Latest / Wedding Pros who are ready to grow - with Becca Pountney / How to get in the press. With Greg Simpson

Transcript

How to get in the press. With Greg Simpson · Wedding Pros who are ready to grow - with Becca Pountney

• 0:00
  You need to spend a consistent amount of time getting and keeping customers.
• 0:05
  I'm Becca Pountney, wedding business marketing expert, strategist, speaker and author.
• 0:11
  Over the last decade, I've combined my love of marketing with my knowledge of the wedding industry to help thousands of wedding pros and venues just like you learn new skills, strategize, get re energized and grow their businesses.
• 0:23
  Because after all, that's how you stay top of your game.
• 0:26
  Whether you're brand new into this industry or been here forever, I want to help.
• 0:30
  So grab a cup of tea or a cocktail, sit back and enjoy a brand new episode of my award winning podcast, Wedding Pros who Are Ready to Grow.
• 0:38
  Let's get going with today's episode.
• 0:44
  Today I'm chatting with Greg Simpson, founder of Press Retention pr.
• 0:48
  With a previous career as a business journalist, he now helps business owners turn what they know into press coverage and content that builds authority.
• 0:55
  If you've ever wondered how your competitors have become the go to expert in the media or you've always wanted to get some press coverage for yourself, then today's episode episode is going to be for you.
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  Greg, welcome to the podcast.
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  Morning.
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  How are you doing?
• 1:08
  Very well.
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  It's an absolute pleasure to have you.
• 1:10
  I always find journalists incredibly interesting creatures.
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  As someone who used to work in the media myself, but on the television side, journalism is still a bit of an enigma to me.
• 1:20
  So tell us a bit about you so that people can get to know you.
• 1:23
  How did you become a journalist in the first place and what did you do?
• 1:28
  I'm not sure how I became one in the first place, other than not knowing what else to do because I, the careers advisor suggested gamekeeper or marketing and I didn't know what marketing was at the time.
• 1:38
  And then I remember that when we had to do work experience, my football coach was a journalist on local paper and he said you can come and come and do a thing with me.
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  And the first story I ever did wasn't very exciting.
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  It was about a new Ford Escort.
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  It was on sale at the local garage.
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  But the second story really was very exciting because it was a murder and it's one of the most famous miscarriages, miscarriages of justice in the UK technically.
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  And that guy went on to get awarded MBE's and all sorts of stuff for his services to journalism.
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  So I sort of got into it that way and then I went off and did various things with events.
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  So Waterstones, when they did, when they opened a great big store in Nottingham and it went from One little floor to four.
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  And they started doing author stuff.
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  The team was sort of looking for someone who understood the media part.
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  And I, you know, I've done that, so I was kind of helping them do that.
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  And then I moved back across to journalism, local business news, regional business news, before escaping into the mysterious world of marketing.
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  So I've done all of that and then got back into pr.
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  I love it.
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  I think there's something to be said for that.
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  School work experience.
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  And my son is 12, so he's a couple of years off of work experience at the moment, but I'm already having those conversations with some of the fellow parents about actually how important work experience can be because it
• 2:57
  can change someone's trajectory.
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  And I think sometimes it's.
• 3:00
  A lot of people at my school did what I would call the lazy work experience.
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  They just went with their mom to wherever they were or they went to the local school.
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  But I bit like you.
• 3:08
  I did my work experience in local television and then I decided to work in television and it completely transformed it.
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  But I think sometimes at school it's not set up to help, you know, how to get into those places.
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  You know, one of my son's friends has just said he wants to be a sports journalist and his mom said, I don't even know where you start.
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  And so, you know, it is.
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  It's interesting how putting yourself in the right rooms early on can then change the whole source of your career, you know?
• 3:33
  Was it a family friend?
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  How did you.
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  How did you find this person?
• 3:36
  No, he was.
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  He was my football coach.
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  So this is on a Wednesday evening.
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  We would do training and then, you know, you never know what people do for a living, real life, do you, when you're a kid?
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  So I was 15, 16, but I'd been training with him since I was about 12, I think.
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  And, yeah, he sort of.
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  He was aware that I like writing and it was creative and a bit odd.
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  So I think he threw me a lifeline on that.
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  And then, yeah, I went to work with him for a bit longer and I ended up.
• 3:59
  Honestly, at one point, you can.
• 4:01
  I won't say the case that you can Google it.
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  I was in a graveyard at one point with a psychic in the middle of the Peak District.
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  Of course you were.
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  I mean, total normal career opportunities.
• 4:10
  So you had this career as a business journalist, you did your marketing.
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  At what point did you think, you know what, I'm going to set up my own business and help people with pr.
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  I was working, I've worked with Some fairly large agencies.
