really help people in establishing relationships to understand the ethics and the jargon and behind the scenes scenario with newsroom another point, you make his offering someone journalist free admission to a gala. Or maybe, you know, can i buy you a lunch? You should. We should know that. There’s. A good chance. You know you’re polite offers will politely be turned down. Right, and most organizations have a have a policy about that on the other side of the news room, so don’t take offense if they say no, i can’t accept your ticket. I mean, it’s it’s for, you know, a ten dollar event that might be that might not be an issue, but if it’s for one hundred fifty dollars gala, you know that that might be an issue for journalists, except that it could be considered, and julie influencing their objective news stories on din the new york metro area, it could be a fifteen hundred dollar ticket right way. Okay, we’ll get there in north carolina. It’s coming, it’s going, well, i’m not i’m not saying that’s a good thing anyway, i’m just saying that that’s that’s the state of the state of some some dollars in the northeast or certainly in the new york metro area, i’m not saying that that’s something to aspire to by any means, right? So you antionette you touched on earned and paid versus owns you in the book the two of you call this the trifecta could you distinguish between earned payden and owned media for us? Absolutely. And the trifecta isn’t a unique term for our conversation when that is used quite often in the journalism world, but what i noticed is that non-profits we’re really focused on earth media, but sometimes their strategies weren’t connecting their own video, which earned media traditional journalism. So it is what a reporter on whether it’s radio on the radio are print, which cover and its objective information paid media is advertising, and then all of the media which people forget that they actually own their own media sources right now between social media and website, they they do have control over that i’m seeing people, for example, a community college that had a huge cam picking that they paid for with an advertising firm to say we want a traditional student but well written their website, it didn’t really correlate with the messaging that they have paid so much money through advertising and paid people to get stories and earned the other press releases, and then they didn’t coordinate that with their own owned media that we really talk about dating you cover that case in the book that they were paying to get nontraditional students, but then there’s social media and the website was highlighting volleyball and some other sport. You know, it was highlighting the sports, and so people are looking for coordination in message, and they weren’t finding it right. They were born. They were showing back about players, and they wanted older students, people to consider themselves a student. If they’re older, they had a violent past about being featured on the website. Let’s, see so let’s stick with you internet talk a little about the earned media. Peter gave some tips about press releases. What i like way like here, actionable, no actionable strategies tips. You know what? What, what, what some other advice around making press releases more likely to be acted on and not not trashed. We have a section where we talk about appealing for may have been working with pressure lisa’s much first job as an intern at a newspaper with a full presently about the fax machine and deliver it to the right. This doesn’t seeing press releases the good, the bad and before quite some time and for non-profits a particular thing after you that they’re not really appealing a lot of times that we’re having the same event. You know, we talked about the gala where a golf tournament, we just kind of recycle the same press release every year and again, that’s not showing what worthy and a lot of times when you read the press release, i tell people, if you get bored reading your own press release that, don’t they? So just to make him appealing is good and then as some really powerful quote. So once the happiest people has this really stuffy quote from the executive director, that doesn’t end quality to the conversation. So that quote from from your weather report chairs or eighty your communications director to me, something exciting, not great language, but nothing exciting. You even recommend you recommend spending ten minutes interviewing the person, even if you’re the internal. You know, if you’re the internal communications person, you recommend spending ten minutes interviewing the person you’re going to quote, you can get some of their active language and bring some of that passion out that theyve got for the subject. Absolutely, absolutely that’s part of making your strategy appealing. So, you know, just just kind of sprucing up the language and and again removing the jargon from your non-profit and your great language. I feel like people, especially if they receive a grant that cutting case, you know, part of their executive summary into the press release and the journal is not you. I love making this news worthy. So, peter, our press release is still valuable men. Should we even bother be doing them, though? Yeah, i mean there’s value to him. But i think they shouldn’t be the default any more. I think a lot of organizations think there think that by sending news releases out, whenever they have something to announce that’s their media relations, they’ve got made a strategy right right on that it should be part of the picture, but it shouldn’t be the whole picture, and they are