The Art of Contacting Reporters By Phone

For the first time over a six-month span, encompassing story pitches for four different clients, I reached one particular reporter yesterday at the Chicago Sun-Times.

She had never responded to any of my prior messages, neither my well-crafted and eminently timely e-mails nor my professional and succint voicemails directing her attention to those e-mails.

Of course, when she picked up the phone this time around, I read her the riot act, chastising her for being so inconsiderate and failing to recognize a helpful publicist when one was right under her nose.

(If you believe that tale of mine, then let me recommend you trust all your life savings with my financial adviser, Bernie Madoff.)

In reality, after introducing myself to the reporter, I asked if she had 30 seconds to hear why I was touching base. Politely, she replied that she needed to make a phone call right away.

"I understand entirely," I said. "I just wanted to let you know that I'll be sending you a story idea that I think you'd be interested in. I'll follow up with you another time."

Before I hung up, she hastened to make sure I knew her e-mail address.

This vignette underscores three points I make regularly to my clients, as well as audiences that attend my PR workshops:

1. As the individual making the story suggestion, you want to get off the phone before the reporter, editor or producer really wishes you were out of their face.

This no-nonsense, fast-paced style respects the reality of the media member's time, and it sets you apart from the many long-winded blowhards that place a stress on their already-burdened schedule. Asking if a reporter is on deadline signals to them that you know their world, and sets you on a path toward establishing that you are a peer worthy of respect and consideration.

2. Rarely do you get a reporter to agree to pursue a story in the phone call. He or she will always want to review more information before making such a decision.

So the phone call's purpose is to plant a promising seed (that a follow-up e-mail will nurture in short order), not bring home the harvest a few moments after the seed has gone into the soil.

3. Except in rare instances, whether your call results in a conversation or only a voicemail, always be ready to follow up immediately (within 60 seconds is a good idea) with a well-written news pitch or release.

Securing media coverage is the result of winning small victories along the way, and one such triumph is having the reporter refrain from deleting your e-mail without giving it more than a glance.

If they recognize the e-mail as coming from a professional who also took a few moments to phone them, then your story's chances of moving beyond the embryonic stage climb exponentially.

For related PR advice, see Inside Edge PR Tips: 4 Myths To Combat Along the Way.

A Story About Unintended Consequences

I am in the midst of outreach with the media about a story looking at unintended consequences--how the "Back to Sleep" campaign to prevent SIDS-related deaths has contributed to an uptick in "flat head syndrome, or plagiocephaly.

A portion of the effort, which I'm undertaking with Plunkett & Associates on behalf of Scheck & Siress, is online at Triblocal.com.

PR Focus: Picture this....and this...and this

For more than a year, I have helped McAdam Landscaping share stories about the breadth, depth and quality of its work with the Chicago-area media, as well as nationally.

Increasingly, a pivotal part of that story can be told via photographs, such as ones that are included in this post.

The photos were among those that led to McAdam's receiving an award for commercial maintenance from the Illinois Landscape Contractors Association.

Media outlets provide simple tools for posting multiple photographs to complement written content, and it's an avenue that companies and organizations ought to capitalize on more often.

North Shore magazine, for example, is interested in printing a few photographs from a charity fundraiser that was held in January at Five Seasons Sports Club in Northbrook, another Inside Edge PR client.

At sites like Triblocal.com, there are "photo gallery" features that enable anyone to post a variety of photographs that showcase any given story.

You can see samples of some recent Inside Edge PR photo postings here and here.

A Mega-Fun News Release On Biz Program

As anyone who knows me well can attest, my life the past three months has often revolved around coordinating the Shop the Village program that debuted in Oak Park.

Today marks a high point of the campaign, which has been focused on stimulating commerce among more than 100 participating merchants from across the community. On Sunday afternoon, an Oak Park couple discovered that they are holding the Mega-Gift ticket, worth more than $4,000 in gifts, services and other prizes.

The couple, Paul and Polly Grimes, e-mailed me shortly thereafter and we coordinated a meeting today, where I confirmed they had the winning ticket and passed along all the prizes.

The Grimeses shared a delightful story that thrust me gladly back into the role of reporter as I interviewed them to develop a news release that I issued this afternoon to the local media.

At Triblocal.com, you can read the Inside Edge PR news release about the Grimeses' story.

Amid Steroid Era, Aaron's Legacy Shines

The other day, I saw a fantastic cartoon by Mike Luckovich of the Atlanta Journal-Constitution.

It shows a huge Hank Aaron, the all-time baseball great, towering over the likes of steroid-taking cheaters Barry Bonds (technically, but scandalously, the all-time home run king), Alex "A-Fraud" Rodriguez, Mark McGwire and Roger Clemens.

As you can see by clicking on the image above, the quote bubble coming from Rodriguez reads: "How come when WE take steroids, HE gets bigger?"

It's quite a different scenario than 1998.

That is the year McGwire and Sammy Sosa captivated baseball fans with their single-season home run record chase. At the time, I was a reporter for The Courier News in Elgin, Ill., and wrote a column called "By the Numbers."

It was all the excuse I needed to research 80 years of baseball's most fearsome sluggers' statistics, to see how McGwire, Sosa and others stacked up against history.

Along the way, I invented the Home Run Power Ratio, a home run inflation index that enables relevant comparisons between players from various generations by objectively gauging how they fared against their peers.

I wrote various pieces on the HRPR, including one for a grand baseball publication called The Elysian Fields Quarterly.

Then, at the end of the 1999 season, Sports Illustrated, published
a brief piece, "Home Run Standouts," on the HRPR.

Alas, the numbers don't seem so objective any longer, as revelations about steroid use continue to dog some of the game's biggest names.


