The Wax Blog

Last June I wrote about pitching radio in 10 steps. Since then, advertising is up and free spots are DOWN, making it a bit harder to gain those coveted drivetime spots. Be sure to check out 10 Tips for Pitching Radio – these basic points still apply, as do my tips for Being a Great Radio Guest. I’ve also included a sample pitch at the bottom of this post…this pitch got over 50 interviews for my client!

Here are a few more ways to see if you can get noticed and booked on a radio station. (more…)

(MICHAEL ROZMAN/WARNER BROS.)

After the success of my last blog post on pitching freelance writers I decided to start a weekly feature called “How to Pitch”. I’d like to encourage readers to comment with their own tips and ideas. Also, please let me know if there is a specific show you’d like to pitch. I’ll try to interview one of the producers to get the inside scoop! ( If you’re curious about being a good TV guest, here’s a post on that I did a while ago.)

First let’s start with basic stuff. Although social media is the craze (and it’s cheap) it’s still building fans one to one. Although TV numbers continue to decline the medium provides  a huge opportunity to deliver your message one to many.  But for most people regular press releases and pitches probably won’t get you in the door unless there is a show already planned -  that your message or back story fits perfectly. That can happen, but then you’re depending on luck.

It’s better to create your own pitch, which means thinking like a producer and coming up with a compelling segment all your own. (At the end of this post I’ve included an actual pitch that got my client on Montel, just to show you a successful sample.)  Here are the steps for creating your own pitch – whether it’s local or national, this is really how it works on most talk shows. Authors, it works the same for you. Unless you’re already well-known, you need to come up with a unique idea to help sell your book. (more…)

by Beth Graddon-Hodgson

For some businesses, choosing a topic isn’t quite as easy. It’s always important to write with your target demographic in mind, but with a business that caters to a broad range of people like a catch-all online retail website; who are they and what do they care about? There are a number of questions that you can ask yourself when establishing a blog for your business. They are the ones that I go through to hone in on a specific topic area for a client who can go in any direction with their blog. (more…)

Chinese symbols for fame

Woo woo alert!! Readers, since you’re so enamored with the Feng Shui tip about wearing red underwear to give you energy on TV, I thought I’d provide five ways to use the ancient Chinese art of feng shui to improve the results of your PR campaign.

Think this is weird? The Chinese often refuse to erect a new office building in China until  it’s been certified for Feng Shui. Here in this country, folks like Roger Green and Carole Hyder are in high demand for their feng shui workshops and consultations. When I did Carole’s PR, people used to line up out the door at her book signings.

First find the area of your office or home on what they call the Bagua that is the “fame” area. (It’s basically the back middle area of your office) Then it’s time to decorate. (more…)

I was sitting here wondering when a marketing person was going answer my email (from two days ago) when it occurred to me that  traditionalists will have to add a sense of urgency to their worklife in order to survive. I came out of sales where response to request timing was everything. But when I started working with other publicists and marketing folks I realized that isn’t always the norm. Okay I understand when you’re working with books that get released 6-8 months after you’ve sent the galleys out for review. Or when you’re developing brand images with focus groups, etc. All those things move at a snail’s pace (at least to me).

A sense of urgency in response can no longer be reserved to the daily print reporters and local TV folks, or for breaking news. Folks, we’re living in an extemporaneous, real-time conversation world now. Getting back to someone three days later -or never- isn’t gonna cut it. I work with quite a few partners in what I do, whether it’s web design, marketing, writers, etc. Guess what – the blogger that answers my email or tweet the same day I send it is going to get my business. The one that answers me within an hour – they will always move to the top of the heap. And I think my clients feel the same way, and have felt that way long before the social media “engagement” craze started.

Look, I’m not asking you sew a Blackberry into your bra. But the days of taking days to answer messages are over. And the traditionalist publicists and marketing folks better learn that or they might end up like poor Goose.