valuable in a couple of ways. One is they actually can provide valuable information to a reporter when they’re reporting on a story they’re very helpful toe have posted on your website a zoo in an archive for when people are looking for information specifically when reporters are looking for information on a lot of times, if you have those news releases posted on your website, they may connect through a story they’re writing on. It may not happen the day you signed the release out, but three months from now, if you release an important report on something and reporters covering that issue let’s say you put a report out about hunger in your community and it gets to be around the holidays and reporters doing story about hunger and hunger charities around the holidays that release might actually get their attention when they’re looking for information so there’s value there. But when i think you’re sending them out, i i feel like you get a lot more attention and you do a lot better job of building relationships if instead of just sending a news release to everybody on your media list, you you identify a few people and actually send a personal note to that reporter talking about what’s coming up, you know, giving them a heads up about what’s there, talking about some things that might be of interest in that announcement to that reporter and then making yourself available is a resource for for follow-up either right then or whenever the reporter needs that, i think if you actually spent more time doing that and less time just cranking out press releases you, you get more of your news covered and you built some better relationships and that the personal note idea. You have a little section in your book where you say you’re recommending something, you say way, have we switched years to make this a fund-raising book? No, you’re talking about relationships with reporters? Yeah, yeah, and no. So, i mean, i know it’s. Just that relationships are important and the personal note goes above and beyond how many personal. You know how many personal handwritten notes would you get in a month? You know what? The chronicle of philanthropy? Very few. But you know what? Average it’s a stand. And it stands up, you know? So he’s going to get rid. Exactly, write something stupid in your hand written note. You know, it’s still gonna end up in the garbage, right? So don’t try anything stupid, but, you know, you can stand out absolute waste. And that z very, uh it’s perfectly consistent with what we say about dahna relationships, absolutely for fundraisers sends the personal thank you note from a boardmember or something? Yeah, the personal notes, the thank you’s are really crucial. Azan example on dh this has happened fairly recently. One of the clients i work with, you know, is looking to build relationships with reporters who cover philanthropy in wealth. And i’ve reached out to a really prominent ray boerner, who covers wealth and have built a relationship with him without ever actually pitching a story to him. Yeah. So, you know, i sent along a couple of of story ideas to him and explain to him who i was and who i worked with and how i could be helpful to him. And we had a bit of a back and forth, and it got to a point where he actually reached in some of the email back and forth, he finally reached out to me and said, hey, i’m working on the story. Do you have any people who can who can be quoted and and i got back to him with three people home run, yeah, he’s asking you, he’s asking me, and then on top of that following that and, you know, actually delivering on it and him getting the sources he wanted. I got our email back afterwards where you actually i thank him for the story and he replied back and he said, you are now in the pantheon of pr people whose emails all open every time. So if grand slam, if you can deliver on that, you can you can move yourself into that pantheon and and that’s way more valuable than that would’ve been way more that one relationship is way more valuable than me putting a release out on pr newswire and hoping it gets picked up a thousand times more. See all these ideas in the book you got to get the damn book that’s just the point where we can’t cover everything in an hour. It’s modern media relations for non-profits just buy-in panepento incur. Just get the done thing let’s see? Okay, little moron earned media. That was some good in the media for us, right? They’re actually very good. It wasn’t e-giving, but nobody. You’re welcome, but nobody listens to this show way. Have over thirteen thousand. Um, let’s. Stick with you, peter. Peter p on on beds writing your you can write up ed. You’re writing on spec though you might spend a lot of time. It may not get printed, but it could be valuable if it if it does absolutely, you can be purposes. That’s, right? Ok. Writes a little opera. Okay. So op eds. If you’re not familiar with what i’m not, that is if their opinion pieces that are written by outside writers. Thank you. You’re a newspaper keeping me out of george in jail. Well, my own show. I have jack in jail and i think it’s interesting s o, i’m about to put out an e book on top says, and we’ve had a really hard time titling it because way can’t assume that anybody knows what an op that is so it’s kind of an internal struggle i’m having right now too, but ah ah lot of people think that op eds are kind of ah dinosaur thing of the past that they don’t really exist anymore, but guess what? Newspapers are still running them, and in fact they’re probably running more of them now because they have smaller staff, so they’re actually looking for more writers to