How to get Media Attention for Your Practice with Dave Pidgeon – Part 1 | GP 22

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How to get Media Attention for Your Practice with Dave Pidgeon - Part 1 | GP 22

Why is media attention so important for your practice? Where should you start when trying to get media attention? What should you absolutely avoid when contacting media outlets for attention?

In this podcast episode, Alison speaks to her husband Dave Pidgeon about his work in the media and in public relations, and how to get ongoing media attention for your practice.

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Meet Dave Pidgeon

Dave Pidgeon

Dave Pidgeon is a media relations and crisis communications professional, serving both private and public sectors for about a decade. He currently is director of public relations for Pennsylvania’s State System of Higher Education, which oversees policy for 14 public universities and about 96,000 students. His media career began as a journalist in 2001, leading to a decade of work in newspapers, magazines, and television news management. Dave transitioned into a spokesperson role for Norfolk Southern Corp. in October 2011, covering media markets in 16 states for the Class 1 railroad for about five-and-a-half years, managing messaging strategies and crisis communications for the Fortune 500 company. He then moved to the Bureau of Public Health Preparedness in the Pennsylvania Department of Health as deputy director of communications, before transitioning to his current job.

In This Podcast

  • Why getting media attention for your practice is important
  • Where to start when trying to get media attention
  • Building a solid, professional relationship with local healthcare reporters
  • Pitching yourself/your practice to a traditional mainstream media outlet
  • Pitching an article to a local magazine
  • Common mistakes people make when trying to get media attention

Why getting media attention for your practice is important

Alison’s practice has benefited greatly from Dave’s advice to get attention from mainstream media attention, such that her practice’s features in TV news and in local newspapers has led to an increase in calls to the practice and further media attention opportunities from local magazines. Although reaching target audiences has become so much easier thanks to other media platforms (e.g. social media, blogs, websites), business owners should keep in mind that traditional mainstream media can still be useful depending on the business’ media strategy.

Where to start when trying to get media attention

Start by doing research on local media sources, such as the local newspapers and TV stations, to find out what stories they cover in terms of healthcare and mental health. The next step would be to contact local healthcare reporters, particularly those who are dedicated to covering mental health and attempt to build a relationship with them.

Building a solid, professional relationship with local healthcare reporters

Reaching out to local healthcare reporters who cover mental health stories is recommended so that you can develop a mutually beneficial relationship. You help them with expert mental health advice, and they help you to garner media attention for your practice.

Send a local reporter an email to introduce yourself and offer to meet up for coffee, where you can get to know them and the topics that they generally cover. Ask questions about the kind of stories they’re usually interested in, and show genuine interest when they are talking to you about their work, thereby developing a connection with the reporter.

  • Let the reporter know that you want to help them out by being a useful resource, or a go-to expert, when they are working on a mental health story.
  • Reporters are highly sensitive to people just trying to get some free advertising, so make sure to build up trust with them so that they know you have their best interests in mind.
  • Make it known to them that you are available if a mental health story comes up, and remember personal details or simply to ask how they’re doing.

This should strengthen your connection with them, especially during times like now where the stories and interviews are rather tough. Make yourself available for interviews, quotes, and advice, be dependable and easy to work with and make sure to ask them about their deadline to establish the best strategy for working together.

Pitching yourself/your practice to a traditional mainstream media outlet

The dynamic between you and the reporter can be viewed as a value exchange – you want access to their large audience so as to get attention for your practice, and they want access to information that is actually useful and does not waste their resources, including limited time for research.

Do research about the kinds of stories that they cover and to make sure that you are a valuable resource to them before pitching yourself/your story/your practice. This type of research involves understanding the type of people in your client base and target audience for your business.

Pitching an article to a local magazine

You have to understand that most magazines prefer “front of the book” or “magazine surface” journalism. These are 500 – 1000 word quick hit stories that are usually numbered lists of things to do or not to do to achieve something. For this type of column, plan out several ideas based on the type of magazine (e.g. a year’s worth of topics for a monthly magazine) and send them to the magazine in an email.