The latest is Rodriguez, the heir apparent to the career home run record. Long known as "A-Rod," he will forevermore have to live with the "A-Fraud" label.

And in terms of legacy and reputation, that's one development impossible to fully measure.

My Two Cents on Humor's Pivotal PR Role

Last Friday, when I let newspaper editor Helen Karakoudas know that I had a "timely and hilarious" news release coming her way, she immediately gravitated to the "hilarious" half of that promise.

"Now you've got my interest," said Karakoudas, managing editor of Wednesday Journal, Inc.

I was referring to my effort on behalf of Charo's Hair Design and Day Spa, involving former Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich and his wellspring of hair.

Karakoudas posted the story on the paper's web site a few hours later, and the media ball had begun rolling.

Communicating with a sense of humor, clearly, is an immense aid, no matter who you are and no matter what your professional (or amateur) pursuit.

When I was a newspaper reporter, having a sense of humor was an indispensable part of how I built rapport with people, either one-time interviewees or long-term sources.

Did they always appreciate my humor? I strongly doubt it. But at least I tried, and it's something that I continually strive to weave in to my everyday interactions as I meet a steady stream of new people, from prospective clients to folks riding the elevator with me to dealings with the cashier at Trader Joe's.

In my experience, the key is authenticity--to work with whatever humor God gave you, and not try too hard. In sports, this is called "letting the game come to you." In day-to-day life, it springs forth from being an active, attentive listener--not constantly thinking of what I will say next--and identifying the lighter side of things.

On the sense-of-humor front, publicist Wayne Pollard wrote an essay that appeared in today's Bulldog Reporter. And guess what? Not only does it contain excellent content, but it's quite funny, too.

I highly recommend you read Pollard's piece, "Tough Times Call for Laughter: Obama and Reagan Got It—Why Doesn't PR?"

Client Sets Sights--And Shears--On Blago

Public relations can get you into some hairy situations, but in the case of a new Inside Edge PR client, Theresa Charo, that's not necessarily a bad thing.

She has set her sights--and her shears--on former Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich, and it's triggered an immediate media reaction. More on that momentarily, but first, a recap about Blago:

Perhaps even more than his troubles with federal investigators, he is noted by Americans for his over-healthy crop of hair. For more than two months, his mop-top has been the butt of jokes, digs, jibes and snipes.


Seemingly unfazed and certainly unbowed, Blago has stared down his critics, all the while peering from beneath the thick, dark tresses that conceal his forehead as he declares his innocence.

So it was only a matter of time before someone tapped into widespread public sentiment that the ex-public official could benefit from a haircut--and possibly even a complete Kojak (for youngsters unfamiliar with the term, that's the 1970s TV series starring bald actor Telly Savalas).

With that in mind, you can read an Inside Edge PR news release about Charo, owner of Charo's Hair Design & Day Spa in Elmwood Park, Ill. The story, which received more than 1,000 views at Triblocal.com in less than 36 hours this weekend, relates how Charo has extended an offer to cut not only Blagojevich's hair, but also his wife Patti's and their two daughters' hair.

As the Wednesday Journal of Oak Park and River Forest noted on Friday afternoon, Charo has even pledged to donate $1,000 if Blago agrees to go Bald-o.

C'mon, admit it, you'd kick in a few bucks if it meant seeing his hair scattered on a salon floor, right?

To see Ms. Charo elaborating on her offer, visit a link to the letter she sent Blagojevich on Friday and/or click on the video below:

Shop the Village's Mega-Gift Moment

It's been quite a three-month journey with Oak Park's "Shop the Village" and it's coming close to an end.

Last night was the Mega-Gift Drawing, with one ticket out of the estimated 83,000 tickets (about $2.1 million worth of shopping) generated by the program worth $4,000 in prizes from each of the more than 100 participating businesses.

Time will tell who holds the valuable ticket, as I noted on the Shop the Village website and as was reported by the Wednesday Journal of Oak Park and River Forest, a huge ally in our program.

A lesson re-learned last night: it's never too late to ask for help.

About 10 minutes before the festivities were to begin, I asked an employee of Park National Bank, the event host, if they had a drawing drum so we could use something appropriately classy instead of the motley gray bucket into which I'd crammed the 83,000 tickets.

A few minutes later, after a search of the basement, she hauled up the drawing drum that we used. Of course, as the photo shows, we had a heck of a time squeezing all the tickets through the small, square gate.

Timely PR: A `Real Estate Reality Check'

It's hardly news to report that real estate values have declined lately.

But if you find a local, specific angle on that general state of affairs, and back it up with some reliable statistics, it can become news to your target audience.

And better still, because you are taking the lead in disseminating the hard data, you automatically position yourself as being at the forefront of transparent communication about this sensitive issue.

And that can't be too bad for business at a time when trust is such a precious commodity. These ruminations date back to a month ago, when one of my newer clients, Better Homes and Gardens Real Estate Gloor Realty, told me it was about to issue its second postcard in a new series called "real estate reality check."

The firm's president, Richard C. Gloor, asked that I proofread the new piece, which I was happy to do. But I also strongly recommended that we go even further and develop a news release highlighting what his firm is doing.

The result was a news release that struck a chord with Bill Cunniff of the Chicago Sun-Times, who wrote a piece, based on the "reality check." The Sun-Times real estate piece appeared in the Sunday, Feb. 8 edition.

To read the full news release, visit Triblocal.com, which lays out what Gloor is doing "to champion candid communication" about the real-estate market. (I couldn't resist the alliterative temptation.)