contribute to their pages. So if you’re actually looking to advance an idea or, you know, advance an issue trying to, you know, build awareness about, you know, health care and you’re in your community or some kind of gap there, this is an opportunity for you to build a, well, a statue, you know, well crafted argument written by a thought leader in your organization, your ceo, your executive director, you know, the head of whatever initiative you’re working on and and use that space is a is a a place to kind of articulate your argument about why that issues important and what’s being done about it, or what people can do about it and a cz you noted the great value of that, you know, there is competition for these so you you’re writing these on spec your you may send it into ah paper, and they may not pick it up. The op ed page is limited space, right? Exactly if it does get picked up. Wonderful, right? You’ve gotten you’ve gotten in there if it doesn’t get picked up now you have a piece of writing that you can use for other things, you can use it on. You’re on your own media, you can use it on your website. You could put it in an appeal to donors. You can put it in your annual report. You khun it’s, it’s, not wasted effort. You can you can do something else with it. And the great thing about the era of internet journalism now, too is if the if the peace does get picked up before you know, twenty years ago you pick up the newspaper, you’d read the op ed that day and you throw it away. Now it lives forever online and when people are searching on that topic, your op ed might show up six months later and you might win a new supporter. You might, you know, no, get somebody who wants to learn more about your organization and joined your email list, you can get lasting value from these now internet there’s. Also some services is that you can use teo to find out what generalists are working on currently, as they’re trying to source. Haro is one help a reporter out profnet say little about those would you please sure the one of the big things that we really try to emphasize that help people find you. So a lot of times reporters are working in a silo like peter mentioned before, they have us to worry they have a story idea whether they’ve pitched it to the editor of the editor, came that i really love you to write a christmas story about non-profits in the area, i get that i get that a lot, and so here they are. You know, out here looking for sources. Finding people on facebook is a really great way, but there are services like said president, helpful reporter out sourced bottle on pitch rate that you can, you can say, you know, here here we are, here’s our mission and we can provide stories on this particular topic so you can go forward and really and thinking about your strategy think about what stories you want to share. I worked with a community that serves families who are facing homelessness, and they wanted people to know what that looks like, and they wanted to challenge this stereotype. So when they had an opportunity to connect with reporters over the holiday, they really share different stories about who was living in their community and why, and that was great for them because it was a really empowered story versus just having an expectation that you’re only is gonna work out the way you wanted to. We have just about a minute before a break internet so we’re gonna spend a lot of time after this break talking about great goal oriented, responsive, empowered, appealing and targeted for your media strategy started start us off with goals, and we’ll have plenty of time. The finish up talk more after the break, we’re gonna start with what your advice around setting goals for your strategy? Well, i wouldn’t say start with your with your team, so you know what if whatever role you’re in and you’re reading this book, i mean, we wrote it so that it could be helpful before members of your communications staff eighties, but really start with city now with her team and talking about what is your goal for your media relations strategy? That’s a measurable outcomes like you would for a grand opportunity and think what what comes out of that conversation? It’s really simple, but not something that people take the time to do in their non-profit daily work, you have some sample? Ah, couple of sample goals you can share. Yes, one of the big goals we talked about that before, with the with the community college i worked with was, do they really sell student enrollment going down? And they thought, has only increased enrollment, so their media relations strategy goal was to show that, you know, other that, you know, you just have to be a high school student high school graduate coming directly to the community college. They wanted to emphasize that college was open and welcoming to also they said, oppcoll around that i’ve also you know, i’ve had a personal goal of my last organisation, i work for housing non-profit that kept getting mistaking for the housing authority that our goal was just for people to know our name was a big old fred. All right, we’ll take, uh, take a break. Weather cps it’s personal now heat coach doom he’s a partner. You heard him on the four hundredth show just two weeks ago. Check out the firm, then talk to him. Very good guy. He’s no pressure, have you? I don’t know if you have you ever even heard of a high pressure sepa? I’m not sure that exists, but dahna you will listen to what your needs are and then he’ll tell you whether they can help you. They are wagner, cps dot com to start and then talk to him now. Time for tony steak, too. While there is a lot of talk