Latest / The Starfish Storytellers / Season 2, Episode 4: PR and Journalism - Storytelling Across the Media w/ Tom Zuppa

Transcript

Season 2, Episode 4: PR and Journalism - Storytelling Across the Media w/ Tom Zuppa · The Starfish Storytellers

• 0:00
  Welcome to the Starfish Storytellers, the podcast that makes a difference one story
• 0:04
  at a time by bringing storytelling to life.
• 0:12
  Three firefighters from the rescue squad arrived at 15 Hurd Street for admission yesterday
• 0:16
  morning.
• 0:17
  It was all new to Lieutenant Charles Stamp and firefighters Dave Mayer and John Duby.
• 0:23
  Safe crackers are usually on the other side of the law.
• 0:25
  Police detectives usually handle mysteries.
• 0:31
  A small cooperative bank had a riddle to solve in the basement.
• 0:32
  What was in the stubborn safe that wouldn't open?
• 0:35
  Stacks of cash?
• 0:36
  A trove of coins?
• 0:38
  Or perhaps this is a reprise of Geraldo Rivera's April 21, 1986 live TV broadcast of the opening
• 0:44
  of Al Capone's vault.
• 0:46
  Breathless Geraldo and his crew broke through a 7,000 pound concrete wall at Chicago's
• 0:50
  Lexington Hall that night and found nothing.
• 0:54
  Yesterday, 55 minutes after they began, the firefighters cracked open the door.
• 0:58
  With one final pry, Stamp set the heavy door crashing to the basement floor.
• 1:03
  You could feel it land.
• 1:05
  A whiff of a must coursed through the room.
• 1:07
  The mystery was solved.
• 1:10
  Everyone smiled.
• 1:11
  The locksmith and his son videotaped it.
• 1:14
  The bank president watched.
• 1:16
  Walter Baylis, a bank director, looked on with particular glee.
• 1:20
  The safe door emblazoned the Muller-Sloos safe company Boston stared back at them.
• 1:25
  The building opened in 1948 and three banks called it home.
• 1:29
  The Vilsex Cooperative Bank, the first federal savings in the loan, and Butler Bank.
• 1:34
  Lowell Police used it as a domestic computer center for five years.
• 1:38
  Honor Louis Sob sold the building to Lowell Cooperative.
• 1:40
  The bank wants to renovate, but first there was a question of three vaults.
• 1:45
  The others on the first floor in the basement had opened without a hitch.
• 1:49
  Carmen Jecnavorian, owner of Post Office Lock and Key, opened them with the combinations,
• 1:54
  swinging the 18-inch thick steel doorstep to reveal some shelves, empty cabinets, and
• 2:01
  a few two-shaped fluorescent vaults.
• 2:04
  The third vault would not yield.
• 2:06
  We don't need these vaults, said Richard Cough from the bank president.
• 2:10
  We'll trash this one, but we'll keep the other two.
• 2:13
  Baylis brought in the firefighters.
• 2:15
  These guys trained with the jaws of life he'd figured.
• 2:17
  If someone had become trapped in a bank vault, how would they get out?
• 2:22
  Jecnavorian briefed the fire crew.
• 2:24
  Bolts retracted, handle broken, maybe locked inside at the top.
• 2:28
  This could be quite no deal, the locksmith said.
• 2:31
  We've never done anything like this before, Stamps said.
• 2:34
  They brought an air chisel, a hydraulic ram, a K-12 saw, various wrenches, a hydraulic door
• 2:40
  spreader.
• 2:41
  They decided to peel away the steel frame on the top of the sides.
• 2:45
  Within a minute, pop.
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  The rim separates from the wall.
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  Stamp works up the right side, the trims squealing, popping and cracking as the metal bends like
• 2:54
  taffy.
• 2:55
  The safes have come a long way, says Jecnavorian, a lock history buff of sorts.
• 3:00
  In India, he says, the emperor used to take his valuables and seal them in a large block
• 3:04
  of wood than submerged in a pool.
• 3:07
  And they had crocodiles in there on strict food rations, so they were always hungry.
• 3:10
  When they wanted the valuables, they'd either drug the crocs or kill them.
• 3:16
  Stamp cranks the hydraulic tool.
• 3:17
  We can peel away the top here, Mayor says.
• 3:20
  Pop it off and fold it down.
• 3:23
  Then another loud pop.
• 3:26
  Good one, Mayor says.