I also created a blog, Oak Park-River Forest-Forest Park Real Estate, so that anyone can review the raw data that is behind content in the release--an essential element when striving to communicate transparently.

WSL Profiles Five Seasons Sports Club Duo

One of my clients, Five Seasons Sports Club in Burr Ridge, received prominent mention in the current issue of West Suburban Living Magazine, a classy publication that focuses on, well, the western suburbs of Chicago.

It came about in November, when managing editor Brittany Ashcroft asked if I had any candidates for a profile on individuals who "use more unique exercises and routines to stay fit." Through nominations provided by Dawn Hanson, the club's fitness director at the time, I hooked up the magazine with John Monacella and Lisa Scafido.

They are featured early on in the piece by Laura Otto, which you can read by clicking on the images below.





Reprinted with permission. West Suburban Living Magazine Jan./Feb. 2009.

Obama's FOIA Move Holds Key PR Lesson

Though he may well have been driven by even loftier motives, shortly after taking office two weeks ago, President Barack Obama made a decision that, from a public-relations standpoint, was most astute.

To read my piece, "Obama's FOIA Move Holds Key PR Lesson: Open the Front Door," check out the essay at BulldogReporter.com.

Myths To Combat Along The PR Journey

On Monday, through the Small Business Networking Event held at the Oak Park (Ill.) Public Library, I will be sharing public-relations tips with business owners, entrepreneurs and those seeking to launch enterprises of various kinds.

Among the points I will convey are four myths that can sidetrack individuals and organizations from attaining genuine PR success.

Here's one: It’s all about the press release.

Reality: First of all, the proper term is “news release,” since the press is only one of the targets, anyway. In addition, the news release is simply one part—often, but not always, an integral part—of a multi-pronged approach to increasing your target market’s awareness.

Other vital elements to get your message across:

*Creating a professional, dynamic website that clearly communicates what makes your product or service superior to and distinctive from your competitors;

*Understanding what the various media need in a story and then going all-out to fulfill those cravings with timely, localized, visually compelling material.

*Identifying Internet venues where you can connect directly with your audience, such as contributing to a blog, creating a blog of your own, or posting a video on sites like YouTube.

There are numerous other myths and misunderstandings about PR, including:

*If your publicist has strong media connections, then don’t worry about having a great news hook.

*The publicist’s top goal should be media placement—getting as many stories told through the media as possible.

*PR is a contact sport—the key is to flood as many media outlets with your story, then cross your fingers that some will be interested.

For more specifics about the nature of those myths, you can find, on the Resources page of the Inside Edge PR website, PR Success Tips: 4 Myths To Combat Along The Way.

Godin Offers Take On Newspapers' Future

Evidence of the decline of newspapers--as we now know them, anyway--is all around us, both locally and nationally.

Pioneer Press, the chain of weekly newspapers that has been around for more than a century, just shut down a dozen of its papers throughout the Chicago region. Last week, three Pioneer editors I have been in regular touch with the past two years were among 10 top editors who received pink slips.

Amid that dour news, I recently came across "When newspapers are gone, what will you miss?" a blog post featuring some refreshing insights from marketing maven Seth Godin.

One point he makes about journalism, and which I wholeheartedly agree with: "Punchline: if we really care about the investigation and the analysis, we'll pay for it one way or another."

Still very much in flux: just what that business model will look like.

Political Pundit Proft Offers Unique Blago Blast

Four years ago, toward the end of my stint covering the storied town of Cicero for the Chicago Tribune, I first crossed paths with Dan Proft.

He was the campaign manager who helped engineer Larry Dominick's upset victory over incumbent Ramiro Gonzalez as town president and since then he has served as the town's spokesman, among other duties.

In basketball, I've come to appreciate Dan's set-shot abilities from 22 feet and beyond, though he really does need to work on his drive to the hoop.


And in the arena of political commentary, he continually finds a fresh take on things, rife with historical context, pop culture references that span the generations and some well-justified cynicism (after all, in the wake of the Jack Ryan-for-U.S. Senate meltdown five years ago, Proft was stuck with Alan Keyes as the Republican nominee/sacrificial lamb against Barack Obama.)

Today's Proft commentary, as part of his ongoing observations that air on the Don Wade & Roma Morning Show on WLS Radio AM-890, offered a hilarious take on the imminent departure of Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich.

Take a few minutes to see how Proft weaves in Ted Kennedy driving off a cliff, a swipe at actor Dermot Mulroney, and the phrase "gaggle of middle-aged, man-hating shrews in sensible shoes" into his commentary, "The Circus Won't Be The Same."

The link also provides an audio option, for those interested in gleaning the full effect of Proft's sardonic jabs.

Blah-Blah Blago Takes His Cue From Drew

Emperor Rod Blagojevich at this very moment, instead of defending himself before the Illinois Legislature as it proceeds with an impeachment hearing, is in the midst of making the national media rounds.

As Rex Huppke so ably noted in a story that appears in the Jan. 26 edition of the Chicago Tribune, Blah Blah Blago's talk-show tour is much like the path blazed in November 2007 by that other notable Illinois creep, suspected murderer Drew Peterson, about whom I wrote a few months ago.

And though he is the Emperor Without Any Clues, Blah-Blah must surely know that he is simply the Freak Show of the moment, having just begun to tap into his 15 minutes of infamy.

He has even stated that he knows his days as Illinois governor are numbered ("the fix is in," he self-pities). Left unsaid, but clearly understood, is that he only has so large of a window he can jump through before the media moves on to the next heel.

The Emperor's PR team, which includes the same shameless publicity crew that is representing the aforementioned Peterson, may well be pleading with the staff of Oprah to let Rod on her show.