about millennials, including on this show covered in many times millennials, donors, i’m pursuing baby boomers. I’ve got a different perspective. If you’ve got donorsearch or sixty and over, you need to promote plan gift to them that’s gift in their estate and retirement plans? I’ve heard it so many times loyal donor-centric boardmember they’ve been giving for fifteen, twenty years, maybe more, they die and there’s nothing in their state plan for the organization, everybody expected it, you know, people are saying we just assumed it would be there, but it’s not there they were never asked. I hear about it because it’s often the reason that people initiate contact with mito to start a plan giving program because they’re so disappointed about this, this gift that you expected and wasn’t there and they don’t want to repeat that they’re competitors are asking, your competitors are asking the other non-profits it might be a small community and, you know, they’ve found out that there was a gift to another organization in their will in the community that hurts a lot, but they were left out on against that they didn’t ask. So it’s it’s really not? You know, millennials versus baby boomers uh, you don’t you might very well need to be promoting to both, depending on what your causes and who you don’t what your donor looks like, but, well, the headlines and webinars you know often are going to millennial. E-giving i’m paying attention to baby boomers sabat there’s a north an enormous amount of wealth in that generation, and they are generous with it, and that creates potential. My video says a lot more, and that is at twenty martignetti dot com let’s go back to peter panepento and antionette car who are with me talking about their new book, modern media relations for non-profits, um, answer that we were talking about goals, the g and great, um, you need to identify who you want to be pitching once, you know what you want to do you to identify, you know, who you’re what, your audiences, right, who the right journalists are absolutely, and i need to pitch with purpose. So instead of spray and phrase talk about know, how do you how do you actually pitch with purpose? And a lot of that piers talked about with your delivery of, you know, sitting a press release but also sending a personal note or pitching or approaching them even when you aren’t necessarily pitching your no, i’m agreeing with you and cut you off there no, no, absolutely absolutely that’s that’s part of our goal oriented basically it’s what’s. Your game plan? What we’re asking people, you know, what do you each year you should sit down with your non-profit and say, what’s our game plan with our media relations strategy? You some people call it a campaign, you want to look at it that way, but that is important, and it can it can enhance what you already have going on. Maybe you’re having a big no anniversary fundraiser that really wants some great media attention around that. This could really help you with promoting your fund-raising strategy well and go hand in hand. You need to think of it as something long term to write a relationship building like you were saying, peter, absolutely, and in setting the goals, they’re really not goals there. Not so much goals for your media placements, but as much as their goals for your organizations and you’re connecting your media strategy to your organizational mole. So it has the huh? The maximum value free organization if you’re only able to invest, you know, twenty hours a month of media relations let’s, make sure we’re investing those twenty hours a month on something that’s actually going to move the needle for the organization not just necessarily get you media hits for the sake of media and in the in the immediate term, right? Like, you know, if you if you’ve got your, uh, let’s say you got a milestone anniversary. So you got a fifty if their hundredth anniversary coming up, you know, the time to think about your media strategy is not two weeks before the big gala celebrating the anniversary, right? Yeah. It’s, like, eighteen months before of the anniversary. Osili abila start building those relationships like you’re talking about exactly what you want to build the relation in ships, and then you actually want to think about all right, we have we have one hundredth anniversary coming up. What do we want to? Not only not only do we want to celebrate that, but what do we want that to say? What message do we want to come out of that? Who do we want to reach with that message and having some clear goals around that that actually kind of advanced the work of your organization, you know, really gets you off much bigger lift from the effort and the investment that you are putting in the media. In the in the end. And it requires more thinking and and work up front. But it’s going to lead to much better results. And i think. What? What always gets me and and i understand why it happens is is a cz you noted like you don’t you don’t just make it an afterthought two weeks before the event. Oh, no, we’ve got to invite the media to this that’s. What leads to those cookie cutter press releases? They don’t get into any impact, but if you are actually building the relationships, you’re thinking about what the key messages are your thinking about how they connect to the reporters you want you want, you actually want to connect with, ah, that time is really well spent, and you probably actually ultimately wanna spend less time chasing stories than you. You you are if you’re just kind of doing the dahna oh, no, we need a press release conversation two weeks before that, and you’re also