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  And a lot of the time what will happen or can happen is someone like me turns up to the meetings and we'll have a lovely chat and we show, we talk about some exciting PowerPoint presentations and lots of
• 4:33
  great stuff.
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  And then the client kind of doesn't see you for dead.
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  Once it's been won, it kind of gets passed down to more junior members of stuff.
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  And I didn't really like that because I liked my clients, I didn't get to work with them.
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  And I had this thing in the back of my head about the journalism bit.
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  That was the only people who are getting hold of these journalists are the ones who can afford our big fees.
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  And that means it's always the same people, it's always the same suspects and it feels unattainable for most people to get pr.
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  So I wanted my agent agency at the time where I was the guy getting wheeled out to do the pitches, to create kind of a subset where there would be a startups piece or a small business piece or
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  a local good causes.
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  And it just wasn't commercially viable for them.
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  And I was coming up to my 30th birthday and I thought, it's commercially viable for me, I might do something rogue.
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  And I went to see someone and my agency was trying to pitch this business and I knew them personally because again, I've been playing football with them in various charity tournaments as usual.
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  So how I get into everything.
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  And I went to that client meeting with my boss, met the guy, went away.
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  My boss was saying to me in the car on the way home, text them, text them, how did it go?
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  How did it go?
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  And I kept saying that won't go down very well.
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  It's not the way they, they do things.
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  Eventually I text them and they said, we think it's brilliant, love the idea, it's great to see you etc.
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  But we want to work with you.
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  Ah, awkward.
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  So I left and I went in house with them for a few days a week and then I had to find myself a new client because an accountant told me that I can't have just one because of all
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  sorts of regulations.
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  And I thought, oh, I better go and find another client then.
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  So.
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  And that's where it was.
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  Yeah, in 2008, just before the crash.
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  Great time.
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  So you went out on your own, which is incredibly brave and a lot of people listening will be in, in the same boat.
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  And I think it's really interesting because there is this misconception, I supp suppose that you can only get good PR if you've got a lot of money.
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  And I think that's why a lot of people in the wedding industry, in small businesses kind of neglect it.
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  It's sort of a.
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  A thing over there that just feels completely unattainable.
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  And I think also for many people, as I said earlier, is it's a bit of an enigma, it's a bit of a mystery.
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  It feels like this world that they don't really understand.
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  So what are.
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  What, in your opinion, are some of the misconceptions that small business owners, those florists, those cake makers have about this world of PR and press?
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  I think there is the mystery thing, and I think it probably is the Hollywood thing.
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  It's a very glamorous industry, isn't it?
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  In Hollywood, there's always someone who's working in advertising or marketing or pr, and I think it becomes one of those.
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  You only do that if you know people things or if you were a journalist.
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  So it seems already that the barrier to speak to someone in the newsroom is borderline terrifying because there must be this incredible doyen of marketing, whereas most of the time these journalists are just massively stressed and desperate for
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  a good story.
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  It doesn't necessarily matter matter that it's coming from a small business.
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  It's if it's a good story.
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  Because, you know, in your case, with your listeners here, we're not trying to get them necessarily to be famous in Country Life magazine.
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  We could do if they're to a certain level, but it might be just relevant for them to be in Cotswold's Life or to be in the, you know, the Manchester Evening News or wherever else it would be.
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  And those journalists on all those titles are all desperately seeking content, but they're kind of.
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  They struggle to find the right people to go to, so they go to the one that is reliable.
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  And that's why when you sometimes hear on local radio in any industry and you go, oh, they've asked them again, what a surprise, it's the lawn care guy.
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  They've got him on again talking about whether to leave leaves on the lawn or not.
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  Well, that's because the lawn care guy probably told them two years ago not to leave leaves on the lawn, and then every three months said, and also now do this and also now do that.
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  He didn't try to talk about being the lawn care guy.
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  He spoke about how to make your lawns better.
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  And I think the problem that people think about PR is no one wants to hear about me.
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  And this might sound harsh, it's technically true.
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  No one wants to hear about you and your logo and your company.
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  They want to hear about your story and what you know when it comes to being a journalist.
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  Because their job, like your job right now, is to inform and entertain their readers and their listeners.
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  It's not to promote you.
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  So your job in PR is to think, how does what I know help the listener?
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  Will it be useful to them?
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  And therefore will the journalist like that story?
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  And then will I get exposure from it versus trying to go to a journalist and say, please write about me?
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  So that would be an advert.
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  And I think this is where people come unstuck right at the start because they get pitched advertorials all the time, which are really expensive, and they turn them down.
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  And so when it comes to then thinking about pitching themselves, they think, well, I'm just a florist, I'm just a celebrant, I'm just a local wedding venue.
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  Like, I have nothing interesting to say.
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  What.
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  What am I going to talk to a journalist about?
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  So in your opin, what makes something newsworthy?