Position yourself as an expert in your field by telling them:

  • What work you do
  • How many years you’ve worked in the field
  • How you have done the research and know that their readers will value the information that you are offering.

If you do not have publishing experience on your resume, you should also include a mock-up written piece showing your writing style and expertise while keeping in mind that the writing style should match that of the particular magazine.

Common mistakes people make when trying to get media attention

  • Cold calling – Avoid cold calling the reporter and asking for an interview or meeting in that way, as you are likely to interrupt them during work and not necessarily start off on the best foot.
  • Sending out the press release first – If you’re hosting an event, send out a media advisory as an invitation to local outlets before sending out a press release. That way, you’re not giving out all the information to them just yet, but rather teasing them to come to you for more information before the press release.

Useful Links:

Meet Alison Pidgeon

Alison Pidgeon | Grow A Group Practice PodcastAlison is a serial entrepreneur with four businesses, one of which is a 15 clinician group practice. She’s also a mom to three boys, wife, coffee drinker, and loves to travel. She started her practice in 2015 and, four years later, has two locations. With a specialization in women’s issues, the practices have made a positive impact on the community by offering different types of specialties not being offered anywhere else in the area.

Alison has been working with Practice of the Practice since 2016 and has helped over 70 therapist entrepreneurs start and grow their businesses, through mastermind groups and individual consulting.

Thanks For Listening!

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Podcast Transcription

[ALISON]:
When it comes to keeping your practice organized, you want software that’s not only simple but the best. I recommend Therapy Notes. Their platform lets you manage notes, claims, scheduling, and more. Plus, they offer amazing unlimited phone and email support. So, when you have a question, they are there to help. To get two free months of Therapy Notes today, just use the promo code “Joe” when you sign up for a free trial at www.therapynotes.com. Welcome to the Grow a Group Practice podcast. I’m Alison Pidgeon, your host. Today, I have a very special guest. It is my husband Dave Pidgeon. I asked Dave to come on the podcast because he is an expert in the media and public relations, and he is going to be talking all about how to get media attention for your practice. So, Dave has spent many years working as a reporter in the media, and now he is on the other side, the public relations side, so he has to interact with the media and figure out how to get coverage for his job. So, he is a great person to talk to because he’s been on both sides of it, and we talk all about kind of the step-by-step of if you want to get media attention, like where do you even start? How do you approach the reporter? How do you write a press release? What do you make sure you don’t do? So, we really cover almost like a how-to guide about how to get media attention for your practice, not just one time, but maybe on an ongoing basis. So, there was so much good information that we split the interview into two parts, so I hope you enjoy this interview with my husband Dave Pidgeon. Welcome to the Grow a Group Practice podcast. I’m excited to have my very favorite guest on the show today, my husband, Dave Pidgeon. Hi, Dave.

[DAVE]:
Hi, how are you?

[ALISON]:
Good. How are you?

[DAVE]:
I’m doing great. I have to say, this is so cool that you’ve invited me on. You have been an amazing host and you have been working so very hard. You always do, but your perseverance through this time is nothing short of inspiring. And every day, I know that I’ve got to up my game because I’m married to you.

[ALISON]:
Oh, thank you. So, right now, I am in my office which is on the first floor, and you are in our master bedroom closet, right?

[DAVE]:
I am sitting in our closet, realizing how much we have yet to organize.

[ALISON]:
But at least the sound quality is excellent.

[DAVE]:
Right? It is like a sound booth.

[ALISON]:
Yes, yes, lots of fabric to absorb the noise. So, I asked you to come on the podcast, we’re actually gonna do a two part series because we’re gonna be talking all about how to get media attention for your practice, because that is your area of expertise. But I thought, before we jump into all of that, you could introduce yourself to the audience and tell us a little bit about your work experience and why you are, well, qualified to tell us all about how to get media attention.

