At that point, they are free to do whatever they want with information you gave them.

Your job from then on: control and communicate it to maximum. Offer new information if you find it. Steer them to resources that may help them flesh out story. Assure them that you will be available for follow-ups, day or night.

But they own media outlet. Their job: creating story as it will appear in their newspaper, magazine or over airwaves.

That heap of paper that thuds onto your doorstep early each morning – it’s called a newspaper, not an information paper. And that evening broadcast you watch to catch up on day’s events? They call it Evening News, don’t they? Not Evening Information.

The media take huge mass and swirl of information out there every day and spin it, by a process that seems magical but isn’t, into what we all call news. Into stories. Simply put, news is what’s new. It’s what everyone’s talking about today. Whatever that may be. Or, it’s whatever news media, in their judgment, think we need to know today, so we can all talk about it tomorrow.

First, let’s just get our arms around this key distinction between news and information. It’s critical to getting meaningful publicity.

News and information: two different things.

The media take a raw ingredient – information – and condense, distill, sort, and package it into a product called news. News, whether in print, on TV, or Internet, is delivered in tidy little packages called stories.

Compared to your financial planning knowledge, news stories are unbelievably short, simple, and – sorry to say—usually shallow. (That’s not as cruel as it sounds: audience – your prospects – usually don’t need to know huge amounts of information, to decide they may need your services.)

But those stories sure do pack powerful punch of immediacy, urgency, and relevance to daily life.

Examples:

Information: a financial planner devotes an entire career to mastering intricate details of investing and managing a 401(k) retirement account.