Of course, Blah-Blah today divulged what he surely knew would reap headline play across this celeb-obsessed land. While appearing for an interview on Good Morning America, he let slip a slight smile as he told Diane Sawyer that he considered approaching Oprah Winfrey to fill the U.S. Senate seat vacated by President Obama.

Maybe the Emperor's supplicants and enablers could propose tying in his Oprah appearance with the talk show titan's hoped-for weight loss--as in, the state will be shed of Blago's 180-extremely-odd pounds when he moves from governor to prisoner.

We can only hope that, like Sawyer, other national media types will have the sense to ask Blah-Blah the same tough questions that he's been ducking by local reporters for years.

Among them:

Do you know how to spell "narcissist"?

With a 13-percent approval rating before the feds charged you in December with, among other misdeeds, plotting to sell Obama's Senate seat to the highest bidder, did you really think you had a shot at the U.S. Presidency in 2016?

How long have you been quoting Rudyard Kipling poems?

In any event, Blagojevich will eventually have to answer to criminal charges.

As I forecast when he was elected to a second term as governor, even then under a cloud of federal investigation, he very likely faces some significant time behind prison bars. If that comes to pass, he will follow in the shameful footsteps of his gubernatorial predecessor, the chronically corrupt George Ryan.

Can a Drew Peterson bid for governor be far behind?

ULI Summary: Niche Property Classes

Freezing temperatures and the Urban Land Institute: the two will be forever linked in my memory.

That's because last Thursday, very possibly the coldest day of my life (it was about 20 degrees below zero), I trekked to the Union League Club to cover a meeting of the Urban Land Institute's Chicago chapter.

The topic: "Niche Property Classes: Are they faring better than Primary Real Estate Asset Classes?"

For the fourth time in as many months, I learned a wealth of information. When my fingers thawed upon returing to my office, I wrote this summary for the ULI, which touches on some of the insights shared by development experts in the niches of parking garages, medical offices and college housing.

You can also read three prior summaries I've written for the Urban Land Institute's Chicago chapter, "Emerging Trends in Real Estate 2009®," "The Credit Crisis: How the Collapse of Credit Impacts the Economy and Commercial Real Estate," and "River North: Past Plans, Future Opportunities."

Presidency To Test Obama's PR Realism

President Barack Obama's inauguration today brings two other dates to mind:

Twenty years ago today, I was an intern at the Telegraph & News of Macon, Georgia, helping edit the front page that included news of George H.W. Bush's inauguration as president.

And 20 years before that, I was in diapers as Richard M. Nixon was sworn in as president.

Unlike Obama, both Nixon and Bush had relationships with the media that were strained, at best, and often disastrous.

I have nearly finished reading Stephen Ambrose's Nixon: Ruin and Recovery and among other truths, Ambrose shows that Nixon recognized the impact of public relations perception on his political viability.

At the same time, it's even more obvious that he terribly misgauged the magnitude of his actions on generating the worst kind of PR. He also had a fundamentally flawed view of the media's very nature. He tried to battle journalism's investigative, cynical, "gotcha" qualities instead of accepting those traits as fact and proceeding accordingly.

Of course, in the immediate aftermath of the June 1972 Watergate Hotel break-in, Nixon's options ranged from really, really bad (if he had 'fessed up immediately that his subordinates--though not Nixon himself--had ordered and orchestrated the botched Watergate break-in) to politically lethal (hide his subordinates' role and then hide his role in the cover-up, then conceal each successive half-truth, distortion or outright lie that followed in the tangled web).

As for the elder Bush—fittingly, as the Republican Party's National Chairman he was among those advising Nixon during the disintegration of Nixon's administration in 1973-74—his view of the media became remarkably unrealistic and embittered over time.

In 1997, four years after he left office, Bush 41 issued a ridiculously impossible “no media allowed” demand on a talk that he gave in Elgin, Ill., where I was a reporter at the time for The Courier News.

What brought him to town? He was the featured speaker at Money magazine’s “adoption” of the city to teach personal finance lessons. While the magazine was at it, maybe they should have added a PR lesson for Bush.

As his talk before thousands at Elgin High's gymnasium approached, reality set in, and Bush’s handlers had no choice but to “waive” the unenforceable media ban.

Obama, on the other hand, appears to have developed a clear-eyed view that he can influence, but not impose his will, on the media.

That realism will be put to the test as his honeymoon media-darling phase comes to a close in rapid fashion, and he begins bearing the inevitable brunt of criticism that confronts all Presidents.

This essay also appeared in the Marshfield (Ma.) Mariner, the publication where I began my journalism career 25 years ago.

Doors Open, Narrow On Healthcare PR

Healthcare is integral to our lives, and over the past few years it's developed into a significant portion of Inside Edge PR business, with more than a dozen health-and-wellness clients in my A to Z experience.

This afternoon, I had the intriguing, immaculately timed experience of fielding a call from one healthcare provider (who had spoken with me about six months ago) seeking help with marketing and PR strategy, even as another provider--a hot prospect only a few weeks ago--notified me via e-mail that the regretted to report they were cutting back on marketing/PR support.

One door opens wider, another door goes from wide open to ajar.

(I never view doors as being entirely closed, unless I simply would not want to work with a given individual or organization. Um, Emperor Blagojevich, that includes you.)

Keeping Your PR Eye On The Calendar

Of all the similarities between being a journalist and being a publicist, one of the most prominent ones is the need to keep your eye on the calendar.

Mine says that today is Jan. 16th, which means, among other things, that it's well past time to start thinking about Valentine's Day-related story ideas, whether you represent a client or toil in a newsroom.

I touched on this timing truth in an Inside Edge PR post two weeks ago.