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  It's the bit when, if you were on this on a train and you look over someone's shoulder at the newspaper, the reading, you go, what?
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  Oh, so it's the Daily Mail is brilliant at making you click.
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  Right.
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  So it makes it newsworthy because normally it involves a human.
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  Doesn't ever involve a logo unless someone's really big, is changing their logo.
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  So it might be that florist recognizes which flowers offer value this season or every season.
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  Or it might be that a photographer is noting three classic poses that never work well and then does those poses and shows them.
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  So you get a kind of a pictorial story versus a.
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  Would you like to write about my local photography business?
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  Like, no, I wouldn't.
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  I would like to know which weird poses are the best in which light.
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  So that's useful stuff.
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  But I think people kind of get this thing like, no one wants to write about me.
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  And you can write about you because if you've pivoted from a career, let's say you used to work in the armed forces and now you're a florist.
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  Wow.
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  Or you used to be a professional athlete or a semi pro athlete or used to be a nurse and now you are a cake maker or wedding planner.
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  That is about you.
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  And that's interesting, but it's always about you.
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  And then what you do not about buy my stuff.
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  Yeah.
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  And I think that's.
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  That's the bit where people often get stuck.
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  But what's interesting is I think in terms of people coming up with stories, the examples you gave are actually things that wedding business owners are doing content about on social media all of the time.
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  But I don't think they've ever would have thought about the fact that that information that three tips that they're giving could translate into traditional media.
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  So where's the disconnect?
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  I think it's just a bravery pill in some cases, which is crazy because I talked to lots of my clients who purely hire me on the PR side and I'll say to them, it'd be really, really good if
• 11:16
  you could do this, but do an insta version of it as well.
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  On, you know, we've just put this piece out that's talking about, you know, Halloween horrors, how not to do X or Y or trick or treat.
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  Three things to never do.
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  And I'm doing a lot of hard work behind the scenes with the media, but if they were to do an Instagram post about it as well, it would really help me as their PR guy.
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  And so some people are actually really nervous about doing the socials.
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  They will, they will hide behind someone like me instead and let me do it all.
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  Other people will only do the socials because they're quite confident on camera or they love the creative aspect of it.
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  Especially in your industry, I suspect, because the creative factor, if you were a florist, it would be amazing planning what real, real you're going to do or what you're going to do on Monday when you're unpacking the lorry
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  and all that sort of stuff.
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  And I think the bit with the media press wise is it is that nervousness of I don't know how to approach them, I don't know who to approach, I don't know what I'd say, I don't know how I
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  would say it.
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  And what if they say no, that might ruin my day.
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  I think there's a nervousness about that.
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  Yeah, and that's definitely true.
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  And I think also there's no barrier to entry, right?
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  Any of us can turn up on social media and give our tips and there is no one in the way between us sharing that with the world and it going to the world.
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  Whereas when it comes to that traditional media, there is, there's a gatekeeper, there is a person there that has to say, yes, this is a good idea or no, that's not a good idea, or they just ignore you
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  completely because their inbox is full And I guess that's the bit that's scary for people.
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  So, you know, there'll be.
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  If there was a journalist right now looking for a story, you know, you've been a journalist, you understand what it's like to be in that.
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  That situation.
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  What's the kind of thing right now that someone could be giving them that's going to help them help their day move forward?
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  It depends.
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  Fast moving it is.
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  Because if you're looking at a glossy magazine that's sitting on the shelf in Marks and Spencer's, you need to be thinking about January.
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  You know, this is.
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  I don't know when this is going out.
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  We're recording this in autumn.
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  You need to think months and months and months before.
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  If it's going in printed media, when it's local press that has a local newspaper, and then online, you could be far more immediate.
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  So you're kind of thinking, if I'm thinking about a personal trainer client of mine, it wants to get into, say, something like Men's Health magazine, I'm already asking for the New Year's resolution story.
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  Now, I'm not asking for a Halloween story about horrific ways you might injure yourself if you train at home, but that would work as a local press story because I've given it a Halloween hook and it's got immediacy.
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  So it's trying to think in the terms of the journalist, which is.
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  I wonder what they're up to right now at their desk.
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  I wonder what they're panicking about.
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  I could help.
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  I know this.
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  And trying to go to them as a kind of.
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  You become their asset, effectively.
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  This is what PR is.
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  You're between the clients and the journalists and you're the broker.
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  And if people who are trying to do their own PR can get that hat on as well, as well as all the other flaming hats you got to wear running your own business, it would really help people, I
• 14:07
  think, with the way they approach marketing in general and PR specifically.
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  So where are the journalists looking for people then?
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  Because we.
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  And we'll talk more about businesses pitching to the journalists.
