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Confused Messages Driving Catch-22 Brand Marketing

10/14/2014 By Jayme Soulati

ALT="Pink Campbells Soup Cans, Soulati"The headlines in national newspapers and trade ‘zines are a mixed bag of damned if you do, damned if you don’t. Consumers are taking the biggest hit amidst the confused clutter of brands’ messages.

Let’s take a look at several finger-in-your-eye examples and see if you agree:

Price Drop Tests Oil Drillers, Wall Street Journal, October 10, 2014
In this front-page story, you already know the gist. If you’re like me, you’re likely ticked off about it, too. Consumers have not even realized the benefit of one week of under $3/per gallon of gasoline and the analysts that cover the oil industry are bitching. If oil being fracked in Bakken sells for less than $84/barrel, then fracking is uneconomical. What does that mean for consumers? Another squeeze in oil supplies due to the cease in fracking, the loss of jobs and a price increase.

It’s that supply and demand thing, and the consumer conundrum remains for marketers — do we continue to pinch the customer and force higher prices so we make our margins and keep stakeholders happy, or do we risk losing market share and influencing a nose dive in local economies dependent on the jobs created from oil exploration? The media love to report on oil companies emotions

Pay TV’s New Worry, “Shaving The Cord,” Wall Street Journal, October 10, 2014
Do you subscribe to a television provider where the most favorite and in-demand channels cost the most money? Is your bill for satellite or cable television in the hundreds of dollars monthly? YES! Consumers are looking elsewhere for entertainment to try to cut frivolous expenditures. and the pay-TV companies are none too happy. Upon further examination, consumers are not totally ditching pay TV, they are shaving dollars off the monthly fee and leaving the big channels.

What’s the impact? No surprise, it’s the brand marketers seeking the subscriber base to feed us advertisements on CNN, USA Network and ESPN. If the subscribers aren’t there, ad dollars disappear and BAM! pay TV just got pricier as there’s no one left to subsidize programming. And, who’s responsible for the story behind this headline? A research firm probably dueling as an industry analyst seeking buyers for reports like this.

Smile! Marketers Are Mining Selfies! Wall Street Journal, October 10, 2014
Ahh, the ubiquitous selfie soon to grace a Snapchat, Instagram or Facebook near you. And, if that selfie is a smiler complemented by a brand logo, then look out consumer! You’ll soon get more advertising messages from the brand that bought the image catching you in the happy moment.

Guess how? [Read more…]

Filed Under: Branding, Marketing, Message Mapping/Mind Mapping Tagged With: Allstate, brand marketing, CNN, consumer squeeze, Ditto Labs, Facebook, fracking, health insurance premiums, message mapping, messaging, privacy, selfies, Wall Street Journal

Storytelling And The Media Relations Pitch Revisited

04/01/2013 By Jayme Soulati

storytellingThe December 2012 issue of Vogue is an unlikely source to prompt a blog post about storytelling and media relations, but if you read ahead, you’ll see what I’m talking about. Arwa Damon – the 35-year-old Syrian-American CNN reporter who broke the story about finding the personal diary of Ambassador J. Christopher Stevens in the American consulate in Benghazi, Libya, and who has covered every aspect of Iraq and all theaters of war in the Middle East since she was 25 years old – provided a glimpse to public relations practitioners about what makes a story her story.The coolest thing about this example is that Damon had no clue she was acting like a PR professional when she had to pitch her story to superiors and convince them of its importance.  Let me back pedal for you with this quote:

“Arwa Damon’s fearless reporting from the Middle East has made her a star at CNN. What she uncovered in Libya sparked a national furor.

And in 2007, Damon pushed to do a segment on a five-year-old Iraqi boy who had been badly burned in a raid. It was a small story, but the piece led to an enormous outpouring of support from viewers. Ultimately, CNN allowed Damon to find the boy medical care in the states and then to follow the story for four years.

Permitting such a level of engagement between a reporter, a subject, and her audience was something of a first for the network, and it made Damon a popular figure, both inside CNN headquarters and out,” Vogue, December 2012.

Think about this for a minute; I’ll ponder with you:

  • A millennial reporter who jets around the world into dangerous settings to do her job finds a 5-year-old injured in wartime.
  • She wants to do this story in the worst way and begs her superiors to make it happen. They acquiesce.
  • The reporter also begs to locate medical care and then reports on happenings for four years!

What would make a producer say yes to a story about an Iraqi toddler when U.S. troops are getting maimed and dying every day? It had to be how she presented the story, her conviction about drawing attention to babies and children as victims of war, and her passion to use her position to affect an outcry of support. Don’t forget this small fact – CNN had never done a story of this nature where the reporters became a seamless part of story for four years (not to mention earning the child free U.S. medical care).

What do you think? Are you tracking with me about how Damon had to put on the hat of a PR professional (although she didn’t know it) and pitch the heck out of that story until her producers said, “OK already!”

The clue for we in PR is this: each time we pitch a reporter, that gatekeeper has to – in turn – pitch it to editors or producers. It’s more challenging than ever for media relations professionals to sell news in one pitch.