On another front, if you don't have a Super Bowl-related pitch ready to roll, it's time to go into the two-minute drill. Yesterday, as I was speaking with Don Riley, the new fitness director at Five Seasons Sports Club in Burr Ridge, a thought popped into my head--how can we tie in his expertise with the big football game on February 1st?

The answer came quickly, and simply: offer simple fitness and nutrition tips that TV spectators (aka "couch potatoes") can implement as they "watch 22 players desperately in need of rest," as the late, great football coach Bud Wilkinson has been quoted.

More to come in a future Inside Edge PR post.

The Cyber-News Tension: A Story's Worth

I had to chuckle this morning when I came across a story online at The Wall Street Journal. It was about the Chicago Tribune’s announcement that next Monday it will soon be offering a tabloid edition (with the same content as its home-delivered version) for newsstand sales

Earlier, I had seen the story, by Phil Rosenthal, on the Trib’s front page (since I am one of the dinosaurs who still gets the print edition delivered to my home). But I had yet to follow the jump inside, distracted as I was by the Obama bobblehead doll reference that also graced Page 1.

So I figured I’d see what the esteemed WSJ had to share about the development.

The Wall Street Journal piece built up a head of steam, captured my interest and then….asked me to fork over some money (“to continue reading, subscribe now”) if I wanted to continue reading the third paragraph, let alone the rest of the story.

I moved on, my credit card safely tucked in my wallet. That moment underscored the tension that newspapers are waging in terms of traditional vs. online content delivery.

I didn’t want to subscribe to the Journal—I simply wanted to finish reading the story.

In a world where access to information is so rampant, what is the worth of any given shred of news? If a single copy of the Trib is 75 cents, how much monetary value can be assigned to a John Kass column --a few pennies, a nickel, eight cents?
Some day, maybe they will devise a system that zeroes in with such laser-like fashion. For now, anyway, I’ll just flip back to the Trib’s print edition and pick up Rosenthal’s story where it left off.

(A John Kass P.S.—mark my words, within six months he will be a household name in America, as the rest of the media world catches up with his no-hold-barred reporting on the “Chicago Way” and its intersection with President-elect Obama.)

Triblocal Gets Much More Local For Clientele

The other day, I posted a news release for the Illinois Association of Acupuncture and Oriental Medicine on Triblocal.com.

You can see the release ("Acupuncture & Oriental Medicine: Not All Providers Are Created Equal") here. It joins dozens of other Inside Edge PR news releases (written, as all my work is written, in journalistic style) on the site.

Soon, many more Inside Edge PR releases will be on the site, as the Tribune expands its reach to include Oak Park, River Forest and Forest Park--right in the heart of so much of my client roster.

Though its focus on western and southern suburbs has typically been beyond most of my clientele's reach until now, Triblocal has been a solid go-to resource for nearly a year. The site is easy to use, has a broad reach and, of course, is connected to the top newspaper in the region.

Make no mistake--the site does not draw anywhere near the traffic that flocks to the flagship paper's site at Chicago Tribune.com.

But clients report receiving visits to their site from the Triblocal pages, and the pieces also frequently pop up on Page 1 of Google searches for various organizations, businesses and individuals that I've publicized. That all has a real, if difficult-to-measure, impact on a company or organization's bottom line.

One quick case in point: during the recent dog wedding in Oak Park that I promoted (I Do, Doggone It!), I asked a gentleman who trekked from Glen Ellyn to Oak Park how he learned of the event.

He first replied, "The Tribune." When I mentioned that I'd not seen it publicized there, he clarified that he meant Triblocal.com.

Rarely will I develop a news release with Triblocal in mind--it's simply one of many spots where I send or, in the user-generated website's case, post it. However, at bare minimum, tapping into the site provides an online home for stories that might otherwise not get published anywhere else.

In that regard, it becomes a kind of online adjunct to an organization's website and overall marketing effort.

PR Aimed At Local Newspapers: Alive & Well

In yet another piece of News That Isn't Really News comes a recent report from the Pew Research Center for the People and the Press.

Pew asked more than 1,000 folks where they got "most of" their national and international news. In 2008, the Internet eclipsed print newspapers as their primary news source.

You can see more detail here in a New York Times blog.

Local news, however, is a different beast. For one thing, local publications don't have a user-friendly (or even, in some cases, any) website. More significantly, however, local news is a much more intimate, day-to-day relevant resource than national and international news.

While the future of major newspapers is cloudy, I am most optimistic about the fortunes of local publications that do a solid job of covering their own communities. From a PR perspective, it is crucial to recognize how to tailor news releases and story suggestions with that specific smaller geographic focus in mind.

For example, if you have five people, from five different communities in the same metro region who have benefited from a given company's service, then the same type of story can be pitched to at least five (and sometimes even more) distinct publications.

Increasingly, this has been a most fruitful approach for our clients at Inside Edge PR. We regularly secure multiple "media hits," each one of which is targeted to an audience that is actually in a position to take action that benefits the client (for example, becoming a new patient of a given practitioner.)

Page 1 Ads Signal Tough Economic Times

About 12 years ago, while I was on the news staff at The Courier News in Elgin, Ill., the newspaper began placing advertisements on Page 1. For what felt like months on end, we hawked a chance to win a free Daewoo.

I didn't like it at all. The "journalism purist" in me feared we had crossed the line and, by doing so, had diminished our credibility. In short, I felt we had "sold out."

Today, as advertising is a commonplace sight on the front page and as I near the 10-year mark of self-employment, I have a more sympathetic take on things: my paper was simply trying to do what it could to make ends meet.