[DAVE]:
Yeah, so I currently work in media relations and crisis communications for a very large public higher education system of 14 universities. But my career has been about 20 years now, you can divide it into half. The first half I spent in the news, primarily in newspapers covering state politics, sometimes some national politics here in Pennsylvania, and then I shifted, did a little bit of TV work behind the scenes, not on camera. But then I shifted into public relations, specifically with a specialty in crisis communications. I worked between five and six years, about five and a half, for a very large, highly recognizable railroad company and then left that in 2017, and now here I am in public higher ed.

[ALISON]:
Nice. So I think what’s cool is that you have both perspectives of being… you were a reporter for many years, and now you’re kind of on the other side as the public relations representative, and so you kind of see the media from both angles.

[DAVE]:
Yeah, I’m really lucky because in my media experience, my time as reporter, like I said, the bulk of it was in newspapers, but I had enough time working in television about a year a little more than a year to understand the differences between those two mediums and what they need from their sources. The people they want to interview, the people that need the information from… they want two very different things, and it’s important to know that when you begin to think about your media strategy.

[ALISON]:
Yeah, and I think what I wanted to kind of impart to anybody who’s listening is why getting media attention for your practice is important. Every time I have utilized your advice to get media attention for my practice, it’s always translated into a lot of referrals for us. We’ve been on the TV news a few times. That was huge for us in terms of getting referrals. We got like triple the amount of calls the week following when the TV news aired the story, and then also when we’ve gotten coverage by the newspaper, and I have had the opportunity to write a column for a local magazine. So, I feel like it’s well worth practice owners’ time to get some media attention because, for me, it’s always translated into clients.

[DAVE]:
Yeah, as you’ve seen with your experience, there is still a place for traditional mainstream media attention and a media strategy that reaches out to that. There, I think, has been a false impression that there’s a zero-sum game here, where we all have these platforms that we now own; our social media platforms, a blog, a website, and we have the ability to reach target audiences so much easier than we ever have. But that doesn’t mean a business owner should ignore traditional mainstream media. There’s a place for it, especially when you think through what your strategy is, and how to get that attention and what it means for your business.

[ALISON]:
I think the biggest question that I hear from practice owners is they don’t even know where to start. So, what would you recommend as the first step if they’re trying to get some media attention for their practice?

[DAVE]:
It’s important to take some time to do a couple of things. I would look at your local media sources, your local newspaper, your TV stations, you may have one, you may have several. But look at what they like to cover when it comes to healthcare and mental health. What are the trends? And what types of stories do they like? So that would be one thing. And take some notes, look at where their coverage is going. I would also think about reaching out to a healthcare reporter. Normally, newspapers and TV still have dedicated healthcare reporters who incorporate mental health into their coverage. That’s important because there’s been so many changes in media and yet, one steadfast beat has been healthcare. Especially now. I would do a lot of research on that, find out who they are, and then reach out to them. I would not cold call them, I don’t recommend that, but shoot them an email, introduce yourself, offer to get together for coffee with those reporters. Anytime I’ve done that, it’s worked out really well and it’s built a solid, professional relationship with that reporter. Get together with that reporter and ask them questions about themselves and their coverage. What kind of stories are you interested in? One of my favorite questions to a reporter is always: What’s the story you’ve always wanted to tell, but haven’t been able to? That shows genuine interest in them, and that is incredibly important to building that relationship. As with any relationship, it’s a two-way street. So, show genuine interest in that reporter and his or her work.

[ALISON]:
Yeah, and I think one thing that we’ve talked about is really emphasizing, when you make that connection with the reporter, to let them know, hey, I want to be your go-to expert. If there’s a mental health story that comes up in the news and you need a quote related to that, call me up. I’m happy to give you a quote, I’m happy to go on camera for a couple minutes, whatever you need. So how do you kind of nurture that relationship or just sort of let the reporter know that you want to be that resource for them?