so much more likely to have a positive outcome absolutely and less frustration, absolutely absolutely the are they are in our great is responsive. Does this mean that our media strategy should be responsive? We’ve covered a little this already in the conversation, but really it’s about making sure that you’re not just pushing things at a reporter that you’re being responsive to that reporter’s needs and what here she might be working on. So it’s it’s really media relations there’s two words in it there’s media, obviously, but there’s relations it’s it’s building that relationship on dh kind of being attuned to and responsive to the needs of that reporter that you’re tryingto work with. So it means it means being available, it means, you know, helping connect them the sources it means sometimes actually saying we’re not the best source for you, but let me connect you to somebody at another organization who is on, and it also means to having some basic information on your website and some other places that are actually helping a reporter when they’re on a deadline, connect with you and get the information they need. So we talked a bit about the fact that a lot of non-profits don’t have, you know, a media or a pressroom page on their web sites, and if they dio, they may include a bunch of press releases there, but no contact information for for their media person on dh having been in that reporters share and looking for sources if i can’t find your media contact. Or a place to to connect with you. I’m going to move on to the next organization s o being responsible in some ways being proactive, too. It’s, you know, it’s it’s having some of those basic kind of, you know, building blocks in place to make sure that you’re you’re responding to the needs of the reporters. Internet let’s say little about this flesh is fallible, but in terms of deadlines and you know the urgency that a reporter has when they’re on assignment first, let me ask a basic question is this i used to learn back when i had relationships with people like stephanie strong at the new york times who once upon a time had the new york non-profit beat in the times that ten a m was a critical time like that was a deadline time for a lot of newspapers. Is that is that anachronistic maya dinosaur? Or does that there’s something like that still hold true? I know you’re not a dinosaur at all. I would never say that. Hee hee. I never say that, but every publication as their own deadlines and that’s another thing that speaks to what? What peter mentioned. Understanding the reporters deadline and i love whenever i reach out to people and they say what’s your deadline because they know that they’re going to try to help me keep things moving in a timely manner. That’s a good question, and one that might impress your reporter friend of what you just did. And the other aspect of this being responsive is that when the news breaks that might be related to your organization, one particular organization talked, and we share this example in the book about how there was a domestic violence situation, unfortunately, with nfl player in there state that really launched this conversation about domestic violence, and they responded, but, you know, when you’re where they call newsjacking you have to be ready to go on dh and be prepared to be the scout leader for the person leading the conversation and really no sharing why this particular thing that happens, your organization have been working with families to help ensure that that just doesn’t happen. So they were i mean, you know, when reporters call you calling back, understanding their deadlines, but also if you wanna happen, teo a popular topic in news cycle reach out to a reporter and say, i know everybody’s talking about me too, here’s, how our organization within that conversation and that’s what newsjacking is ok, just try and keep you out of jack in jail. You’re paroled, okay, but longs to explain the term newsjacking alright, so it’s taking advantage of what’s happening in the news, right, and seeing how your organization fits into it and can lend its expertise to the conversation. Absolutely. Okay, um, okay, okay. Um, anything else about well, events? Yeah, internet hyre peter. Peter was talking about events, and, you know, the ubiquitous gala press releases that he would see, but but hey, touched on this little bit. I want you to flush it out for me. If there is something newsworthy about your event, then, you know, highlight that, like he mentioned, uh, maybe a celebrity attending or something like that. Absolutely so that’s a good way to get the media out, offer them a media representative of a time before or after, where they can talk to the celebrity or the expert. You know, i’ve seen a lot of people successful when they had data report, and they offered this expert as they made it relatable to a community need, and then they offered an expert who will interview we do have a section where we talked about what to do to make your event we’d hear friendly, yes. So having been on the other side of that, you know, it has been a challenge with reporters show up everybody’s busy at the gala for the event, and, you know, things are hectic and the reporter shows up looking for the executive director, and no one can seem to find that person who was it? Who was the media contacts and doing something as simple as making a little place where you tell the reporter here’s where you could check in is nice and important, and you really don’t want the reporter roaming around, you know, in some cases talking to random people, so i went to one of it. And i assure you that i was there