Elements of A Successful Pitch

Anyone reading this is likely to be extremely knowledgeable about elements of a solid national or global story, but let’s recap for those who may not be:

  • Mass audience appeal. A story about children and especially 5 year olds is going to tug at all heart strings without language barrier.
  • Medical attention. When someone is injured as a result of war, that’s a natural story hook or news angle.
  • Consumers or victims of war. National stories always require a consumer/people angle. Have you ever pitched national network TV? The consumer angle is an absolute.
  • Call to action. We’re not sure about the call to action in Damon’s story; however, when the article suggests an “enormous outpouring of support from viewers,” we know how much ratings are driven by consumer sentiment and stories like these. While call to action is more of a marketing tactic, media relations professionals need to think about what the outcome of a story should be. How do you want the story to be regarded? Can you push for someone to open a wallet and donate funds to something? That inadvertent influence of earned media becomes so critical at the end of the day.
  • Data/Statistics/Big Data. This story in Vogue didn’t include statistics; however, we are fully aware of the importance of empirical evidence to support a story’s proof points.

Storytelling

I remember after Hurricane Katrina when Anderson Cooper launched a story segment called, “Keeping Them Honest” on CNN. He and his team returned to New Orleans to follow-up on officials’ plans to ensure the re-build was happening as it should. Each time I caught that segment, I said “good for you, Anderson,” as he provided everyone with a bird’s eye vantage about post-crisis Katrina.

While marketers need to be the consummate storytellers, media relations professionals need to craft the story with all the elements and more prior to pitching it anywhere. Put all the elements on the table, and if anything is missing, then hit the drawing board and dog the details. Imagine the tough sell Arwa Damon had to make to her producers to become personally involved in a story they didn’t even want to produce. All you need to do is let her be your inspiration.

This post originally appeared on the Cision Blog December 3, 2012.

By Jayme Soulati

Related articles
  • Arwa Damon’s Iraq: Suffocating in a cloak of sorrow
  • Syria’s women: Fighting a war on two fronts
  • CNN’s Arwa Damon arrived in Iraq 10 years ago amid cloud of fear and secrecy – CNN
  • CNN’s Wolf Blitzer relfects on covering the Iraq war
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Filed Under: Media Relations Tagged With: Arwa Damon, Benghazi, CNN, Damon, Hurricane Katrina, Iraq, J. Christopher Stevens, Middle East

Christine O’Donnell — Say NO More

08/25/2011 By Jayme Soulati

For the first time in my 27 years in public relations and media relations, I watched right here as a guest walked off a national prime-time, LIVE broadcast based on the recommendation of her “handlers” – those PR peeps who sit on the sidelines and direct traffic for their spokesperson while nodding heads or coaching silently. (I know, I’ve been one of those frequently.)

Christine O’Donnell, you may recall, is a Tea Party candidate who tried to run for U.S. senate in Delaware, and her book, “Trouble Maker,” details many of the issues she either believes or doesn’t believe in.

When Piers Morgan queried her about gay marriage and masturbation, she began to unravel.  You can watch the interview with link above and form your own conclusions. It’s a good lesson for everyone including public relations/media relations as well as those figureheads who deem themselves prepared for prime time television.

There are so many other links you can go find, and many are attempts by Christine to massage her weakened brand and accuse “the producer” (she calls Piers the producer albeit he’s the host) of sexual harassment during the CNN interview.

The point is, PR, that if your spokesperson, client, company executive is NOT ready for live, national, primetime and potentially raucous interview tactics (do you remember Sarah Palin and Katie Couric?), then by all means KEEP THEM OFF TV!

Here are some media relations thoughts for everyone’s digestion:

** In media relations, it’s your job to comb previous interviews with that particular host to understand the style and potential for the segment to go downhill fast. Always expect negativity!

** Negativity sells, and there’s absolutely no way a former politician (especially in the Tea Party movement) can be safe. I say “especially in the Tea Party movement” because their policies and beliefs are strong, and when you get the “liberal” media going 1:1 with a candidate, there’s going to be bashing and addressing the issues.

** At the first sign of discomfort by an interviewee, the host is going in for the kill. Obviously, Christine was not prepared for a negative interview and did not expect to be thrown off course – book promotion, not running for office, I don’t want to speak about this issue today, “you’re being rude.”

** I fault Christine O’Donnell’s media relations people for this debacle. Either they didn’t prepare well enough or thoroughly enough to identify all the possible land mines any host would attempt to uncover, or they were not seasoned enough to manage this situation.  With issues as contentious as gay marriage, abortion (I don’t know if she addressed that topic in her book), masturbation, and the like in a book she wrote and is promoting, it’s open season!

** Preparation for an interview of international importance like this should be oriented to diving into all the Q&A with possible discomfort zones. Role playing and watching tapes of previous interviews would be part of the prep; in addition, dog earing book pages with highlighted text should have also been part of the prep.

** Piers Morgan is an investigative journalist; it’s his business to uncover scuttle butt on everyone who sits across from him. He wants ratings, and boy was he enjoying himself – trying not to laugh at Christine’s obvious discomfort.

** Finally, when has a PR person EVER stepped in front of the camera on national live TV? Are you kidding me? Terminate.

What thoughts can you offer based on your own experience, your experience being interviewed, and the prep that needs to happen in this contentious media age?

(Image: CNN)

Filed Under: Media Relations, Public Relations Tagged With: CNN, Piers Morgan, politics

ALT="Jayme Soulati"

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