Again, boil your message down into one simple sentence. Avoid temptation to hit more than one target. Focus, focus, focus.

4. Target journalist or media outlet that can best deliver you message to your audience.

The whole point of PR is to get your message to your audience through a credible third party. In this case, third party is news media. Forget general press release.

Focus instead on proposals that aimed to convince one particular reporter to write one particular story. Figure out which reporter is most influential with audience you want to influence, then pour all your energy into devising a proposal that will appeal to that reporter or to that reporter’s editor.

Study reporter’s past stories to discover that reporter’s tendencies. Fit your story to reporter’s needs.

5. Create a proposal that hits bull’s eye.

Make your case in just one page. No nonsense. Get right to point. Give reporter at least three good reasons to do story, each of which strongly appeals to reporter’s needs and tendencies.

Put your proposal in writing, send it by overnight delivery and then follow up in two days with a phone call. If reporter says no, don’t argue. If you missed, you missed. Time to reload. Listen carefully. Often reporter will tell you how to hit target next time.

Above all, don’t get frustrated. Most story ideas end up in trash, no matter who comes up with them. Don’t resort to scattergun. That’s for amateurs. Be a professional and learn to shoot with a PR rifle.

Copyright 2003 by W.O. Cawley Jr.

But be forewarned. Most companies will readily accept a story proposal that focuses on change and aberration. But most will resist proposals that point to conflicts and problems.

Stand your ground. If your job is to get your company into news media, then it is your responsibility to insist that your company maximize its potential for news coverage. The trick is to do it in a way that does not harm or embarrass your company.

In this, you must be guided by common sense and good judgment. Look for conflicts and problems that portray your company as a hero or as an underdog. Do this, and resistance within your company will melt away.

Just as attorneys must keep their clients within law, and accountants must keep their clients within generally accepted accounting principles, so must you – as your company’s media relations counsel – prod your client or your boss to make most of any opportunity to create news.

The PR Rainmaker knows: Change is news. But to really get attention, you must find a way to include conflict, aberration and problem in any story proposal.

Copyright 2003 by W.O. Cawley Jr.