• 3:28
  Duby leaves to gather more tools.
• 3:30
  With a wrench, Duby removes the six bolts that hold the door to the frame.
• 3:34
  It takes four minutes.
• 3:36
  Or in, he says.
• 3:37
  He's joking.
• 3:38
  He tries to peel off the outer casing with a crowbar.
• 3:42
  It rejects his efforts with a sproing.
• 3:43
  It must be a quick ray in.
• 3:46
  Someone mentions calling a welder.
• 3:48
  A firefighter's dragging an air compressor, hoses and saw attachments.
• 3:52
  They can't get enough air pressure.
• 3:53
  A bead of sweat falls from muscular Duby's shaved head.
• 3:57
  He grabs the hydraulic tool, heads back to the door, and pumps the instrument doing the
• 4:01
  work for it.
• 4:02
  He works up to the left side.
• 4:04
  Pop.
• 4:05
  18 inches higher.
• 4:06
  Pop.
• 4:07
  Six inches above that.
• 4:09
  Pop.
• 4:10
  He tears out the frame with a suspended ceiling over his head.
• 4:13
  And inserts the hydraulic tool.
• 4:14
  Crackle.
• 4:15
  Pop.
• 4:16
  The frame just splits under the pressure.
• 4:18
  The stamp pulls it half down.
• 4:20
  The other half is wedged off.
• 4:24
  Stamp picks up the halogen, a long thin steel tool, and swings it with the end of the curved
• 4:28
  spike at the wall along the vault tool.
• 4:31
  As he slams, plaster flies.
• 4:33
  On one swing, the spike wedges between the steel door and the frame.
• 4:38
  The door budges, then recedes.
• 4:40
  It hits the spot again.
• 4:41
  It budges more.
• 4:42
  Everyone sees it this time.
• 4:44
  Whoa, whoa, I think we've got it, Mayor Shouts.
• 4:47
  Ready?
• 4:49
  Stamp prides the door and opens a bit.
• 4:51
  Everybody takes a step back.
• 4:54
  Stamp prides hard.
• 4:55
  It flops like a steel wheel forward and onto the ground.
• 4:59
  A funky smell waths through the room.
• 5:02
  Mayor heads inside the vault with a spotlight.
• 5:05
  Look at the money!
• 5:07
  More humor.
• 5:08
  He finds wood shelves, boldly carpet rolls, and old desk.
• 5:12
  The bankers box is filled with vintage accounting equipment and finger dial phones.
• 5:16
  Its document, Vault Chief Knoborian says, probably last opened in the 1980s.
• 5:21
  No rivetches.
• 5:22
  On the backside of the door, a warning is handwritten.
• 5:26
  Do not close the door.
• 5:43
  Hello, my name is Leanna Henry and welcome to the Starfish Storytellers.
• 5:47
  I'm the CEO of the Black Dog Group, a Marcom and Project Management firm headquartered on
• 5:53
  the east coast of the US in quaint Colonial Bedford, Massachusetts.
• 5:57
  I'm your host and passionate about storytelling, and I'm actually on a mission to raise up
• 6:01
  the next generation of storytellers.
• 6:04
  We've named ourselves the Starfish Storytellers after the Starfish Story.
• 6:08
  The moral of the Starfish Story is based on the power of one.
• 6:12
  No matter how big the challenge, each action we take makes a difference and has an impact.
• 6:17
  One step, one starfish, or one story at a time.
• 6:21
  Every episode, we welcome a new storyteller who will share their story meant to inspire
• 6:26
  and connect with you.
• 6:27
  Then we break it down and offer tips for any listeners who are ready to tell their own
• 6:31
  stories.
• 6:32
  So thanks for tuning in.
• 6:33
  Now let's get started.
• 6:35
  Today's episode is about PR and journalism, storytelling across the media.
• 6:41
  With me today is Tom Zupa, senior account executive from John Guilfoyle Public Relations
• 6:47
  and former managing editor for the Sun of Lowell.
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  I am so excited that you are here.
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  I am so happy we get to talk shop.
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  So thank you and welcome.
• 6:56
  Thank you, Lana.
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  I really appreciate the invitation.
• 6:59
  You're welcome.
• 7:00
  I'm glad you're here.
• 7:02
  So we would love to hear you introduce yourself.
• 7:05
  You just shared this amazing story with us, but please tell our listeners who are you.
• 7:11
  So my name is Tom Zupa and as you said, I work at John Guilfoyle Public Relations.