on assignment and never find anybody who would take the time to talk to me, so i went back and told my editor, we weren’t covering that story. So that’s that’s really, you know, one thing that people don’t think about that think about it in the media there when they’re they’re sometimes they are prepared, so we talk about how to how to make your event media’s really before, during and after the event and share some of your coaching tips for for when they are talking to the executive director ceo, the person may not be so media savvy. You have you have a lot of tips in the in the book share a couple of those for coaching in advance to prepare so coaching and prepare. You want to make sure your media person is on message that’s part of that goal conversation. So, you know, whoever is responsible for coaching the scout leader, that could be a boardmember a lot of times it is, and, you know, that’s, even worse, they don’t do work on the day to day basis, so you want to give them the key. Points, and he did don’t overwhelm them with information, but maybe even a sheet to say no if you get stuff, bring it back to this message and bring it back to this place. I recently experienced that i am on a community advisory board, so i was in that position where our public radio stations and they had a white board and the communications director was like, ok, tell me why you like public radio, and then she would tie it to key messaging, lifelong learners. So she said, well, just keep saying lifelong learners get stuck just say and i’m a lifelong learner, so that was messaging that they wanted to promote it fit within something that was very comfortable for my story and that’s a tip that i also get two people to make sure that that you give them some practical tips. But i’m not why they why they like being a part of your organization that they’re boardmember if there is the executive director, make sure they’re not doing day to day work, they’re busy thinking differently. Make sure they have a personal connection to the story. Peter, you can probably give tips for foundations. Sure, yeah, absolutely. And, you know, it’s really about kind of both preparing the spokesperson or the leader for with, with what those key messages are, but it’s also kind of preparing them for what to do when they don’t know an answer to something, and in some cases it’s, it’s, it’s, even them saying, you know, i actually don’t have that information in my fingertips can i have? Can i have somebody follow up with you after the interview, or can we send you some more information afterwards? A reporter often, especially when they’re dealing with non-profits isn’t out to get you, you know, they want to get accurate, useful information, so though they’ll respect that and and and if you don’t know an answer to something, just say you don’t know an answer something and yeah, by the same token, you talk about the hot mic problem and the fact that anything that a reporter hears is fair game unless it’s explicitly off the record. Yes, there’s there’s tons more tips. Yeah, no, i think the one thing to keep in mind, though, is that anything you actually say can unless it’s it’s agreed upon between you and the reporter that it’s off the record and they can’t use it it’s fair game is shooting after they put their notebook and that the men away. Some of the best stuff i ever got as a reporter was after i put my notebook, you know, i closed my notebook and the doug, and it wasn’t deceptive at all. The people let their guard down a little bit, and they start talking a little bit more contemporaneously, and then you go in, the reporter might go back and say, oh, hey, do you mind if i write that down or can you can you talk a little bit more about that kind of make it give them a signal that there are they actually are still on the record, but but always assume when you’re talking to a reporter, when you’re when you’re sitting in front of a microphone like i am right now, that it’s getting picked up way have a president who knows that very well right now. All right, so you know what you say in the presence of a reporter is is on the record, and there are a lot more tips about coaching your ceo. We gotta take a break, tell us you’ve heard me say the test. The tellers, moughniyah, lt’s, tell us, moughniyah, lt’s from from charities that referred companies for credit card processing and air. Getting that revenue each month, and from the companies who are using tello’s. Four credit card processing can use more revenue that long stream of passive revenue. You’ve heard the tell us. Moughniyah, lt’s. Watch the video it’s at tony dot, m a slash tony. Tell us now, back to peter panepento and antionette car. Let’s, move on because we’re going to cover the whole word greek and there’s there’s more about were jumping around. We’re jumping to different parts of it a little bit as well. Just gr yeah, it comes e what do you mean, jumping around this a planned? Well, i mean, we’re kind of covering a little bit of empowered with some of the other things we’re talking about, okay? That’s what i’m saying? Yeah, you’re staying on target antionette hyre assault so anarchists but oppcoll look, i’ll keep you on a message, all right? I’ll help you with your media strategy, your media messaging. Okay, so yeah, there’s a lot more about being responsive. Just get the book for pizza. Alright? Empowered the ian. Great empowered what do this mean? Peter it’s really about kind of owning your message and being proactive in your in your in your work with reporters and wave touched on this issue at different points in the conversation here, but it’s really