[DAVE]:
Yeah, I think it’s important to understand that reporters feel often that they are at the center of whatever is happening. They’re covering healthcare, they are building themselves as their own experts on healthcare. So, they’re seeing so much information, stories from across the country, local stories, they’re getting a lot of press releases thrown their way. But you as a business owner, particularly on mental health, you are an expert in mental health. You are a local voice for mental health, and for them to get, let’s say, a national story on mental health, maybe a study has come out of the university or some medical research about addiction or anxiety, something mental health related, you can make yourself available as a local voice. But what’s important is, in the beginning of your professional relationship with a reporter, understand that they are highly sensitive to anybody trying to get free media, free advertising, right? So, you don’t want to get into, at the very beginning, a whole lot of discussion about yourself, you know, make it about them, build that trust with them. If you show genuine interest in their work, they’re going to trust that you have their best interests in mind when you offer yourself up as an expert. So, I think that is an incredibly important component to building that relationship. Show genuine interest in them.

[ALISON]:
Yeah, I think the other thing too, is just to show them that you’re easy to work with, you know, like, I think sometimes we don’t understand, because we don’t work in the news industry, how tight deadlines can be, and that kind of thing. And so, if our reporter calls you and says, Hey, I need a quote right now about blah, blah, blah, and, you know, you’re like, well, I don’t really have time. Can we do it later? You know, like, if it becomes a huge hassle that obviously they’re not going to call you in the future. But if you’re like, Sure, I’m going to run and put makeup on and put on a suit jacket and I’ll meet you in 20 minutes, then they’re going to be more likely to call you again the next time they need something,

[DAVE]:
Right, you want to be dependable. So, make yourself available, especially on TV. One of the things you should ask if a reporter reaches out to you is: What’s your deadline? What deadline are you on? Sometimes, it might be in a couple of days. Other times it’s ‘I need this by this afternoon’. Work with them. Obviously, you have responsibilities that, if you can’t move certain appointments to meet that reporter, your priority, your commitment is to your business and to your employees. But if you are able to make that effort and help that reporter turn around the story very quickly, again, you’re going to build that relationship with that reporter, and that is so important because you want that reporter to think of you every time they have a mental health story fall on their desk.

[ALISON]:
Yeah, and I think to even just, it may seem really obvious, but even just telling them that. I remember when a reporter had come to interview me and I made sure to say at the end of our interview, Hey, if another mental health story comes up and you need a quote, call me, you know, here’s my personal cell number. I’m happy to, you know, kind of help you out however I can, even on a tight deadline. I think even just coming right out and saying that, so that they connect the dots, is important too.

[DAVE]:
It really is. Also, they’re people, right? I mean, reporters who are on TV or whether they are a newspaper reporter. I have a newspaper reporter that covers my agency. She owns a parrot. I ask her about her parrot before we get into any interview, and some of those interviews can be kind of tough, but I always make sure that I at least find out how she’s doing, particularly during our present challenge, this pandemic… It’s hard for everybody. So, I like to make sure, with every reporter, I ask how they are doing and then get into the interview.

[ALISON]:
Does the parrot talk?

[DAVE]:
I’ve not actually heard the parrot talk. I think it’s green, and that’s about as much right now as she has told me. She always laughs, she says the parrot’s doing fine, and then we get into the interview.

[ALISON]:
Okay, good, good. Well, at least you have a point of connection. So, a question I get a lot from practice owners as well is how exactly you pitch to the media outlet? Do you write a press release? Do you run a media advisory? Like, how do you know how exactly you’re supposed to contact people, what you’re supposed to say? Do you have any advice about that?