That's certainly the case with no less an institution than the New York Times, which recently began offering Page 1 ads for $75,000 a pop and even more on weekends, according to the New York Post.

Desperate economic times call for desperate measures.

Profile on Helen Karakoudas in Medill Magazine

Back in August, I shared an Inside Edge PR post about a piece I was working on for my alumni magazine, Medill.

The story was about the remarkable career-comeback journey of Helen Karakoudas, managing editor of Wednesday Journal, Inc., the Oak Park-based company that publishes nine newspapers in Chicago and the near western suburbs. She is pictured below with her dog, Mr. Big, at a mass dog wedding that I promoted, I Do, Doggone It!, in November.


It's always unnerving to write about journalists, since they are so familiar with the process and there can be a considerable amount of self-consciousness on the part of both scribe and subject. In this case, it was doubly so, since Helen can edit circles around just about anything I write.

In the end, to my relief, Helen said she thought I did a fine job. Demonstrating admirable restraint and diplomacy, she even refrained from offering post-publication editing suggestions.

You can see the piece here on the Medill website, as well as below:

PR Resolution: Give Media Plenty of Lead Time

If it's January 2, then that must mean it's time to start seriously brainstorming some Valentine's Day story suggestions.

Though the romantic holiday may seem way off on the horizon--a full 43 days away--a recent story in Pioneer Press newspapers reaffirms that it's never too soon to start planting story seeds with the media. In late October, I sent a news release to print and television media about the fitness transformation of Wayne Arner (pictured, with son Tommy).

Arner is a member of Five Seasons Sports Club in Northbrook, a client of Inside Edge PR for the past two years.

At the time, I was trying to be as timely as possible, in the wake of Arner's competing in a national triathlon championship. You can read about him, and my initial PR approach, in this Inside Edge blog post on Oct. 27, 2008.

Of course, Arner's dramatic weight-loss is a timeless story--and is especially timely as an inspirational and educational New Year's Resolution piece. And that's just what Pioneer Press staff writer Mary Graham did in a recent story bearing the headline "Man of Resolution."

Graham also wrote a sidebar to the Arner profile that included input from Drew Surinsky, who has trained members at Five Seasons Sports Club, as well as Marie Pearson, the club's group fitness director.

A remarkably versatile trainer in her own right, Pearson is the one who first tipped me off to Arner's story and offers important tips for anyone seeking better fitness.

Local Paper Covers Car Repair Shop

A few weeks ago, I shared a post about the re-emergence of Asian Domestic Authority, the Oak Park car repair shop gutted by fire in September 2007. Pictured here is Roy Rivera, co-owner of the business.

The holiday season can be a tough time to secure media coverage, with short-handed staffs and year-end top-story roundups putting the pinch on available editorial space.

So I was grateful to see that the Oak Leaves, in today's edition, published a piece by Chris LaFortune on the shop's re-opening, which you can read by clicking here.

An FYI You Want To Apply ASAP: Use BCC!

Growing up, I learned early on about A.D. and B.C.
Around the same time, I discovered ABC, NBC and CBS, and how those three channels dominated images that emanated from something called a TV.

Along the way, I've encountered other acronyms, be they musical groups (BTO, for Backhman-Turner Overdrive; and CSNY, for Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young) or Internet-induced abbreviations, like LOL (laughing out loud) and ROTFL (rolling on the floor laughing).

And BCC, too. That stands for "blind carbon copy" and it's a magical e-mail function that all too many otherwise-intelligent individuals have yet to discover or continue to refuse to apply. By using the BCC address field, you conceal the identities of those to whom you are sending the e-mail.

Amazingly, sadly, among this group of BCC boycotters is the occasional publicist.

The second word in "public relations" offers a hint that (positive, fruitful) relationships are central to a publicist's success. Yet just a few minutes ago, a publicist from a decent-sized Chicago-based company (self-dubbed as "Specialists in Mission-Driven Marketing") just sent an e-mail to me and 60 others whose last name begins with "B."

I recognize one other person's name on the list, but the rest are strangers to me. Strangers who now have my e-mail address and, fortunately, will use much better sense than to spam me as this publicist did. I suspect that right now, he's blazing through the alphabet, onto the letter "R" by now, and sending his hastily created emails to upwards of 1,000 people.

Driven, for sure. But the mission and marketing are sorely lacking.

And he really ought to delete "FW:" from the prior mass e-mail that he sent and come up with something more creative than "thought you might like to see our newsletter."

Moral of the story: if you are ever in a position of sending e-mails to a large group of people who are not connected to one another beyond simply being in your e-mail address book, then use BCC.

Minasian Exhibit Gains Tribune Coverage

Minasian Rug Co.'s textile arts exhibit that I've been promoting the past few months received a nice mention in today's Chicago Tribune, as an "Editor's Pick" in the House & Homes section.

You can check out its coverage of “Island Magic - Court and Tribal Textiles from Indonesia” online here.

Previously, I posted more background about the exhibit (at Minasian's Evanston location, 1244 Chicago Ave.) at Neighborhood Circle.com.

The exhibit has nearly two more weeks to go, concluding January 10th, so don't just settle for watching some of the YouTube videos I uploaded--check out "Island Magic" in person for yourself.

In addition to coming across some amazing pieces, you may just bump into Stephen Blackwelder, the textile arts director for Minasian, or co-owner Carney Minasian (pictured, above).

A Brave, New Archive-Friendly World

When I began writing for newspapers, in 1984, I needed to clip stories myself and make photocopies if I wanted to ensure keeping track of those pieces.

Today, nearly a quarter-century later, the Internet has created an entirely new archive-friendly world.