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  But ultimately, if something happens tomorrow, I mean, we've seen it all over the, the, the news recently with all the Man City football scandal stuff that they keep going to these experts who understand law and, and sports.
• 14:31
  So where are the journalists going to find people if they want a comment on something in the wedding industry, on flowers, on anything like that?
• 14:38
  Where are they looking for people other than the list they've already got?
• 14:40
  Well, the thing is, yeah, that's the thing.
• 14:42
  You've got two things.
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  You can sit and lurk and hope and pray that someone asks you or you can become a bit more proactive with it and and pick out your ideal titles and just send a very conversational email that says, dear
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  Greg, read your piece recently about such and such and such because that really helps that you actually bothered to read what they've been doing.
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  And I thought it was a really insightful piece.
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  There was one bit in it which I wasn't so sure about.
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  Now, if I'm a journalist reading that, however cynical journalists might be, I want to know what it was they are wondering about.
• 15:13
  But then below it you've got to add that value and say, because here's my take on that.
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  I've got loads of these tips and I'm all about sharing.
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  Let me know if you ever want comment.
• 15:22
  Kind regards, Bob.
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  And you become a useful resource.
• 15:27
  So that's a proactive approach and I would do it kind of create almost like a dream list in your head.
• 15:31
  If you're doing with customers, if you're a venue, you'll have a dream list of people you want to be working with.
• 15:37
  If you're a commercial photographer, you probably have a dream list of clients you'd like to work with.
• 15:41
  It should be the same really, when it comes to the press.
• 15:43
  So you think, if I could just get into these five and then think to yourself, how could I interrupt their day's attention span?
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  And email may not be the best way.
• 15:55
  I wouldn't advise calling them.
• 15:57
  Journalists get very nervous about phone calls.
• 15:59
  They're not necessarily.
• 16:01
  You don't know how long that call is going to take.
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  So it's not always that welcome.
• 16:04
  Some journalists will happily receive a pitch over social media, so you can go that way, but otherwise you can create kind of, what do you call, like a media bio.
• 16:14
  So you have it on hand.
• 16:15
  So if for instance, someone did come to you and they said, becca, we need something, what have you got?
• 16:22
  You have a little bio ready to say, just a quick reminder, here's my area of expertise, here's what I've got.
• 16:28
  Let me get back to you.
• 16:29
  When's your deadline?
• 16:30
  So you are ready and prepared all the time.
• 16:33
  And then there's the reactive side of it.
• 16:34
  So whether you like it or not, a lot of journalists are on Twitter or X and that's when they will go and reach out to say urgent deadline looking for a comment from a XYZ by 3pm and you
• 16:48
  don't have to actually be on X or Twitter every day, doing all of your content.
• 16:54
  Again, that's irrelevant to me.
• 16:55
  My clients are all on Instagram.
• 16:57
  I don't want to do Twitter as well.
• 16:59
  You can look and just find useful things and use it as a research tool.
• 17:03
  So that's when you could then pitch.
• 17:05
  Because they'll ask specifically what they're after and then you email over your bio.
• 17:08
  Here's me, a little bit about me.
• 17:10
  I'm available.
• 17:11
  Would you rather do a phone call?
• 17:13
  Do you want to do it over teams or do you want me to drop you an email with 100 words?
• 17:16
  So it's trying to.
• 17:17
  You do the two things.
• 17:19
  The easiest thing, of course, is to sit and wait and hope and pray.
• 17:23
  But everyone does that.
• 17:24
  So I would try to find a way of thinking, if I was trying to get the attention of someone on such and such and such, what could I do to break their attention span?
• 17:33
  And that might be.
• 17:34
  If you work in the cake industry, why wouldn't you send them some cake versus send them yet another email?
• 17:40
  If you're a photographer, why wouldn't you send them a fantastic photograph framed that shows something really interesting?
• 17:46
  But I think people sort of see because this is all PR and mark.
• 17:49
  But if you think about a journalist, they're just, it's just content.
• 17:53
  That's what they're effectively buying from you.
• 17:56
  So how would you market to them?
• 17:58
  You show them what you do.
• 17:59
  Yeah.
• 17:59
  And they're just, they're just a person, like you said.
• 18:01
  I think we have these ideas of like the Devil Wears Prada or something.
• 18:04
  It's this big scary people.
• 18:06
  But some of these people are just in their entry level local journalist jobs.
• 18:09
  They're not, they're not necessarily.
• 18:11
  And actually if we can do something to help their day go more easily, then that's going to be a win all round.
• 18:16
  And I think that's.
• 18:17
  That's the balance, isn't it?
• 18:19
  And I always say it's the people who knock on the doors that get invited in.
• 18:21
  And so often,.
• 18:22
  Always,.
• 18:23
  People don't knock on the doors.
• 18:24
  People don't ask or they do it the lazy way.