• 7:14
  I had a very long career in journalism at a number of stops.
• 7:18
  The last stop was in Lowell at the Sun and that's sort of how we met one another years
• 7:22
  ago.
• 7:24
  And a few years back, you know, local journalism started not being what it once was.
• 7:30
  And I was one of the many people who all of a sudden found themselves in search of another
• 7:34
  job.
• 7:35
  So considered a lot of options and just kind of found this wonderful new home at John Guilfoyle
• 7:43
  Public Relations.
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  John is a former journalist.
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  We have a lot of former journalists on staff.
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  We work almost primarily with municipal government.
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  So town schools, police, fire, and we're sort of that extra hand when they need it.
• 7:58
  So if it's internal communications, external communications, crisis management, we just
• 8:05
  sort of that extra hand somebody to talk to, somebody to consult with.
• 8:10
  John started the company 10 years ago himself and five clients.
• 8:14
  And we now have about 300 clients.
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  We work in 11 states.
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  We have a video division and a web marketing division and a spin off training academy to
• 8:25
  train communicators.
• 8:26
  So it's been a wonderful change of pace.
• 8:30
  It is wonderful working in a growth industry.
• 8:33
  Nice.
• 8:34
  Nice.
• 8:35
  And that's really good to hear as far as public relations is concerned, you know, and
• 8:41
  you know, kudos to your boss for launching and growing the way he has.
• 8:47
  So good for him.
• 8:51
  So I really loved the story.
• 8:55
  You know, I think we typically have folks come in and share personal stories.
• 8:59
  We've only had a few people come in and share an actual story.
• 9:03
  So where did you, you said that was one of your favorite stories.
• 9:08
  Like how, where did you hear that story?
• 9:11
  Or how long have you known that story?
• 9:14
  So this is actually a story from the son, one of my former colleagues, Dave Perry, who
• 9:17
  was probably one of the three best storytellers I've ever worked with in my career.
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  Dave just had a way with words.
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  And we got one of that story that day and he decided to go out and let me check this
• 9:31
  out and see what it was.
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  And just Dave had all the right words on that day.
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  I love the story so much because it uses so much of storytelling.
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  You know, it's, I always tell people, you don't write with your pen, you write with
• 9:45
  your eyes and your ears and all of your senses.
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  So in that story clip, you get, you get the smell of the room.
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  You get the feel of, of the door striking the ground.
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  You get the intensity.
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  You sort of have a sense of place.
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  And when you're able to pull all those things together as a storyteller, the reader gets
• 10:05
  a little bit transported.
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  You sort of, you can forget time.
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  You know, all of a sudden it's five minutes where you're not thinking about your job or
• 10:13
  what's coming up for dinner that evening or errands you have to run.
• 10:18
  You sort of, it takes you out of that, that your regular life.
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  And to me, those were always the most refreshing stories to read.
• 10:24
  I mean, that's one of many, many narrative stories I've read of you, but that continues
• 10:29
  to be one of my favorites because it does bring all the elements together.
• 10:33
  And I mean, you really did take us on a journey.
• 10:36
  You know, I could feel myself really concentrating when you were telling the story because I
• 10:41
  was like, what's going to happen next?
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  You know, and there was such a buildup of, you know, going through the layers of the
• 10:48
  vaults and, you know, the sounds.
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  And so it was very well told, but you know, you're a storyteller.
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  Well, not my words though.
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  Those are Dave's words.
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  No, no, no, I understand that.
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  But I think, I think you come from a background of being a storyteller.
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  And I think when you are a storyteller, you know how to tell a story.
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  You know, we both come from a background in journalism and PR.
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  My graduate degree is in PR.
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  And so I was, I was reading up on it and, you know, storytelling, journalism is storytelling
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  with a purpose.
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  You know, there's a purpose for when you're telling a story.
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  And you know, it's on the journalists to verify, collect information and then present
• 11:33
  it in a way that is going to make for a good story.
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  And you know, journalists really are those who are the eyes and ears for the situations
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  and circumstances, the issues that we all face.
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  And they present it in a way that really helps everybody be able to understand it.
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  And PR, you know, public relations, you know, you're meant to create this really relevant
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  narrative and you're trying to get that emotional response from the audience.
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  And in essence, trying to get them to act.
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  So you know, I, you know, I think there's, there's such a, there's such a need today
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  for really good storytelling.
