Media training isn't exactly rocket science but it remains a perplexing component of PR. Even as the business world seems to be growing technologically savvy, executives are found eating crow or stumbling over poor explanations in print and in front of the camera.
Too often, those being interviewed forget that the press is a conduit for information and not an exclusive target audience, says media trainer Carol Ivy, founder of Up Your Image of San Francisco, Calif.
Ivy recently spoke at a Public Relations Society of America and Ragan Communications media relations conference in Washington, D.C.
A lot of spokespeople and business leaders, such as CEOs, don't manage the press conference or interview process because they lack media training. Spokespeople often flounder because they're blindsided by the limelight or fear going digital on the nightly news.
Potential interviewees should weather several mock interviews that are taped and critiqued. All major PR agencies provide media training, which can range from several hundred to several thousand dollars per group.
Ivy offers some easy media relations tactics that help control the interview. They include:
- Flagging - When you segue into a key point, detail or explanation, for example, highlight the message by saying: "This is a really important point."
- Hooking - End with an answer that prompts a question you want asked; and
- Bridging - Use your time in front of the camera to discuss issues you want to explain. For example, if you are responding to a crisis situation, discuss the measures the company will use in the future to reduce the likelihood of a similar situation.
Additionally, any representative facing the press must remember the target audience or audiences: consumers, potential customers, the community, employees, stockholders, analysts, third-party vendors or associations. This does not include the press as a constituency.
Lessons in the Unlikeliest of Places
Generally, spokespeople lack a key skill in managing media encounters and forget to address proposed changes, Ivy adds. "Sometimes, you can't avoid it - what I call 'The Big Dump' or repent and confess."
Part of Ivy's media relations mentoring includes showing tapes of spokespeople who have handled crises well. And one of those isn't a high-profile, highly paid Fortune 500 spokesperson. It's Sgt. Mark Lohman, a police officer in Riverside, Calif., and the public information officer for the Riverside County Sheriff department.
The department received national press scrutiny after two of its deputies were videotaped beating two suspected illegal immigrants.
Two years later, Lohman still is receiving kudos for the way he handled the initial press conference after the incident
Lohman frankly told the media: "we're embarrassed," and that the incident, which the media compared to the Rodney King beating, would be investigated.
"We thought we'd be there all night," Lohman told PR NEWS last week. "During the press conference, reporters began packing up their bags and shaking their heads because by being honest and forthright, we took away a story. And because we didn't tap dance around the issue, part of the focus was off of our agency and on the immigration issue."
But Lohman didn't make that call in a vacuum. Sheriff Larry D. Smith, who was away when the incident happened, flew back to deal with the issue and help prepare Lohman to address the press.
After the press conference Lohman experienced criticism from some of his peers for apologizing. But the press was fair, he says.
After the clubbings, the Los Angeles Times wrote, "By seeming to level with the media, Riverside County has begun effective damage control...As many a corporation and politician has learned: a cover-up only makes things worse."