A decade ago I sat in meeting after meeting in Silicon Valley hearing about the new economy and how the ‘old school’ IT companies were dead. It’s so funny to me now, listening to all the social media experts and Web 2.0 pundits say that ‘traditional PR is dead.’ I venture to say that lazy people hope by saying traditional PR is dead, maybe they can make it so. After all it’s a whole lot easier to sit in your jammies and tweet and facebook the night away than it is to call Patty Neger at Good Morning America to find out if she likes the latest book you’ve sent her. Believe me, I would much rather be trading snarky barbs with folks like @CLE84 than getting rejected for yet another story idea by a crusty print reporter. (more…)

I am a huge fan of Problogger . The latest post has some of the best writing advice I’ve seen for blogs. Here’s a recap of the 8 tips, but be sure to read the entire article. (more…)

In honor of being incredibly lazy this week, here’s one of my fave 2009 posts – the last Friday of every month I’ll throw a repeat of one of the more popular posts, just in case you missed it!

A product, service or book is probably the greatest thing in the world – to its creator. But when an editor or producers says “pass” it’s the publicist who has to tell the client. Sometimes ZERO  media are interested. And for anyone who has written a book, started a business or provided a service, that can be a pretty personally hurtful message no matter how carefully it’s couched. For me, it’s the equivalent of having to tell clients “your baby is ugly” 95% of the time, without hurting their feelings. Nearly impossible. (more…)

Because I’ve worked with a pretty wide range of celebrities – from Ralph Nader to Bode Miller -people sometimes call to find out how much it would cost for a celebrity to attend their event, endorse their product or contribute to their non-profit cause.   No matter HOW GREAT your product is, or how important your cause, stars generally don’t do anything for free unless its for their own foundation (or for George Clooney). The good news is that almost any celebrity can  be booked if you have enough money. Here are a few tips for figuring out how to find someone, how much they cost and what the process might be like.

First, find out who reps the star. The easiest way is to buy a subscription to Who Represents an online listing of virtually every celebrity’s agent, publicist and manager.  Although some people like to go through managers first, I always call the agent. Agents are usually straightforward, no BS types who will give you prices and explain the ins and outs of back-end deals and endorsements. (more…)

100 million years ago I worked as an executive at a publicly held tech firm. We knew that in order to bury bad news (ie a poor quarter) we would send the release out at 4 pm on Friday. By the time Monday rolled around there would be two to three more days of news covering ours.   Now more companies have become much more ingenious ways at burying their bad news – rather than addressing it properly. (For more on that, read my post on  “Crisis Communications in a 2.0 World“)

Wondering how they do it? Here are just a few methods I’ve seen. Comment with more examples, please!

1) Flood the Internet with alternative messaging. Piling on the social media releases, blogs and Twitter posts can help bury a negative opinion or story quickly by using SEO. Studies show about 60% of Internet users click on a result in the first page. Keeping that page inundated with positive information – particularly if it appears to come from sources that are not your own – can easily bury negative opinions. I agree with the Online Marketing Blog, though, that using this to address a real crisis is not a long-term fix.

2) Bury it on a holiday. At the end of 2009, a story came out about Goldman Sachs selling mortgaged-based CDO’s to clients and at the same time  selling the securities short themselves. Goldman Sachs supposedly made it quite hard for reporters to reach executives for comment and further blocked the story so that it came out Christmas Eve in the New York Times. Thereafter it’s received little press.

3) Make it impossible to fact-check the article. Although bloggers can write pretty much whatever they want, traditional media still needs to check facts in order to run with a story. Keeping CBS or as in Goldman Sachs “allegedly” keeping the New York Times from verifying aspects of a story can bury it too.

4) Divert the issue.  Although most of the messaging surrounding the Toyota recall focuses on sticky floor mats, the real problem may be the pedal or as Steve Wozniak asserts, it could be a computer glitch. (If you haven’t heard, the Woz ’s Prius gets stuck at 97mph while in cruise control) Although Toyota states there “may” be a problem with the pedal in its latest update, much of what we’ve seen in our media is concerning the floor mats. The Woz asserts its a software problem, not a pedal or mat issue. Since the main issue is sudden acceleration – something we haven’t seen in any of Toyota’s messaging – this is probably a good example of a diversion tactic.

5) Lie. It almost worked for Martha and it definitely worked for OJ.

Bottom line is that the organizations with true investigative journalists are dwindling. TV and print media no longer has the budget to spend months on uncovering stories ala Watergate. Companies have learned the game and crisis communications firms have become much more adept at the spin.  And that could be a very bad thing for us.