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  And I mean, I know from on the corporate level, you know, they're big companies now are dedicating
• 12:20
  just entire web pages just to their stories, whether they're news stories, whether they're
• 12:27
  employee stories, whether they're customer stories, because stories sell.
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  I mean, you know, that's, it's how you really get to know, you know, as, as the audience,
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  it's really how you get to know the storytellers.
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  And I think another very important thing for storytellers is you have to be able to get
• 12:45
  close.
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  Okay.
• 12:47
  Dave was in the room that day.
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  That's how he told that story.
• 12:51
  If you're writing for a client, it's important that you, you're able to connect that client
• 12:59
  to the consumer or the reader so that they, they have that understanding.
• 13:04
  If you are vague, if you're not using clear language, if you are scattered in your writing,
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  it doesn't deliver as well.
• 13:13
  You can, piano writing is, is much different than journalism.
• 13:16
  It uses a lot of the same skills.
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  I, I use so much of, of my, my journalism experience on my job because I'm writing and
• 13:24
  reporting every day and, and thinking and planning as well.
• 13:29
  So the writing can be a little more limited at times, but it's still, you know, I try
• 13:36
  to be a little creative when I can be.
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  We're serving different audiences.
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  The journalist serves the reader and while we may be serving our clients, sometimes it's
• 13:49
  how you serve your clients and having them understand that clear communications and effective
• 13:54
  communications is really how you want to, want to, you know, engage with the community.
• 14:00
  I mean, PR is, is a slow game.
• 14:03
  It really is, you know, it's one step at a time, you know, a marketing is buy this,
• 14:10
  buy this right now and then two weeks later, we're going to sell you something else.
• 14:15
  PR is, is about reputation management and brand awareness and no one press release
• 14:24
  ever changes that.
• 14:25
  It's an ongoing part of the puzzle.
• 14:29
  Yeah.
• 14:30
  Yeah.
• 14:31
  And I found it as a comms manager, you know, it's, it's sort of the breadcrumbs, you know,
• 14:37
  that gets you to where you want to go, you know, and having a client or an employer,
• 14:46
  if you work for an employer who understands that it is tied to brand awareness and that
• 14:51
  it is a slow process and that they're, they're in for the long haul.
• 14:57
  I think is key to making the work that you do as a PR practitioner and professional,
• 15:04
  most successful.
• 15:05
  Right.
• 15:06
  Right.
• 15:07
  And what we, we advise clients, we tell them this is, this is a long effort.
• 15:12
  If you have been damaged reputationally, it is a very long way to get back.
• 15:18
  And you know, for example, if you have a client who has had a crisis that needs to be addressed
• 15:25
  immediately, it's not going to be fixed the next day.
• 15:28
  It's going to be fixed over the course of weeks and months.
• 15:31
  And that good PR and consistent PR positions you as being successful.
• 15:38
  And I always try to tell clients, you want the bad thing to be the exception and not
• 15:44
  the rule.
• 15:45
  You want to have a long stretch of really good positive views so that when a bad thing
• 15:51
  happens and it always happens, the bad thing is now, oh, well, geez, they're really your
• 15:56
  organization.
• 15:57
  They know what they're doing.
• 15:59
  This is an exception as opposed to, oh my God, not that.
• 16:03
  Right.
• 16:04
  Right.
• 16:05
  Right.
• 16:06
  And that sort of acceptance of you, we all make mistakes and right.
• 16:09
  And that, you know, having really good PR helps you sort of come out on the other side.
• 16:15
  And honestly, in crises, some clients don't understand that at first.
• 16:19
  You know, they're in, they're in the hole.
• 16:22
  They're, they're really worried about next steps and like, no, take responsibility.
• 16:29
  You know, taking responsibility shows leadership.
• 16:31
  Yeah.
• 16:32
  Promise how you're going to fix something.
• 16:34
  Yeah.
• 16:35
  And fix it.
• 16:36
  And, and it's, it is an ongoing process and it's, it's not something everyone in a crisis
• 16:42
  grasps initially, but it is, it mitigates long-term reputational damage.
• 16:48
  Yeah.
• 16:49
  Yeah.
• 16:50
  It doesn't just blow over.
• 16:52
  You know, I had a situation as a, as a comms professional that there was somebody who
• 16:59
  was already on a team that, you know, publicly lied and was sued and it impacted the organization.
• 17:09
  And, you know, it, it took a lot of having a solid and they didn't have a crisis.
• 17:17
  You mean like they didn't have a crisis protocol.
