It’s no secret that social media has drastically changed the PR landscape and how PR professionals engage with media. Twitter, Facebook and other social media services can provide great vehicles for connecting with journalists. However, with the social media trend generating so much online chatter and shifting at a rapid pace, it’s important to not get completely caught up in the latest social media fads and forget the basics of building meaningful, mutually beneficial relationships with media.
Back in 2009, Communiqué PR offered insight into how PR professionals can build better relationships with reporters in a blog titled, “The New Rules of Media Relations; Have They Really Changed?” With the continued proliferation of both old and new media, we feel it’s important to revisit the basics and help ensure we continue to master the fundamentals of building relationships with media.
• Research, research and then research some more. You’ll never build sustainable relationships with reporters if you’re pitching a product launch to a reporter who covers policy issues. It’s critical to understand what the reporter covers and what his or her interests are to ensure what you have to say is valuable to them. And researching doesn’t just mean pulling their name from a database that says their beat is technology. You need to get your hands dirty and do the legwork to read their articles, follow them on Twitter and think about how you can add value to their coverage.
• Pick up the phone. Yes, remember, the telephone? It’s the device that sits on your desk with a receiver and some numbers to dial. While you need to be careful not to inundate busy reporters with constant phone calls, actually having a conversation with someone can have a big impact. Reporters are more likely to remember your phone call over your one email in their inbox of over a thousand. Introduce yourself with a few suggestions of stories or angles that would be of interest to them. Having in-person meetings can also be extremely valuable. Go for lunch or grab a coffee. Believe it or not, face-to-face meetings still pack a lot of punch and will give you a chance to connect on a more personal level rather than reaching out only when you’re trying to pitch a story.
• Stay relevant and add value. We’ve heard it all before: “Spray and pray” isn’t an effective media relations strategy, so don’t spam a bunch of reporters and hope that your pitch is relevant to just a few of them. The best way to create mutually beneficial relationships with journalists is to find out what they want and help provide it. Make sure your pitches are creative and to the point and be as helpful as you can in providing resources they may need such as images, statistics, contacts, etc.
While most of us can agree that social media has offered huge benefits to the PR industry and another tool to build relationships with reporters, make sure you remember what life was like pre-Facebook and Twitter. At the end of the day we need to remember that journalists are just people. It’s rare to build and maintain meaningful friendships based solely on social media interaction, so it’s natural to assume that the same is true when building relationships with journalists. Building and maintaining any sort of relationship takes time and proper investments.