What's My Motivation for This Scene?
Nick Hadjinikos reveals why the secret to stardom lies in the world of Broadcast PR
Looking for a better job? Or do you want a hand up the corporate ladder? Well here's a tip. Get the CEO on air, do it right in the bad times and the good, and your future will be secured.
Conversely, if you are the boss, ask yourself when your PRs last handed out cassettes and videos with the morning press summaries. Does your company ever set your industry's news agenda or is it just a follower. And when did you last hear a competitor making a point on the radio that could have, that should have come from you?
The fact remains that too many PRs still break news without keeping the broadcast media in mind. We are fixated by the written word and blind to a revolution that is recreating the way the media works. Because while the parochial press has not changed significantly over the last 100 years, TV and radio have blossomed into a vibrant, interactive technology accessible on line and on the move wherever you are whenever you want.
If this seems futuristic, compare the stats available right now and you will see that you ignore broadcasters at your loss. In the UK, the broadsheet Times has a circulation of some 2 million while the BBC's flagship news programme Today is eagerly digested by an more influential audience of some 3 million. The BBC's 24 hour talk station Radio 5 reaches another five million - surpassing the mighty Daily Mail. The Daily Telegraph sits at 2.7 million while a BBC or ITN TV news broadcast at 6 or 10 p.m. is seen by an average audience of 6 million. And did I hear you say CNN or BBC World Service? Well, try counting your audience in the tens of millions and you get the idea.
A live on air interview is the only way to gain editorial without having it re-interpreted by a subjective journalist. Furthermore, unlike the written press, there are no deadlines on air and a good PR can hold a story in play until his or her case is made. And broadcast tends to lead a story on the same day, while the written media have to report it on the next, offering huge opportunities to shape the story.
Broadcast builds brands, creates awareness, increases institutional confidence and influences parallel media. So why is the world of broadcast a PR turn off? Firstly this is not a territory for amateurs. For the interviewee, natural humility might be attractive but a stammer or fit of nerves can kill. And for the PR, the medium offers complex logistics and tight schedules, the need for strong visual backdrops and the perennial challenge of finding an interviewee prepared to go on air live at 6.15 am. With hundreds of programmes to sift, each with its own peculiar embargoes and schedules, a collection of editors, producers, reporters and researchers to influence and a debate over quality and quantity fuelled by unreliable and overpriced monitoring and evaluation, an overworked PR can be often be excused for sticking to the traditional knitting.
And while broadcasters often complain that PRs give too many scoops to the papers or fail to take their needs into account when they break news, they do little to help their case. Too few seek to engage with their PR peers during downtime, understand issues or cultivate contacts.
The result is often that too few broadcasters have time for PR departments and agencies with no dedicated broadcast PR expertise, and too few PRs know how to adapt or sustain a story on air that might protect or recreate it in print.
A curious by-product of this breakdown is apparent in UK financial services, where retail banks spend millions on commercials that are inaccessible to the mainstream BBC, while frequently failing to adapt or create PR campaigns for news features and programmes that would give them more credible exposure for free!
Despite its insincerity and forced intimacy, eccentric methods and horrible programme timings, the future is quite definitely on air, and a PR function not geared up to its needs is out of tune with reality.
All you have to do is summon your motivation for the broadcast scene. Think sales, corporate credibility, brand. Think promotion. You could even think family, because broadcast in its widest sense touches everyone. Think of how proud your kids could be!
Whatever you think, don't duck the issue. Engage. Step up to the breach, summon the spirits and bring your story to life.
In 1997, Nick Hadjinikos established the UK financial community's first specialised broadcast PR unit at London based Citigate Dewe Rogerson. In 2000, he joined Europe's first internet bank, First-e, as Head of PR. He can be contacted at nhadjinikos@hotmail.com.