A few years ago, for example, I began using Google Web Alerts to tip me off when a particular word or phrase appeared in cyberspace. So any time I begin working for a new client, I add their name to my list.

I also have my own name flagged, and intriguingly enough, it's not only new content that pops up in the alerts. Just today, a five-year-old item, a brief ditty on Retrosheet.org that I wrote for Time magazine, came back around.

So did recent material, such as summaries I've written for the Urban Land Institute's Chicago chapter.

If you are in business--and especially in the business of seeing how your business is being portrayed online--then enlisting the help from services like Google Alerts is imperative.

In addition to your own business or organization, you may want to keep tabs on your competitors and general information about your industry.

To set up your own, free Google alert(s), click here.

Understaffed Newsrooms Drive PR Approach

Over the years, Inside Edge PR clients have occasionally asked why my agency goes to such lengths to provide comprehensive news releases that can (and often do) gain word-for-word placement in respected publications.

My response flows from more than 20 years on staff or as an active freelance writer for newspapers and other publications: newsrooms are notoriously understaffed and overworked.

So anything that comes across with journalistic style and content has a huge advantage over typical news release puffery that more closely resemble advertising copy. (Having been on the receiving end of thousands of news releases in my career, trust me--I'm being kind.)

After being a journalist for so long, finding actual news hooks is automatic. If I can't identify one, then a news release simply doesn't happen. Of course, within 15 minutes of speaking with a prospective or current client, I always find one--even if it doesn't always teem with eye-popping page 1 potential.

For the latest evidence of newspapers' overworked/understaffed plight, check out this piece: Editor & Publisher's Top 10 Newspaper Industry Stories of 2008.

The #1 story: record newsroom cuts.

Those cuts represent a significant opportunity for individuals and organizations that can provide timely, relevant material that bring mutual benefit.

The newspaper fills its paper with legitimate news, and those individuals and organizations in the news receive strategic editorial placement. And those placements carry many times the credibility and marketing potential than buying an advertisement--and often at a fraction of the would-be ad's cost.

Timely PR Tips: How To Get Free Publicity

For me, one of the most enjoyable parts of sports writing has always been the vast array of cool action verbs that you can use in describing a game's outcome.

Routed, pummelled, thrashed, drubbed, nipped, shocked, trounced, to name only a few.

In a similar vein, I suspect that journalists covering the economy these days may be finding solace, amid the overwhelmingly negative news, in being able to trot out numerous adjectives to spice up their stories.

Is the economy "beleagured" or "beset" or "in the doldrums" or "troubled" or "swooning" or "moribund"? Take your pick, and crack open the thesaurus to find other words that may be fitting.

No matter which pejorative word or phrase one uses to describe the economy, there's a public relations antidote for those seeking to wage a marketing campaign in this (pick your pessimistic adjective) climate. It's called "free publicity," and it's something that all publicists strive to attain for their clients (for whom the freebie, of course, is on top of their publicists' fee).

A year ago, Geoff Williams, a freelance writer on assignment with Growing Wealth Magazine, included some of my pointers in a story exploring that very subject.

You can find the story on the Inside Edge PR website, on the Resources page and headlined Marketing On A Budget.

PR For A Cause: Asian Domestic Authority

Last week, I thought I may have fractured one of my ribs. Well, more precisely, I thought that a lumbering 230-pound basketball teammate had done the damage when he barreled into me as I tried to set a pick for him.

As it turns out, I think it's only a bruise. But along the way, a few medical friends have given me counsel without my having to spend hundreds of bucks on a doctor's visit or, worse yet, a trip to the emergency room.

I appreciate this kind of informal, on-the-spot support that friends and acquaintances provide. In my PR practice, I try to do my part as well, whether it's what I call PR Pro Bono Drive-Bys or more extensive no-fee support for people like Roy Rivera (pictured below), an exceedingly knowledgeable, hard-working and honest car mechanic in my community of Oak Park, Illinois.

In September 2007, a fire destroyed Asian Domestic Authority, the shop that Roy owns with Walter Corzo. Today, they are finally back into the new-and-vastly improved space. Recently, I took some time to shoot videos and contact the media about the shop's revival as well as the content at AsianDomestic.com.

One of the local papers, the Oak Leaves, has already assigned a reporter to follow up on stories they wrote shortly after the fire. And if you are anywhere near Oak Park, now you know where to go if you're in need of a car repair business teeming with integrity and competence.

PR Must Follow Audience's Online Migration

In recent years, newspapers have seen a significant decline in their circulation, partly due to readers' migration to the Internet to get their daily news fix.

In my neighborhood, I'm a dinosaur--the only one among 20 households that gets a Chicago newspaper delivered. Among all my immediate neighbors, generally well-educated, middle-class types, only one even joins me in picking up Sunday delivery of the Trib.

From a public relations standpoint, all of this points to the wisdom of placing increased emphasis on the strategic online placement of stories, through user-generated portals like the Chicago Tribune's Triblocal and the Sun-Times News Group's Neighborhood Circle.

While neither site appears to command an audience anywhere close to rivaling the traditional print editions, they clearly can play a complementary role in any media outreach. They are particularly useful in light of newspapers' shrinking news hole, which has made it even tougher to secure coverage than in the past.

At the least, sites like Triblocal and Neighborhood Circle serve as a credible online location to position news releases--a step I've taken scores of times for a variety of clients over the past year.

On a related note, a recent column by Chicago Tribune media columnist Phil Rosenthal (pictured here) is worth checking out.

In his Dec. 14 column, Rosenthal examines the dramatic step that beleagured Detroit newspapers are taking amid declining readership: abandoning newspaper home delivery most days of the week.