[DAVE]:
I think it’s important to have an understanding, as you go into this, that it’s a value exchange, right? You want access to what they have, which is airwaves that reach tens of thousands, if not hundreds of thousands, of people. Or, you could be living in a major metro and that could be millions of people. So, you want to access to that, you want to be able to stand on their platform. But the media, particularly in our present day, are stretched really thin. Their resources are really thin. So why would a reporter spend their resources, their hour, their time, doing research, working with you? So, understand it’s a value exchange. I think from there, you begin to understand that you may have a good story, and that’s great, and you may have a practice and you want to shout about it from the rooftops… That’s really great. But, using an example of a newspaper, newspaper has a readership and specific demographics that read that newspaper and the reporter is going to ask him or herself; what can’t, you know… why do my readers need to know about your business? Because if you are just coming for free media, free advertising, then they’re going to pass. They are highly sensitive to that. So, that’s why it’s important to do your research ahead of time to find out what kind of stories do they like? What are the trends in mental health, and where is mental health going, and how can your business help the reporter illustrate to their readership what’s happening in mental health, right? So, when you go to pitch that story, understand that reporter wants information that’s helpful for their readers or their viewers. So that that’s important.

[ALISON]:
Yeah. Do you have any advice for how practice owners could do research or get a sense of like, who is their main demographic? Because I remember, when I had pitched the lifestyle magazine about writing a column, somehow I figured out that their demographic was kind of similar to the demographic that I was trying to attract to the practice, and so it made sense to kind of align with them for that reason. So, is there any easy way to figure that out?

[DAVE]:
Yeah, well, you know your client, your target audience for your business better than anybody else. And, chances are, you may be very much like your client, right? So, think about how you consume news in media when you go to get information. Where do you go? And where does your local area go? It could be very different, right? Across the country, communities are very different. We live in a largely rural part of Pennsylvania, but we are close to Philadelphia. So, there’s kind of a rural suburb feel here, right? But our media environment is very different than it is, say, in metro Philadelphia. So, it’s important to understand your client and understand where your clients go to get news. So, the sample you’re talking about is, your clientele is more likely to read a regional fashion magazine than maybe it is to read a broadsheet newspaper. So it would make sense for you to try and land a story or land your voice into that regional fashion magazine than it would be to continue to try and chase a healthcare reporter at a newspaper particularly because, in our instance, in our area, that healthcare reporter is covering a lot of hard healthcare news, not a lot featuring mental health news. It’s a lot of what’s happening in the business of healthcare, and what’s happening in medicine and emergency care and so on. A lot of hard news. So, you, you know, you looked into that and understood… One reporter likes to focus on another thing, but your clientele would more likely pick up that magazine in your waiting room, and that’s why it was important to go for that. So, do your research, right? Look at what the reporters like to report on. Go six months back, go a year back if you can.

[ALISON]:
So, for example, if I wanted to write a pitch to the local lifestyle magazine to say, hey, I’d love to write an article for you about mental health. Is there any sort of formal way of doing that? Or is it just sort of an informal email like hey, this is who I am, this is what I want to do, what do you think, kind of thing?

[DAVE]:
Well, that’s a little different than getting coverage. Now you’re talking about writing for the magazine. If you wanted to go for that, if you were looking to do a column, so to speak, for a magazine and a lot of those magazines like what they call “front of the book”, “magazine surface” journalism where, if you open up a magazine today, you’ll see at the very beginning there are the 500 to 1000 word quick hit stories… the three things you need to know about this, the five things you should do to achieve that. If you’re going to make that pitch, you would want to make sure that you have several ideas. Put seven ideas together, put a year’s worth, right? If it’s a monthly magazine, get 12 ideas down on paper and send it to them and say, this is for your readers, your readers will value this, I’m an expert on these matters, I’ve worked, you know, x number of years in mental health, I know your readership, and I believe that this will be valuable to them. So that’s a little different than getting attention to your business from a reporter.

[ALISON]:
Okay, so if I was gonna write a pitch, then I would just give them some ideas, I wouldn’t actually, like, write the whole column to show them that I was a good writer?

[DAVE]:
Well, right. So, it’s a little tricky. It would probably be a good idea to do both, actually. Especially if you lack publishing experience on your resume, right? If you haven’t actually written in a magazine column ahead of time, then they’re gonna want to know that you can write. So, it’s probably a good idea to come up with 10 to 12 column ideas and then yeah, sure, write one. But make sure that, when you go to do that, that your voice, the style that your column takes on, matches that particular magazine.