• 17:21
  Like they didn't have a crisis protocol.
• 17:22
  So we needed to craft that, develop that and then put that into practice.
• 17:27
  And, you know, it took a long time, many years actually to come out on the other side fully.
• 17:36
  And when I say that, I don't mean like it was just years of this difficult thing.
• 17:39
  I mean, it was, you know, progressively got better, but, but like you said, it wasn't
• 17:44
  like a, it didn't happen overnight.
• 17:46
  And I think this is perhaps where we have a little bit of an advantage over someone who's
• 17:52
  purely a PR practitioner because we've been on the other side of the fence.
• 17:56
  Yep.
• 17:57
  And we've asked the tough questions and we know we can anticipate journalist questions
• 18:03
  and community reaction or stakeholder reaction.
• 18:05
  Yes.
• 18:06
  So, you know, to be able to tell a client, no, this is what's going to happen.
• 18:11
  These are the questions you're going to have.
• 18:12
  These are the questions you've got to be prepared to answer, you know, and this is going to be
• 18:16
  your fallout.
• 18:17
  It's extremely valuable.
• 18:18
  Yep.
• 18:19
  And to think that you could dodge the, the press was, you know, that was sort of an,
• 18:26
  like, it was like an awakening for them, you know, it was like, you're not going to.
• 18:31
  So let's have a plan on how we're going to engage with them and communicate with them
• 18:36
  because they're going to want to know.
• 18:39
  And it is extremely difficult for a leader in that situation to stand up and take the
• 18:44
  fire.
• 18:45
  But that's really a piece of leadership.
• 18:48
  And, and hard because if it's somebody on your team, you know, just by default, by the
• 18:55
  being the leader, it's your fault too.
• 18:58
  Right.
• 18:59
  You do have to stand up and take that.
• 19:01
  So, so you, you have been in PR now a few years, but you had a long career in journalism.
• 19:10
  You told us a little bit about why the, why the move.
• 19:14
  So what are your, what are you mostly doing these days with, with your comms work?
• 19:18
  I mean, are you doing primarily crisis comms or are you doing everything or?
• 19:23
  Well, and that's one of the joy, we're a mid-sized agency.
• 19:27
  We have 17 full-time employees.
• 19:29
  So we become experts on a lot of things very quickly.
• 19:33
  So my day can be anything from writing press releases to client outreach to managing a crisis.
• 19:42
  I have a sales component.
• 19:44
  I never thought I'd be involved in sales, but here I am.
• 19:47
  And it, some of it's long-term planning, some of it's campaign planning.
• 19:53
  You know, if we've had a lot of success with communities that are trying to build a new
• 19:58
  town hall or police station or something like that and working with them on a focused campaign
• 20:03
  to make sure the voters and the stakeholders have all the information they need.
• 20:07
  So it can be any, any number of things.
• 20:10
  I had, I was telling somebody I had one morning last week where in the first three hours I
• 20:15
  had internal comms, external comms on a crisis in three hours.
• 20:20
  So, so it's, it's very exciting.
• 20:23
  But no, and it's very much like a newsroom.
• 20:25
  I think that that's sort of, you know, one of the other wonderful things about working
• 20:29
  here is, is you do have that mix of things.
• 20:32
  No one is doing any one thing here at it solely for the most part.
• 20:38
  So it's very, it's interesting, you know, we can have very, very slow days and all of
• 20:42
  a sudden you're hitting the floor just like in the newsroom and, and rushing off to something
• 20:49
  or, or, or handling a client who has a, you know, something huge going on right then.
• 20:57
  So then you have to be ready to go.
• 21:01
  So speaking of newsrooms, you know, you spent a lot of your career as a managing editor
• 21:06
  and senior editor at the son of Lowell.
• 21:09
  I knew it as a Lowell son, but I know that that changed.
• 21:11
  It was a daily.
• 21:12
  So, you know, I had been a news editor at a weekly and I had been a publisher of a monthly
• 21:18
  and I felt, and we had, it was different.
• 21:22
  We had our own crushing deadlines, but I can't even imagine what it must have been like to
• 21:27
  have to put out and churn out that daily news.
• 21:31
  Like what, how did you do it?
• 21:32
  I mean, what were their tools that you use to kind of keep your team moving and managing
• 21:37
  all of that?
• 21:38
  I mean, how did you do it?
• 21:41
  You really do need a good team.
• 21:43
  I have to start there.
