Archive for interview preparation
Media Training Tip #11: Company is Coming!
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In preparing for a visit from a member of the esteemed Fourth Estate, focusing on getting yourself ready with relevant talking points, answers to anticipated questions as well as a mock interview session or two are the obvious and right priorities.
However, you should regard this visit much as you would that of any VIP or a guest in your home. Make sure to communicate “Welcome” with a comfortable setting for the interview, appropriate refreshments, and check that the office areas are free of clutter and the restrooms are spotless. Simple but important.
Media Training Tip #11: Camera is Always Rolling
Posted by: | CommentsDuring our media training sessions we typically show examples of good and bad interviews to illustrate key points. Here’s a classic from television station KTVI Channel 2 in St. Louis that we should add to the mix! It features investigative reporter Elliott Davis confronting Joe Ortwerth, then-county executive of St. Charles (Mo.) County. Ortwerth didn’t take the “no comment” route, but instead chose a more bizarrre approach to “answering” the question! We first saw the interview a few years ago, but thanks to Ragan Communications (via Tripp Frohlichstein of Media Masters) for bringing it to our attention.
Two Media Interview Tips Worth Repeating
Posted by: | CommentsRecently a friend’s story was featured prominently in a less than accurate and less than flattering article in a business newspaper. The article provides an important opportunity to remind us all of a couple of tips when working with the Fourth Estate. For example:
When a reporter reaches out to you regarding a story, reach back. Ignoring the request does not make the story go away.
In fact, ignoring such a request (as our friend did) guarantees that the reporter will file the story without the benefit of your input which in this case would have corrected factual errors as well as provided the missing and critical context for the article.
A request for an “off-the-record” conversation from a reporter who you don’t have a long standing and trusting relationship with should not be automatically dismissed as our friend did.
Rather, get as much information as you can from the reporter, such as the anticipated story angle, who else she will be interviewing and a good sense of what she already knows.
Then give yourself time to collect your thoughts, including writing down a few anticipated questions from the reporter, your answers to them as well as key points you want to make.
Now here’s the deal: answer the reporter’s questions as if the interview were on-the-record, eliminating the possibility of seeing your off-the-record comments in the article.
The payoffs to this approach? The reporter is given a more complete picture of the situation. She now has information she likely didn’t have before and could get only from someone such as our friend. The reporter also has a new and reliable source for future articles, including updates on his story.
This way, our friend can tell his side of the story to someone who can help get it told to others, using the reporter’s off-the-record invitation to his skillful advantage. Everybody is happy.
Media Training Tip #22: TV Skills Now Needed for Print Interviews
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In years past, some clients seeking media training could ask us to focus on prepping just for print interviews, as the likelihood of getting TV exposure was not that great, so why bother with the cameras?
Those days are over, as newspapers are evolving beyond ink and pulp-based sources for providing the news.
This week we assisted with a press conference that attracted five cameras among the media in attendance: all four Baltimore TV stations as well as a local business newspaper, The Daily Record, which assigned its camera-carrying multimedia reporter, Richard Simon, to cover the announcement.
In another recent example, we conducted a series of media training sessions for executives with a social-networking technology company. Starting with local and regional newspapers (partly to refine our message delivery before moving on to the national media and trade press) we included a stop at the Frederick News-Post in Maryland, hometown paper for one of the co-founders.
Sitting in the newsroom, we wrapped up a standard newspaper interview with one of the paper’s business writers for a cover story in the paper’s weekly business insert.
But the next step in the interview process revealed how far newspapers – even a 40,000-circulation daily in Central Maryland – have gone/are headed: they requested an interview for a video version of the story to appear in the multimedia section of the newspaper’s Web site. Our client had gone through Sawmill’s full media training session and was familiar with the nuances of a TV interview, so we were comfortable moving to the on-camera interview.
These real-life examples bring up an issue for executives thinking they can skip the TV-preparation portion of a media training session (and wear whatever they want to the newspaper interview!). Not anymore, as the lines blur and newspapers take on a greater role as multimedia providers of news.
Media Training Tip #13: Interview Preparation Must Include Message 'Internalizing'
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Thanks to David Parmet for his recent Tweet about the reaction of CNN’s Jack Cafferty to a clip from Gov. Sarah Palin’s recent interview with CBS Evening News Anchor Katie Couric.
Politics aside (way aside, actually), I think this clip is one of the best examples I’ve seen that so clearly shows someone searching their memory for the talking points that suddenly weren’t there, despite (what I believe) were many, many rehearsals and cram sessions.
Spokespeople need counsel and practice for even the most routine of interviews, but especially so when it is as high stakes as one for a major media outlet and where the questions require thoughtful, informed and substantive responses.
The next time you are preparing for an interview, keep this clip in mind as a reminder of how critical it is to digest the message points so you can concisely express them in your own words as well as apply them easily and effectively in other, relevant contexts, i.e. internalize them.