The move, writes Rosenthal, "would make them the first major metropolitan dailies in the country to pull so far away from the traditional newspaper business model."

"This new playbook," Rosenthal adds, "less a bold innovation than a Hail Mary pass, comes at a tough time for the entire industry, which has suffered double-digit decline in ad revenue this year."

In Oak Park: Helping To "Shop The Village"

In November 1981, as an eighth-grader at Furnace Brook Middle School in Marshfield, Ma., I started my first business: bubble-gum salesman.

My only goal, at first, was to make enough money to buy my mom some stamps for her birthday. Very practical, I know.

I started with a five-piece pack of gum one day (at 10 cents per piece), cleared a 25-cent profit, expanded to two packs, then four, and then held steady at eight packs of Bubble Yum, Hubba Bubba, Bubblicious and other varieties that I sold to fellow students.

Soon I set my sights on simply seeing how much money I could make between classes (and, yes, sometimes even during class) without running afoul of the school administration, which didn't exactly endorse my grassroots enterprise.


Eventually, and quite by accident, I branched out and began selling more than 100 pieces of Starburst candy pieces a day. Along the way, I offered rewards, especially to my best customers, in the form of freebies here and there that expressed my appreciation for their loyalty.

By the end of the school year, I had earned $500--enough to help my mom buy a used car and to enroll in a summer basketball camp. You could say I exceeded the stamps-for-birthday goal.

The entrepreneurial zeal never waned, even if most of that passion over the years was expended on competing for stories as a news reporter.

Now business has come full circle with a current marketing effort that I am coordinating called "Shop The Village." Comprised of more than 100 businesses in my longtime residence of Oak Park, Ill., the program began taking shape behind the scenes in late October and was unveiled publicly the day after Thanksgiving.

"Shop The Village" continues through Jan. 31, 2009, designed as it is to spur on shopping amid our economically trying times.

So far, and thanks to many business and local government leaders who have thrown in their support, it appears to have ignited real enthusiasm. And where I used to offer a piece of gum or a Cherry Starburst to another student, "Shop The Village" is providing more than 100 $25 gift certificates (at minimum) and a $4,000 Grand Prize at the end of the campaign.

Along with other key allies from throughout this community that I treasure so much, I will be striving to exceed initial expectations in much the same way that they were eclipsed more than a quarter-century ago back in Marshfield, Massachusetts.

And this program enjoys the major benefit of actually being backed by the powers-that-be, so there's no need for anyone to look over their shoulder!

Today, at Lido's Caffe in downtown Oak Park, we held the first of nine weekly drawings for "Shop The Village. You can check it out here:

Azure Horizons: Good Deed Gets Published

In late October, when Azure Horizons owner Keith Carrizosa (pictured, on the left) hired me to tell the story of his company's role in donating computers to Roberto Clemente High School in Chicago, we described it as "no good deed shall go unpublished."

Well, it's gratifying to know that others agree. In addition to receiving Univision TV treatment last weekend (a segment shot inside Clemente High), the Dec. 4 edition of Extra! newspaper included the story, in both English and Spanish, that recounts Azure Horizons' effort.

One element that has helped generate media interest were a series of videos that I shot, and which are noted on this Inside Edge PR blog post.

You can read the story on Extra's web site or by clicking on the image here:

Brainstorming: As Messy As It's Necessary

When's the last time you allowed yourself to forge ahead with an unedited, uncensored, uninhibited train of thought for at least a few minutes--and you took notes while doing it?

In other words, when's the last time you brainstormed?

Brainstorming is vital to the creative process, whether it's dreaming up a headline, the name of your next child, or planning a 50th wedding anniversary party. Here are guiding principles I follow in my brainstorming pursuits:

1. The path to The Great Idea is littered with terrible, hokey, cliched, painfully bad ideas. I must be willing to go through those potholes in order to get to my Great destination.

2. When time and circumstances permit, I must be willing to be vulnerable enough to allow trusted advisers to provide feedback on what I think is The Great Idea, so they can save me from going public (or to a client) with the occasional Really Not-So-Great Idea.

3. No matter how artfully or sensitively someone offers feedback, I must remain open to the possibility that I don't have a monopoly on creative genius. For more on this truth, see my Inside Edge PR piece on soliciting feedback. ("Do you seek it to glow or to grow?").

Contacting The Media: Your First Goal

Do you have 30 seconds? Is this a good time for you to read my blog?

Silly questions, I know. Why don't I just get to the point?

OK, here it is: When dialing up someone in the media, if you want to communicate with power and persuasion, then make sure they have at least 30 seconds to hear why you're calling.

How I typically start: “Are you on deadline, or is this a good time to talk for 30 seconds?”


Such a courtesy signals that I know their world—and I am not about to waste their time. This simple question alone helps me stand apart from the publicist pack, many of whom are self-absorbed and long-winded, not even bothering to check if the journalist has time to talk.

After gaining initial buy-in (and be ready for some wiseguys to say, "OK, the clock's going...now!"), then it's crucial that you make good on the promise.

Succinctly and confidently explain why you are calling, and be ready to get off the phone within the time you've allotted. When I say 30 seconds, I mean it--I avoid saying "a minute" because people don't literally mean 60 seconds when they trot out that phrase, and I want to be abundantly clear that I'll be brief.

The phone call's purpose is not to sell the journalist on pursuing a story, anyway. It's simply to warm 'em up to the idea that the e-mail you're about to send is worth serious consideration instead of the reflexive tap of the DELETE key.

Win that battle, keep the dialogue going, be sure to have compelling content in that e-mail, and at least you'll have a fighting chance to get your story told.

For related tips, check out PR Search Checklist: 10 Traits To Seek in a Publicist.