• 18:27
  And I want to pick up on something you said because you said in there that when you speak to a journalist, you should say about an article you've already read.
• 18:34
  And I would like to say to that, as the person who receives all of these pitches for my podcast, try and actually read it.
• 18:41
  Because, you know, I am getting so many pitches all of the time to be on this podcast and they all sound the same way.
• 18:47
  They've been written by AI and they've just asked AI to say, oh, I listened to your recent episode XYZ with person xyz and they talked about xyz and it's so obvious to me that they haven't actually listened to
• 18:59
  it or that maybe they have listened to it because they've put the email through the AI.
• 19:03
  It sounds like they haven't listened to it.
• 19:05
  And actually, most of the time I then just delete it because I think, well, they couldn't even be bothered to listen to it.
• 19:11
  So if you are going to do that tip, the person who will stand out is the person who has actually read it, rather than ask AI and come up with their own human insight into it.
• 19:19
  And this is it.
• 19:20
  And I would intentionally not poke.
• 19:23
  No, yeah, poke.
• 19:24
  I would intentionally poke and say, I don't agree because you'll read that.
• 19:29
  Whereas if you say, I thought it was all wonderful and kittens and sunshine and blah, blah, blah, and you go, yeah, you and 99 other people.
• 19:35
  Whereas that one person who goes, I'm not entirely sure it's that simple.
• 19:39
  I'm thinking, what?
• 19:40
  What is.
• 19:40
  Scroll down, scroll down.
• 19:42
  What is it, you know, that I don't know or we haven't thought about and it's being contrarian.
• 19:46
  And that's the same with, you know, with anything in marketing.
• 19:49
  You can't be the same if you're vanilla.
• 19:51
  No one wants vanilla.
• 19:52
  Yeah, very.
• 19:52
  True.
• 19:53
  Sometimes you have to be a little bit Marmite, you know?
• 19:55
  Yeah.
• 19:55
  And actually someone did that to me recently with one of my podcast episodes.
• 19:59
  They came back and they said, I know what you're saying, but I didn't like your guests, I didn't like what they said.
• 20:03
  And here's something I could have said that was different.
• 20:05
  And actually, I don't want everyone to send me emails like that.
• 20:08
  So I'm just putting that out there.
• 20:09
  But actually, because they said that it did get my attention and then we had a whole back and forth conversation, it was actually a really great conversation about, you know, the episode and what I could have done differently
• 20:19
  and their perspective.
• 20:20
  And so it.
• 20:21
  You're right, it does catch the attention sometimes because the AI also will always say nice things that tends to agree with you, and so it makes you look more human.
• 20:29
  And right now, I'm all about trying to help people become more human.
• 20:33
  So we identify some publications.
• 20:35
  We say to ourselves, we want to be in the local media, or I want to be in Forbes magazine or whatever level it is.
• 20:40
  How on earth do we Even find the journalists.
• 20:42
  How do we know where they're hanging out?
• 20:43
  Who are they?
• 20:44
  Where do we find them?
• 20:46
  Say they mainly lurk.
• 20:47
  I say this like it's a small pack of animals on the Serengeti, but they mainly lurk on social media when they want something thing which is I need a such and such.
• 20:57
  They're not ever so proactive about saying, I went for a walk in the countryside this weekend and here's a picture of a waterfall.
• 21:02
  Isn't it great?
• 21:04
  So you're not going to find an endless stream of brilliant content from journalists because their job is not to entertain you on that platform unless that is their specific role, but that is where they look and are identifiable.
• 21:16
  And the best way I tend to find it if I start working with the new client.
• 21:19
  I mean, I've got all sorts of lovely databases to help me find journalists.
• 21:23
  But if you're looking for the journalist and you're trying to find something they've currently written about, people forget Google has got an entire thing called Google News and no one uses it in a search bar.
• 21:33
  They use maps and they use images and they maybe use video.
• 21:35
  If you put in weddings UK 2026 Google news, you'll get a whole list of what's been written about in the press, in verifiable magazines, publications and online.
• 21:46
  And then by that definition you can then click in there and see who wrote it.
• 21:49
  And if you then see who wrote it, you can often see their biog on the website and then in there it will give you their social posts and you can come of start to build a little dossier of
• 21:57
  people who should be.
• 21:59
  Rather than being your suspects, they become your prospects.
• 22:01
  So marketing is always suspects, prospects and leads and then customers and clients.
• 22:06
  Right?
• 22:07
  It's the same with journalists.
• 22:08
  You have a suspect, they probably should write about me because they exist with the pulse and they're in the uk.
• 22:14
  Prospect is ah, they write about our industry lead becomes they've written about it recently and then you go from there and the customer is when you start having the conversation.
• 22:24
  But I think people try to.
• 22:25
  I'm not sure how people go about it because I obviously I do it myself in a certain way.