• 21:44
  It's never, you talk about the CEO or the leader being the face, well, when you are
• 21:50
  in senior management newspaper, you're sort of the face of the newspaper and you're the
• 21:52
  people, you know, the person people think is involved in everything when you're really
• 21:56
  not a lot of the day to day operations, you know, there's a level of editors, whether
• 22:02
  it's assignment desk, copy desk layout, who are all involved in that process and you all
• 22:09
  do have to work together as a team.
• 22:10
  So, you know, it's planning every day, at least twice a day, just sort of figure out
• 22:16
  what we're going to do.
• 22:17
  That was our new cycle.
• 22:19
  But the thing about journalism is it does not matter what your plan is.
• 22:26
  You need to have plan B, plan C and be able to throw all of those out in need B.
• 22:33
  I spent a lot of my time early on in my career on copy desks doing pagination, trying to hit
• 22:39
  deadlines.
• 22:40
  I think it's really great training knowing that you need all of this content by this
• 22:44
  time.
• 22:45
  And now you can go do, now you can go do all of that work.
• 22:48
  So important stories are read.
• 22:51
  They're getting enough attention.
• 22:53
  It's the planning of who's going to do what, when, how it fits into their schedule, who's
• 22:57
  going to work weekends, who's working nights.
• 23:01
  It's sort of this entity that has a life of its own.
• 23:06
  And again, throwing something out because you just have to and move on to something else
• 23:12
  because stuff happens.
• 23:14
  Yep.
• 23:15
  Yep.
• 23:16
  Just wanted to pick your brain on this.
• 23:18
  So I, one of my last roles prior to launching the company that we have now was, I was a
• 23:26
  comms manager.
• 23:27
  And one of the things that I found a little bit challenging was capturing and elevating
• 23:33
  the executive voice.
• 23:36
  I was lucky enough to have a supervisor manager who thought the way I did, which is a company's
• 23:42
  brand of the CEO, their voice has to be, their presence needs to be elevated.
• 23:49
  But I, over my career of marketing and communications, I've worked with a fair amount of CEOs and
• 23:55
  each person's very unique style.
• 23:59
  And they had, they knew what they wanted to say, they knew how they wanted to portray
• 24:04
  themselves.
• 24:05
  And, sometimes we needed to advise on best practices and this is your brand and do you
• 24:13
  really want to be seen that way.
• 24:15
  So sometimes our agendas maybe would clash a little bit.
• 24:19
  When you're dealing with a client, what are some strategies or tactics even that you're
• 24:26
  using to sort of elevate their story and, but, but at the same time giving them what
• 24:33
  they want, even if maybe the agendas may not totally align.
• 24:38
  Well, point one is I think when a company hires an agency, they're hiring the expertise
• 24:46
  of the agency.
• 24:48
  At the same time, we both gave up pride of ownership when we went into public relations,
• 24:52
  you know, anything we write doesn't belong to us.
• 24:54
  Anything we do, it belongs to the client.
• 24:57
  So honestly, at the end of the day, if you want to say red and the client says blue,
• 25:01
  it's blue.
• 25:04
  That said, I like to kid that we have a lot of smart clients because they tend to know
• 25:09
  what they don't know.
• 25:11
  And they know they're not essentially the best communicators.
• 25:14
  And I have actually had a client tell me, gave me some content, he said, can you just
• 25:18
  make me sound smart?
• 25:19
  Of course, he's a favorite client because I, so I try to do, you know, and, and there's
• 25:23
  some who, you know, want to change words a phrase, you know, and that's fine.
• 25:28
  I think for the most part, our client base understands that we're there to be that expertise.
• 25:34
  You do have people who push back on language.
• 25:37
  And then you do have that discussion.
• 25:39
  You know, this is why we think you should do this this way or say this in this particular
• 25:43
  way.
• 25:44
  And here's the rationale behind it.
• 25:48
  With the understanding that they might push back from you.
• 25:50
  And I think it's healthy for the most part to have those discussions.
• 25:52
  I know sometimes when I'm writing for a client, I'm, I get feedbacks like, wow, this sounds
• 25:59
  just like me.
• 26:00
  And I'm like, well, that's totally lucky because I don't know how you, how you sound.
• 26:04
  But as you develop clients over time, you learn where their frameworks are.
• 26:10
  I won't name any specifics, but I can tell you that clients are very narrow views about
• 26:16
  what they want to sound like.