[ALISON]:
Okay, yeah, great. So, what do you think traditional mainstream media is looking for? So, I know you said before that they don’t want a business approaching them asking for obvious advertisement. So how can you kinda pitch yourself, or your event, or whatever it is that you’re wanting media attention for, in a way that’s going to be legit to them, I guess is a good way of saying it.

[DAVE]:
You know, one of the things that informs me, whenever I make a pitch, is an experience I had when I worked in television, and that was the art of the tease, and the TV station that I worked for had turned this into a science. They knew that people paid attention, and this is universally true. This is true about Facebook Live, this is true about a blog post, and it’s true about traditional media. And that is people will pay attention when they are receiving information that can help them be healthier, wealthier, sexier, smarter, and then what I like to call babies and kittens. So the first four obviously have a knowledge value to it, and then there’s always what they call the kicker, you know, the thing that, at the end of every broadcast, they show babies being cute, kittens, you know, being rescued by a firefighter or whatever. But, back to something that might be more relevant here is, think about what it is about your practice or what it is that you want to pitch that can help their viewers or their readers be either healthier, wealthier, sexier, or smarter, because that’s what motivates people to pay attention to the media. So, let’s say you have an event…

[ALISON]:
Yeah, I wanted to talk about my open house that I had last year, because, so, I’ll just give a little bit of context here… So, we expanded our practice. I bought a building, we renovated it, we had a big open house to sort of announce to the community like, hey, we’re expanding the practice, here’s this brand-new space that we have open. And so obviously, I came to you to ask, like, how do I get media attention for this open house? And you had some really good tips for me, so I thought we could talk through that a little bit.

[DAVE]:
Yeah. So, let’s say you have an event, and you want to get the media to come out and cover it. So, this is one of the most difficult challenges for any business owner, because you have to show value to that news outlet. In your case, yours was an interesting finesse job because you were having an open house, you had bought a building and had renovated it, and now you were welcoming the public in. So, ask yourself, why would a TV station come out and cover that? Especially when there could be any number of news events happening on the same day at the same time? So, the first thing; think about the tease, right? For you, you have a niche and that was women’s mental health. That alone is a great hook for a reporter, so there was that. Two… Go ahead.

[ALISON]:
Sorry to interrupt. I was just gonna say, I remember we had talked about the, like, what time of the year to have it. So we happened to open the building at the beginning of March and I was kind of debating when to have the open house and you said, definitely have it before springtime really kicks in, like, have it before April because there’ll be a lot more events happening in the community, and in the wintertime, there’s less events happening and if that is the case then they’ll be more likely to cover your open house.

[DAVE]:
Right. So, as the weather warms up, that’s when you start to compete with other newsworthy events, right? So, strawberry festivals are going to be a big thing at the beginning of the summer, because that’s when strawberry picking happens. In early- to mid-fall, that’s Fair season. That’s when there there’s a lot going on in terms of county fairs, so you don’t want to compete with that. Timing it, you need to think about when can you have it that can maximize your attention? So, not only did you have it in late winter when there wasn’t a whole lot of competition going on, in terms of news events, but you also had it on a Sunday, right?

[ALISON]:
Yes, we had on a Sunday because you specifically told me there’s less stuff going on on Sundays.

[DAVE]:
Right?

[ALISON]:
So, yeah, they’d be more likely to come.