• 22:29
  But the easiest way to do it for free is to use Google News and X.
• 22:33
  And.
• 22:33
  There's a thing that people use on X and I could get you down a rabbit hole with, with your listeners here.
• 22:38
  So I monitor a thing called journo request, hashtag journo request.
• 22:43
  But the thing is, I'm honest with that because I'VE got lots of clients and they're all very varied and I've got lots of people who I help every now and then.
• 22:50
  So there's probably every day there'll be something relevant.
• 22:53
  If you do that purely as a small business owner yourself, you're thinking, oh, my God, I know nothing about equine dental care or my knowledge of floorboard.
• 23:02
  Something is quite limited.
• 23:03
  This is a waste of time and it is probably a waste of time for you.
• 23:06
  There are other alerts you can do to refine it, but I would go with the Google News thing as my first approach and then use the socials to kind of find out more about them.
• 23:14
  Them.
• 23:15
  And if you find out that they do like long walks in the countryside and their dog scored Nigel, then you might want to put that in your pitch.
• 23:22
  Yeah, really helpful.
• 23:23
  Google News is a great one.
• 23:24
  I don't think I've ever even looked in that tab and I probably should be.
• 23:28
  So I guarantee that most people listening aren't looking in that tab either.
• 23:31
  And it's interesting to hear from you that X is still big because I think, you know, five, six, seven years ago, we were all over there on Twitter on X and we, we heard about this journal request thing
• 23:42
  and I think a lot of people, the general population, a lot of people have kind of distanced themselves from that platform.
• 23:48
  But actually if you know that journalists are still using it, then, then it clearly hasn't moved on.
• 23:53
  I was hoping you were going to say to me, oh, don't worry, they're not over there anymore, they're now on TikTok.
• 23:57
  No, I mean they will be some on TikTok and there will be some on Instagram, but I just know that the vast majority of still are still there, whether they like it or not.
• 24:03
  And most to make a very public point of saying, I'm still on this flaming platform.
• 24:07
  Sorry, but it's just really handy because it's a massive resource of people.
• 24:11
  And again, by ding of the way that platform works, people who are quite good at marketing, or maybe I should use the term prolific rather than good, will be on there.
• 24:20
  And as a journalist, your job is not sitting there going, oh, no, I can't use that because you're on there.
• 24:25
  So you therefore must be this.
• 24:26
  You're thinking, oh my God, that would really help me with this deadline.
• 24:29
  That'll work perfectly.
• 24:30
  Brilliant.
• 24:31
  You don't then sit there and have a moral debate about whether you got it off X or not.
• 24:36
  No, they're just looking for the quickest, easiest solution to their problem because they're busy people.
• 24:40
  Okay, so we've got our idea, we've come up with our idea that's relevant to the time.
• 24:45
  We know the timings of the publication, we found the journalist.
• 24:48
  So the time comes to send our pitch.
• 24:51
  And again, this is a bit which terrifies people and you've talked about it a little bit, but just give us some top tips about how to send that pitch, what we should and shouldn't do, what makes someone just
• 25:02
  delete it immediately, what should the subject line be?
• 25:05
  Because a lot of people just get stuck immediately at the top.
• 25:07
  I would, you know, you need to make it personal.
• 25:09
  So again, there's lots of different databases you can get where you can pray and spread spray and send it to everybody who's ever written about cakes.
• 25:16
  Right.
• 25:17
  It's going to be very irrelevant to most of those people and for most of your listeners, why would you be messing around with databases?
• 25:22
  So you're going to be doing it, please.
• 25:26
  Doing it this way.
• 25:27
  It's a sniper shot.
• 25:28
  You do not blind copy 20 journalists whose emails you managed to scrape and think, aren't I efficient?
• 25:34
  This is clever me.
• 25:35
  You will smell that a mile off as a journalist.
• 25:37
  So you have to go in there individually.
• 25:39
  I would go in there having noticed something about them and comment on it.
• 25:43
  Not in a weird way like your hair today.
• 25:45
  It's more of a I sawed the piece on or oh, my.
• 25:49
  Like I.
• 25:50
  This depends on your personality.
• 25:52
  If I know that a journalist target of mine is a Manchester City supporter, I will absolutely point it out right now because it's going to prod them and nudge them and they won yesterday.
• 26:02
  And I might even say, good result for you guys.
• 26:05
  Meanwhile, slightly different tangent and you'd go in that way so it looks like.
• 26:11
  Like you've actually bothered to take your time and research so that you're reaching out and you're trying to have a conversation versus broadcasting.
• 26:17
  Because marketing is engagement, right?
• 26:18
  Not broadcasting.
• 26:20
  So you want to become that person where they think, I could probably work with this person.