• 26:18
  And so for me, it's a matter of pouring that, you know, what they want to say into that
• 26:23
  frame.
• 26:24
  Others are like, nope, this is great, you know, and pushing out.
• 26:28
  I think one strategy is to encourage the client to set themselves apart.
• 26:37
  And I'll give you just a very specific example from last year.
• 26:41
  We had one of our communities had very unfortunate anti-Semitic incident at which point community
• 26:48
  rallies and they're going to have a community event on the common to create the event and
• 26:54
  express solidarity.
• 26:55
  You and I have been at enough of these events to know roughly what they're going to sound
• 26:58
  like and look like.
• 27:00
  And the client reached out to me and said, the select board chair has to make some comments
• 27:07
  and she's really not sure of what she wants to say.
• 27:11
  You think you could just draft up some ideas.
• 27:14
  And again, knowing that, that area and exactly what's going to be saying, I want her to sound
• 27:19
  different.
• 27:20
  I want her to be the standout.
• 27:22
  If TV is covering it that night, I want her statement to be the one they pick up on.
• 27:30
  So I actually went up doing some research about the client in their background and was
• 27:34
  able to position her story about why her family moved to town, the wonderful things about
• 27:41
  the town.
• 27:42
  Why this is the exception, but also why it's important we all get together and do what we
• 27:48
  can to make sure this doesn't happen again.
• 27:49
  And it was a very different take on the very sort of formulaic things that sometimes you
• 27:54
  hear at those events.
• 27:55
  So that was my thinking in that.
• 27:59
  And again, as the back and forth, the response I got was, I'm going to tweak a couple of
• 28:03
  things, but okay.
• 28:05
  And I'm like, great.
• 28:07
  Yeah.
• 28:08
  Yeah.
• 28:09
  It's always a great feeling when your stuff is used.
• 28:11
  Right.
• 28:12
  Well, absolutely.
• 28:14
  I had a situation with a piece that I had done the copy for and I had had a designer
• 28:24
  do the design for it and the company came back and said, you know, we want to change
• 28:29
  the design.
• 28:31
  Can you fix this?
• 28:32
  So they said, we'll have some edits for you.
• 28:35
  And when I got the edits back, they were pointing at certain design elements and they had maybe
• 28:40
  changed like four words, but they kept like almost all the copy.
• 28:44
  And I was like, wow, okay.
• 28:48
  I nailed it.
• 28:49
  Clearly I got what they wanted me to say.
• 28:51
  So that felt really, really good.
• 28:54
  And this is, again, we talk about the journalism versus PR, you know, we take public success
• 29:00
  at a newspaper, you know, for us now, a client gives you wonderful feedback.
• 29:04
  He's like, that's your day.
• 29:05
  Yeah, exactly.
• 29:06
  You know, because it's like, okay, I was able to do what you asked me to do.
• 29:10
  I was able to capture your voice and your story.
• 29:13
  So I got it.
• 29:15
  Right.
• 29:16
  Well, going back to what you just said about the importance of comms training, you know,
• 29:22
  if there's, if we have a listener out there who is a budding PR professional or a budding
• 29:28
  journalist and they want to, you know, go into and, you know, engage in the craft, you
• 29:34
  know, what advice do you have for them, both from sort of the professional standpoint,
• 29:40
  but also from the storytelling standpoint?
• 29:45
  Curiosity is number one.
• 29:47
  You have to wonder about the world around you.
• 29:49
  You have to wonder about what people do and how they do it and why they do it.
• 29:56
  And then be able to have the skills on the other end to tell people what that is and
• 30:05
  how that affects them.
• 30:07
  Why should you read this?
• 30:08
  You know, there's a difference in writing.
• 30:12
  You know, most journalists write reports, you know, who, when, where, why, how, piece
• 30:16
  of it.
• 30:18
  Storytellers, they're about character and dramatic arc if there is one and sense of
• 30:25
  place.
• 30:27
  And I think, you know, in the story that I read earlier, there's all of those elements
• 30:31
  in there, which is why it's a little transportive.
• 30:35
  The best analogy I can give is if you were going to write an obituary, how would you
• 30:40
  write it?
• 30:41
  And if you were going to write a eulogy, how would you write it?
• 30:45
  I always look at the eulogy as the chance to have that person there one more day.
• 30:51
  So if you stood up in the church to give a eulogy, for example, if I was giving your
• 30:56
  eulogy, I would be talking, I wouldn't be talking about she did the bill with a green
• 31:01
  and she founded a company.