about not waiting for things to happen to you, but kind of being in a position where you’re where you’re taking an empowered and proactive role in talking about your organization and reaching out to reporters in showing up in the places where where they are so it’s not just again sending emails and press releases its making sure that your, you know your web page has the right information it’s making sure that yes, your own properties? Yeah, you know it’s actually properly it’s it’s, it’s identifying the reporters that you care most about uncover your beat following them on twitter and, you know, retweeting their messages and doing things they’re so you’re kind of showing up on their radar screen and getting their attention that way. It’s it’s really taking the steps that you can in little and big ways to to make sure that that, you know you are showing up and you are kind of putting yourself out there and all the places that really that really help your organization get a story told in the media also, if there’s some placement and it’s inaccurate o r you’re accused of being fake news or you have some rights in this process, absolutely too, and being empowered is recognizing what to do when when this story is wrong or, you know, you feel like something is mischaracterized you feel like somebody’s misquoted. They got a fact wrong, it’s it’s knowing that you have some tools in your toolbox to ask for a correction to run a write a response letter to the editor to take steps to actually own your message. Even in the cases where part of the story was missing or keep perspective was missing. Your organization’s left out of a story that you feel like you should have been in, you know, knowing that you actually have a right and and, uh and an ability to actually advocate for yourself and try to right those wrongs. And we have a lot of tips on how to do that. You also have advice on positioning your organization. Somebody within your organization is a thought leader. Yes. Power say little about s o and an answer not. And i both weigh both work on this issue quite a bit. It’s it’s. You know if and and ties back to your goal. Let’s, say your goal is to position your your organization, your community college as a place for lifelong learners. For people who are nontraditional students having and and by doing that one of the things you decide you want to do is you want to get the message out that there’s value in education in your thirties, forties and fifties, for instance, having an expert on your staff being kind of the voice for that issue, who’s out, advocating and talking about that in your in your own media, but also in her new media is really valuable. So having tony martignetti, the expert in our college, on lifelong learning and looking, you know, for opportunities for him to write op eds for him to be a voice in coverage of education around that issue. You’re branding a person and your organization is a thought leader, but by extension, you’re raising the profile of your organization and building relationships that will get you more media coverage and get you more attention from prospective students, prospective donors and others. There’s a lot of advice in the book about how to position yourself, how to make yourself ready, making organization ready for for to position yourself as as thought leaders plus thank you for the the durney talk pretty when he says my name martignetti martignetti three italians and thank you for that. Yeah, i should have made it about playing, giving. All right, because that’s where your i was going to admonish you that on very shortly start for our last break text to give mobile donations made easy, it’s, simple, affordable, secure. While i was on their sight for a few minutes last night, donations were popping up. The window pops up. Tells you with new donation the ten. Twenty, there are multiple fifties, there was a fifteen hundred donors are using them. Text npr to four, four, four, nine, nine, nine for info on text to give and to claim your special listener offer. Got about six more minutes for your media relations strategy. Internet let’s. Turn to you, teo. Talk about the r is appealing. Your media relations strategy needs to be appealing. What do you two mean there? So we spent time interviewing other journalists about what they would like to see. Not just based on our experience, but we interviewed other people about what they wanted to see in covering non-profits and here’s. How that chapter came together. People told us what they what they wanted to see impressively. The list of them against the elements of a really good quote. I mentioned it. Earlier that people didn’t want to see, you know, great jargon were like, you know, since, um, you know, very it sounds like the official statement of the organization in the quote, but they were looking for something a little bit, you know, when one reporter described it exactly, like, give me something sexy and so that’s how this appealing conversation came about, and the other thing is visuals, a lot of people are under pressure, they might have one photographer that is going to cover breaking news or that that is really important because they high resolution, high quality photos and in some cases, officially, in the television side, videos for the website there’s a pressure we heard from television reporters to have other content on the web site outside of the interviews so that the media source can run that. So having me visuals are very appealing to people, and they’re very helpful when you’re covering something like data and report like, you know, some of us who like that, you know, like