• 26:24
  And then it's the case of it needs to be in your pitch, whether it's the full amount of content that you're suggesting, you know, which seven top tips to make X, Y, Z happen, or, you know, why do
• 26:34
  wedding cakes cost what they do?
• 26:35
  How do you protect them in a heat wave?
• 26:36
  Whatever it was, it would.
• 26:37
  Would be.
• 26:38
  You might just suggest, I was making a cake the other day and the temperature outside was scorching, as you know.
• 26:44
  Oh, my word.
• 26:46
  It Made me think, would it be helpful for you if I put a piece together on I can do picks, I can do some video if you want.
• 26:54
  General suggestion below.
• 26:55
  For the, for the pieces here, I wouldn't necessarily go and write 300 words because again, most people aren't very comfortable writing 300 words.
• 27:02
  I would write 75.
• 27:04
  Giving a flavor of what it is you might offer because that helps them to skim read it, but it also suggests and shows that you're thinking it through rather than giving them a copy paste of something you've probably
• 27:15
  sent to everybody else.
• 27:16
  Yeah,.
• 27:17
  If you have sent to everybody else, you need to have your intro to them.
• 27:21
  Same if you were sending a quote to a potential customer, you wouldn't say dear sir, madam, thank you.
• 27:27
  If you do, please stop.
• 27:28
  You would say dear Janet and John.
• 27:30
  Right.
• 27:31
  So it's the same with the journalists.
• 27:32
  You go in there and you say dear Steve.
• 27:35
  You might even be replying to a previous email you sent them because it's a sneaky tactic.
• 27:40
  Actually sometimes I even.
• 27:42
  I will put a journalist and then reply to my own email to that journalist so it looks like they opened the first one in the first place.
• 27:48
  Oh, I like that.
• 27:48
  That's a lovely, clever sneaky tactic.
• 27:50
  Okay, what about the subject line then?
• 27:52
  Are we putting the idea in the subject line?
• 27:54
  Because sometimes people just.
• 27:56
  The subject line does make people open an email or not open an email.
• 27:59
  Yeah, exactly.
• 28:00
  And I think trying to think of one from the celebrant side of things because my mum is a celebrant, albeit in France.
• 28:07
  So if, because she's in France, I would say something on the lines of why French weddings differ from British weddings.
• 28:12
  Celebrant reveals all because they're like, oh, why?
• 28:15
  How do they differ?
• 28:16
  Or 5 wedding photos couples regret taking or missing.
• 28:21
  So it's the same thing you would be doing with your content on socials.
• 28:24
  You're just putting into the headline or the subject line of the email to that journalist and then your next point down from that is Becca point.
• 28:31
  I wouldn't do the whole point three will really surprise you.
• 28:34
  That's very social.
• 28:35
  But I might say something.
• 28:36
  I might take the mick out of that in fact, and say Becca, without trying to be on social media about this, point three actually will really surprise you.
• 28:43
  Smiley face.
• 28:44
  Because you can use emojis with a journalist.
• 28:46
  They are human beings.
• 28:47
  And it will feel far more that you sat there and thought about reaching out versus sat there and gone, I'm going to spam 20 journals.
• 28:54
  Yeah, absolutely.
• 28:55
  So I Like that idea.
• 28:56
  It's the sniper attack.
• 28:57
  You're thinking about that one person rather than just trying to do this broad approach.
• 29:02
  I think the difficulty, and I think this is where people struggle to get their head around it sometimes, is that you often have to knock on a lot of doors before any of them will open, and sometimes it's
• 29:12
  not always obvious why that door opened either.
• 29:14
  So we were talking before we recorded about, you know, about podcast pictures and what makes me open a pitch or delete a pitch or forward it on and what makes me actually want to talk to someone.
• 29:24
  And it's really difficult to always explain that.
• 29:26
  There's some things that will always make me delete it.
• 29:28
  Like, I think they don't care, or they sound bland and boring.
• 29:30
  But whether or not I.
• 29:31
  They then kind of think, yeah, they're interesting, just depends.
• 29:34
  And sometimes it's just that topic just resonates at the exact moment that email came in, or a client's just said that they're struggling with that.
• 29:41
  Or, you know, I've thought, oh, I haven't had anyone talk about this for a while, or this person sounds like they've had an interesting background.
• 29:47
  So there is no one size fits all.
• 29:50
  Because someone could send me an almost identical pitch the week after, but because I've gone with the first one, the second one's now getting ignored.
• 29:56
  Even though if it had come first, it might have.
• 29:58
  It might have gone further.
• 29:59
  Yeah, absolutely.
• 30:00
  But also, if I was trying to pitch you, having not done this now, and I discovered that you really like salt and vinegar crisps, I would probably put in a subject line, seriously, salt and vinegar.
• 30:10
  And you think, who is this guy?