[DAVE]:
Right. On Sundays, TV news is down to a very skeleton crew and even the newspaper is down to a skeleton crew. There’s not many people working on a Sunday to put together the Monday paper or the Sunday evening broadcast. That means they are hungry for something, and so they will go out and search for something. And in your case, so you had this open house. But, again, that alone isn’t enough to hook the media. What really hooks, particularly TV, TV likes two things. They like sound, and they like active video. So, to unpack both of those, sound, when I worked for the railroad, I knew that if I could get the media to record a train whistle, doesn’t matter what they were covering, I could have been talking about grade crossing safety, I could have been talking about jobs and economic development… But if I told the TV news that they were going to be able to record something with a lot of sound, that is a high value for TV news, and we can dive deep into that, but just know that they like sound. They also like active video. So, active video means that there’s a lot of movement. If you do a story where it’s a series of interviews, just talking heads, that is the most boring television you could ask for. So, they like to be able to show action on TV. Think about it. When you’re walking around your house and the TV is on, but you’re not really watching it, but you see something out of the corner of your eye, that makes you pay attention. That’s why TV news likes to have active video. I think another important part of it, too, is experiential media, which is, as I recall, your open house, you had a massage therapist, you had some other devices that people could use and get their hands on. So, the reporter, him- or herself, could go through the experience of being at your open house. It wasn’t just people could come in and get some brochures, grab a couple of snacks. You actually had things happening at the open house.

[ALISON]:
Yeah, because that was what you had recommended to me, because we had this conversation, like, okay, you need to have activities happening because TV news likes that, so we had different activities happening in different rooms, we had chair massages, we had people using the Muse meditation headband, we had somebody giving a demonstration on, like, nutrition, healthy eating. So, there were activities going on that made it a little bit more exciting than just, like, people standing around chatting.

[DAVE]:
Right, right. So, and now, on the flip side to that, with newspapers… I think with newspapers, that’s where having the experience is so important. So, if you had an open house like you had, having a newspaper reporter go through the experience, because then they can write a description in the narrative about what happened that particular day. They like that, they appreciate that. A lot of newspaper reporters want to do kind of that first-person experience, and then turn that into a news story.

[ALISON]:
Yeah, that’s great. And I want to make sure we don’t go over our time. So, I know we have a lot to talk about so we’re going to do another episode after this one. So, if you’re interested in this topic, definitely stay tuned and check that out. But, just to kind of wrap things up for this episode, can you give us a few tips about what not to do as business owners? We’re trying to get media attention, like, what are mistakes that you see business owners making?

[DAVE]:
Yeah, I’ll touch on a couple. I think I mentioned earlier; avoid cold calling a reporter. Nothing can work against you quite like cold calling a reporter because, think about it. The reporter’s sitting there at his or her desk, they’re on a deadline, they’ve got a story that they need to put together, and all of a sudden here comes this cold call from a business owner who wants attention. Doesn’t usually work very well. So that’s one thing. If you have an event, send out a media advisory, which serves as an invitation to the media for your event, then put the press release out after the event. If you put a press release out before your event, you’ve just given away all the information. So, again, think about the tease. You want them to come to you to get information. So, if you’re having an event, send out a media advisory. And then… Go ahead.

[ALISON]:
No, I was just gonna say that’s great. And I think we’re going to get into that in a little bit more detail in the next episode, because I know that there’s like, at least I know when you were explaining it to me, I was confused. What the difference was between those two, so yeah, we’ll definitely get into more detail about that in the next episode, so definitely stay tuned for that. Dave, thank you so much for being willing to talk to us about this topic. I really appreciate you taking the time and hiding upstairs in the closet so that you could talk to me.

[DAVE]:
You have a lot of clothes that you never wear. So much fabric.

[ALISON]:
No, that’s not true. He has more clothes than I do.

[DAVE]:
That’s definitely not true.

[ALISON]:
No, it’s not. All right, so stay tuned. We’ll be back in the next episode to talk more about how to get media attention for your practice. Thank you, Dave.

[DAVE]:
Thank you.

[ALISON]:
So, definitely stay tuned for part two. If you liked that interview. We’re going to go into more in-depth information in the second part of the interview. And I also ask Dave some personal questions about me. So that’s fun too, in the next interview, so stay tuned for that. This podcast is designed to provide accurate and authoritative information in regard to the subject matter covered. This is given with the understanding that neither the host, Practice of the Practice, or the guests are providing legal, mental health, or other professional information. If you need a professional, you should find one.