• 31:02
  You know, I'd be talking about Leanna the person, you know, her kindness, her generosity,
• 31:09
  you know, the things she did in the community, you know, everybody loves their kids, everybody
• 31:15
  loves their family, everyone's a hard worker.
• 31:17
  But why and how?
• 31:19
  You know, give me an example, tell me what makes someone a family man?
• 31:24
  Tell me what makes someone a great cook?
• 31:28
  Tell me what makes someone a Big Red Sox fan?
• 31:31
  That's far more important because that really brings that person alive one more time.
• 31:35
  In a PR sense, it's the same type of thing.
• 31:40
  You want to have that connection.
• 31:42
  You know, it isn't just enough to say, this is a really good program, but why and what
• 31:47
  does it mean?
• 31:48
  What's the impact that you can have on a school community?
• 31:52
  We work with a lot of school districts.
• 31:54
  If I have a school story where there's a great program, I want to be able to tell people,
• 31:59
  no, this is important.
• 32:00
  Here's the impact that it's had.
• 32:02
  You know, here's the tangible results.
• 32:05
  Here how these students have succeeded because of this program.
• 32:09
  Very, it's very different, but it's that next level.
• 32:12
  There's a lot of journalists who don't ever want to get into the storytelling piece of
• 32:16
  it or PR professionals probably don't want to get into the storytelling piece of it,
• 32:19
  but it's it's hard to be a storyteller.
• 32:23
  You have to have all of your senses available.
• 32:25
  You fill notebooks with content and then and the best part of that is you throw out 90%
• 32:33
  of it.
• 32:34
  So what you're doing is you're mining for gold.
• 32:37
  You throw out all the rocks and you keep the gold nuggets and the gold nuggets are your
• 32:41
  story and that's it's a lot more work.
• 32:44
  It's a lot more thinking, it's a lot more sweat equity, it's a lot more stress, but
• 32:49
  the product on the other hand is just is wonderful.
• 32:52
  So much better.
• 32:53
  And that's what people want.
• 32:55
  You know, they want the story.
• 32:58
  I think, you know, that's what the audience wants.
• 33:00
  Well, and just to back PR one more second, you know, it's it's a marketing, for example,
• 33:06
  this big difference between a car company telling you by our car to some to a friend,
• 33:13
  trusted friends saying to you, geez, I just got this car.
• 33:15
  It's really great.
• 33:16
  You should look at it.
• 33:17
  Yeah, all the difference in the world.
• 33:18
  It's personal.
• 33:19
  It's one way and the more personally you can be more up close, you can be with sources
• 33:25
  and content.
• 33:26
  It just elevates you.
• 33:28
  It'll elevate the reader for a journalist.
• 33:30
  It'll elevate the client if you're in PR.
• 33:32
  Yep.
• 33:33
  One of the things that I did and we will start wrapping up with this is, you know, one of
• 33:37
  the things that I did when I had the green was we would do branded advertising branded
• 33:42
  storytelling.
• 33:45
  And you know, somebody would place their ad, but then they would have the promo article
• 33:49
  there.
• 33:50
  And some of it, some of it was salesy, of course, you mean that's what they wanted.
• 33:54
  But a lot of times it gave me the opportunity to actually tell, you know, a tiny little
• 34:01
  story about something or someone that expanded.
• 34:05
  So it wasn't just an ad in the newspaper.
• 34:08
  You know, you got to know who this was and, and, you know, what they were, what they were
• 34:14
  about.
• 34:15
  And, and I think that was, that was key.
• 34:18
  Well, that's about all the time we have for today.
• 34:24
  Thank you so much for being here, Tom.
• 34:26
  It's been wonderful to talk about PR and journalism and, and just get to spend this time with
• 34:32
  you.
• 34:33
  I appreciate you being here.
• 34:35
  It's just been wonderful catching up with you, Leana.
• 34:37
  Thanks for having me again.
• 34:39
  And hopefully we can talk soon.
• 34:40
  That would be great.
• 34:43
  And to our listeners, whether you hear us locally from the BTB studios in Bedford, Massachusetts,
• 34:49
  or across the globe on such podcast channels as Spotify, Apple Podcasts, or Amazon Prime,
• 34:55
  thanks for listening.
• 34:56
  We hope you enjoyed this episode and we'll see you next time.
• 35:00
  Happy storytelling.
• 35:01
  Bye.