How To Get A Reporter’s Attention For Your Book
Posted by Essay Help on October 5, 2009Reporters are busy people. On any given day they are fielding dozens of phone calls, making calls of their own, reading dozens of newspapers and magazines and rushing to meet deadlines. So how do you break finished all the noise to get a reporter or an editor on the phone to listen to your pitch?
In my 15 years as a magazine journalist I’ve fielded hundreds, if not thousands, of much calls. The following tips are what I’ve told many authors and publicists. The ones I eventually wrote about are the ones who listened and learned from the conversation.
1.) Ask If the Reporter Has Time to Communicate to You
Make “Is now a good time?” the first question you ask when you get a journalist on the phone. Don’t assume that if he or she is busy, they won’t answer the phone because sometimes a reporter on deadline has to pick up. They might be inactivity for confirmation from a author or to connect with a colleague in the field, and Caller ID doesn’t always give enough information for proper showing. Thither were many times when I was on deadline and answered my phone only to find, to my chagrin, a non-stop pitch on the other end. But the callers who impressed me would ask immediately if I was on deadline. All I had to have was “Yes” and they’d have they would call me in another day or so and hang up. All cool. I made careful I made time when they did call back. Sometimes I even checked my mail to accompany if I could find the caller’s press release so I would be ready for our talk.
2.) Believe This: The Fact That You Wrote a Book is Not a Account!
You may have written the best book in the class, but unless you’re Stephen King movement to pulp fiction (as he did recently) or Fabric McMillan publishing your first novel in various years and getting divorced at the same time (as she did recently), you and your book are not a account. I’m compassionate but that’s the plain actuality. Of course if you land on the bestseller lists so we’d have something to discuss. Thither is one instance, however, when you would be a account and that’s when you…
3.) Connect to a Account Already in the News
When promoting your book you should be reading the newspaper and observance the news (local and national) daily. You’re looking for stories related to the content in your book. Ideally you would have something to have and you would offer that capable a reporter. For instance, if you’ve written a book on cronyism in official government posts you could have put out a press release and called up a reporter during the Hurricane Katrina disaster with information much as, “This kind of cronyism has caused mishaps in government response before. I can tell you how it happens and where it has happened before.” The press release would list the details in easy-to-read bullet points. It would be easy to accompany you’d make a great interview case.
This can activity for novels as advantageously. Alice Sebold’s The Lovely Bones is an exquisite book in its own right, but it got a huge publicity boost because it happened to get published at a time when various stories of missing girls were in the news.
4.) Ask What the Reporter is Employed On
If the reporter isn’t interested in your account, don’t just cut and run. Engage the person in a friendly conversation and find out what types of stories he or she is employed on for future issues. This artifact you get to cultivate a relationship–important because good media contacts are difficult to come by. You’re also learning what is newsworthy so you can either tailor your message for other outlets or come back to the reporter when you do have information he or she can consume. I old to love it when the latter happened–it made my job easier!
One last note: Always follow abreast the press releases you send out. You might be cerebration, “Advantageously, if they’re interested they’ll call” but nine times out of ten it doesn’t activity that artifact. Your press release could be in the mailroom, in individual’s office low a pile of papers or in the garbage unopened. It definitely hasn’t been read! Don’t be afraid to make the call. Whatsoever the outcome, at the real least you’ll be able to consume what you learn for your next publicity effort.
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