Media training Archives - Page 2 of 9

Sometimes a media training session will leave you uncomfortable. As trainers we might have to tell you that you’re talking nonsense. On one occasion lead trainer Guy was called in precisely because the PR company involved thought their client needed to hear it.

Client confidentiality still applies so there will be no names here. The company offered a variety of legal forms online.

During the first dummy interview Guy asked who the service was aimed at.

The directors explained it was aimed at everybody. Everybody would need a form at some point.

OK, said Guy. But nothing is aimed at everybody.

“You just don’t get it,” came the reply. “We can aim this at everybody because everyone needs a legal form at some point.”

Media training and reality

He didn’t resolve that issue to his satisfaction and the client didn’t listen which was a shame, because the concept itself was good. Sadly the client wouldn’t listen to the question so they missed out.

Here’s the thing. The fact that a product or service could in theory apply universally doesn’t mean that’s going to happen in reality.

Let’s take food as an obvious example. If we don’t eat, we die. This is why companies like Tesco employ well over 300,000 people according to Statista (the actual number may fluctuate but we can agree “loads”). A quick Google suggests around 100,000 people fewer work for Sainsbury’s but it’s still a vast number.

Even with that many people and providing something as essential as food, however, neither company believes it sells to literally everybody. Of course those numbers don’t reflect the people in marketing but those numbers will be significant too.

So we get back to Guy’s client with the 30-odd staff in total, believing the team could and would sell to literally everybody. No journalist or other media professional would take that seriously. The marketing wouldn’t stack up, the website would almost certainly crash because of the sheer numbers and for all sorts of other reasons “everybody” can’t be a client unless you’re in central government. The PR company that commissioned Guy actually asked him to make this point because they’d tried and the client didn’t listen to them either. The underlying problem was that the client wanted the PR function and media to amplify the message unchallenged.

This isn’t how it works at best. If you get a media trainer in, it’s really worth listening. A good one won’t help you formulate and articulate just any old thing. They’ll test your message, prod it and find holes. It’s a friendly face doing it rather than a hostile journalist who’s going to go away and write.

It’s a very valuable exercise but only if you’re going to listen. We’re here to help – if you’re in PR and your client needs putting through their media paces, we’d love to hear from you – click here for our contact page.

We’ve all been there – you pick up the phone, fire up Teams, arrive at the venue for the interview, whatever – and the journalist just takes over. You get no chance to put your agenda forward.

So here’s a recent video tip in which Guy explains why you need to push your agenda a bit more heavily than you might have thought.

Powerpoint can be a terrible thing. We refer to it as “the enemy” in our presentation masterclasses and lunch and learn sessions. We don’t mean PowerPoint itself, of course, just the way some people use it. Have you ever been in one of those conferences in which someone starts by saying “I hope you can see this text at the back”? Or worse, they start by announcing they’re going to “talk to a presentation” and they turn their back on you and literally talk to it?

People who have attended our courses more than once over the last few years will have noticed our own approach to PowerPoint evolving. This is at least partly because of reading a book and doing an online course, both of which come from expert (and friend) David Henson. We’re therefore delighted to be able to offer this course alongside our face to face sessions. More on that in a second.

Powerpoint and overkill

David has a few mantras for his use of PowerPoint. We urge everyone to adopt them whether you’re buying the course or not. First he urges everyone to keep things to a minimum; if something would work on a handout, it’s not suitable for a slide. Second, you might not need slides at all. If they don’t support your message (or if you’re using them as notes) it might be worth dropping them all together. There are refinements as well.

David’s course offers input on the use of images and fonts. He looks into the different sorts of image files in use and why some of them won’t work. He offers some shortcuts in animations and the judicious use of 3D images in those. Colour palettes, image composition and a great deal else come in for scrutiny.

We’d be delighted to help you with your stage or screen presence. We can coach, train and critique with our roster of actors and TV presenters. If you just want to transform your approach to PowerPoint, however, we can recommend Dave’s course and you’ll have change from £300 even after paying VAT.

Click here to purchase.

You know when they told you at school that in an exam you should include the question within the body of your answer? Here’s why it works in media interviews too.