reports, but of others in immediate really need to know what’s appealing about your report, so having a very cool executive summary and maybe some really great brand messaging will be helpful. You know, something colorful, even a cover, read it and just spending that in your press early. So those are some of the things we talked about, and we also talk about if you are able to do that, it might be time that hyre announce that resource. So that’s, a question that came up for a lot of non-profit that we interviewed, like, when do we know it’s time to invest? We don’t have this ability to make it appealing or the time in our wheelhouse. So we just give some examples of when you might want to invest in and out, that a company that can help you get placement in coverage, like a turn to that, that that is a really question for non-profit. A little piece of earned media there, like like a turn, too. Yeah, turn hyphen to dr dot ceo that’s, right? Wow, yeah, yeah, bookmark it, everyone. I tell you something else. Ah, on appealing visual. Yeah, you sent you say in the book on lee on ly fourteen percent of the press releases that pr newswire hosts have have anything visual on them, even though it’s a very good idea was, like fourteen percent or doing it so you could be in the and you could be in the eighty sixth percentile. If you just start doing some writing, you’re having some visuals that a publication can not only get the attention of the reporter, but they could run with a story they might cover gives you a bit of a leg up having a photo having cem cem, you know, nicely produced infographics for report. You have those things actually can help tip the scales for you in a really big way, a little known secret at the chronicle, and i’m sure stacey palmer’s either going to be very happy or admonished me afterwards for saying this, but they don’t have a staff photographer at the chronicle philanthropy almost all of the photos they run, they either have to hire out or they get them from non-profits that air cover that that they’re covering, and having been inside the chronicle for years, um, you know, often it would fall on the reporter to actually find photos for a story and guess what if if i know a non-profit has an interesting perspective, and they have a great photo that could go with my piece and i and i and i know i can check that off my box and get that done, you know, i’m going to spend a little extra time talking to that non-profit making sure i can work them into the story because now i have a photo to go with the story so ah, a little piece of tip if you’re trying to get the chronicle, have some good photos available for him. Stacy problem, of course. Dropping names. She’s, the editor in chief? Yes, yes. Alright. Antionette i’m going to turn to you with a little bit of pressure. We just have about a minute. So would you explain targeted, please? I will indeed. We talked about it already in the we mentioned that somewhere in the goal oriented section again, this is identifying relationship. One of the things we talk about, we give an example of a non-profit that really had some great media coverage to a podcast that was related to the topic, so they work in the areas of george preservation, and they connected with george preservation podcasts and it’s the best media coverage they were able to receive, they were ableto have fun donors and boardmember through this relationship. So, you know, taking some time to sit down, we call it modern media relations because a lot of the other books were out before podcasts were even popular, but we really try to challenge people to think about a targeted strategy. And where is your audience? The best audience for you and your non-profit work? Yeah, i’ll give you thirty seconds on targeted. Yes. Oh, this podcast is example of that. Antoinette and i you know, when we were mapping out our media strategy for this book, we targeted a few outlets that we thought were really valuable. They were the outlets that reached non-profit leaders and folks who could benefit from this book. And guess what? You were on that list by implication buy-in non-profit radio is a valuable resource, absolutely. Bye. You know, we didn’t send this to folks who covered the textiles industry. We sent it to folks who cover non-profits and we were really targeted and who we knew we reached out to him. He’s peter panepento you’ll find him at turn hyphen too. Dot ceo and at peter panepento and she is antionette car at bold and bright media dot com and at the right folks w r i t internet peter. Thank you so, so much. Thank you. This was great pleasure. Thank you. My pleasure, antionette next week. Not sure have ever let you down, though, except for that one show on fermentation. But that aside, if you missed any part of today’s show, i beseech you, find it on tony martignetti dot com, responsive by pursuant online tools for small and midsize non-profits data driven and technology enabled. Twenty dahna slash pursuant capital p weinger cpas guiding you beyond the numbers wagner, cps, dot com bye tell us credit card and payment processing your passive revenue stream. Tony dahna slash tony tell us and by text to give mobile donations made easy text npr to four, four, four, nine, nine, nine. Our creative producer is claire meyerhoff, known to these teo co authors sam leaving, which is the line producer. You have to get the book to see how they know her. The show’s social media is by susan chavez. Mark silverman is our web guy, and this music is by scott stein of brooklyn. Be with me next week for non-profit radio. 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