• 30:12
  And.
• 30:13
  But I would then talk about how that approach helps people to understand how to pitch the media.
• 30:18
  And then you go, oh, you sneaky cat.
• 30:20
  But you will need to be.
• 30:23
  It's a borderline thing of stalking and research, isn't it?
• 30:26
  Which is probably why a lot of PR people were journos.
• 30:28
  Because our job as a journalist is to find a story, research it, sniff it out.
• 30:32
  You have to become that same person with your target audience.
• 30:36
  It's this, how do I get to know them better so I can pitch them better and serve them better, versus what most people do is, how do I get in them magazines?
• 30:43
  You get in the magazine by doing what I just said you should do, which is getting to know them, because then you know that they've not written about whatever it is in a year or two years, and you're
• 30:52
  not calling them out on it.
• 30:53
  You're saying I spotted your piece from autumn 2025 and it made me think about this because I was about to do a blog on it it if you want a sneak preview of it, let me know.
• 31:02
  Actually, if you'd rather have it exclusively, I can hold the blog.
• 31:06
  And now I'm thinking, oh my God, you thought of me and you're going to hold your blog first and you're going to give it me first dibs.
• 31:11
  That's really helpful.
• 31:12
  And that's when they'll say actually is there any chance you could do a little real on Insta because we can share that because a lot of the time I don't think people realize this is when you see something
• 31:22
  typically Daily Mail, Daily Express, Metro where they say speaking on TikTok this GP revealed three things to never do to make sure you future proof your heart.
• 31:33
  They didn't necessarily spot that on TikTok.
• 31:36
  It was on TikTok that someone pointed out that it was on TikTok.
• 31:40
  Someone like me.
• 31:41
  Because you're going, hi Becca, I know you're busy, it's a Thursday just spotted client do this piece on TikTok is actually it's.
• 31:50
  It's always good fun from him.
• 31:53
  Main copy down below, highlights over.
• 31:54
  Here's a link.
• 31:55
  And now what they can do is take that content away from the email pitch from me, go over on Tick Tock and appear to discover it.
• 32:01
  Yes, but also, but journalists can also be sneaky because once you put something on Tick Tock it is kind of public, isn't it?
• 32:10
  So the journalists can use it even if they don't seek your permission.
• 32:14
  I think sometimes that takes people by surprise when they are out there.
• 32:18
  That actually something.
• 32:19
  You know, I follow some guys and I don't know the ins and outs of it, but basically he teaches people how to be better TV presenters and he did a pizza camera about the new strictly presenting trio and
• 32:30
  his opinions on it.
• 32:31
  And that has now been appearing in all sorts of publications.
• 32:34
  Now there's two ways to look at that.
• 32:36
  Number one, it could be that someone like you has put that in front of the journalists or it could be a journalist has taken that and spun it in their own direction, whether that person likes it or not.
• 32:45
  Right?
• 32:45
  Yeah.
• 32:46
  And which is why I would always say to people when it comes to social, I mean I'm just thinking now, what have I posted recently?
• 32:52
  Never post something on social media that you don't mind seeing on the front cover of the Times,.
• 32:56
  Which is terrifying.
• 32:57
  So everyone listening now is going to be Terrified thinking, no, I shouldn't do anything.
• 33:00
  That's not true.
• 33:01
  You should keep putting yourself out there.
• 33:02
  But you're right, you've got to be able to sleep well at night and agree.
• 33:04
  With what you're saying.
• 33:05
  Yeah, that you genuinely agree with.
• 33:07
  And if someone said, hey, what's all this about sudden search?
• 33:09
  And you could talk about it versus, you know, why wouldn't you do it?
• 33:12
  That way you wouldn't have to overthink everything you do.
• 33:14
  But if it's an opinion piece, I would.
• 33:16
  And you.
• 33:17
  Or you're ranting about something which, you know, gets picked up.
• 33:20
  I would always say, you know, would you be happy with your mum saying that?
• 33:22
  Would you be happy with being on the front cover of the Times if.
• 33:25
  If he would then crack on.
• 33:27
  If not, take a beat before you post.
• 33:29
  Yeah, absolutely.
• 33:30
  I think it's important for people to be aware of that.
• 33:32
  So if someone's listening now and they're thinking, okay, this sounds really interesting to me.
• 33:36
  I'm excited about this prospect.
• 33:37
  I'm thinking maybe I should do some stuff.
• 33:39
  Where should they start?
• 33:41
  Should they start with local news?
• 33:42
  Should they look at national news, magazines, print podcasts?
• 33:45
  Like, there is so much.
• 33:47
  It's not just one size fits all.
• 33:49
  How do they know where to begin?
• 33:51
  It depends where their audience is, where their audience lurks.
• 33:54
  So you'll know that I primarily work with people in the uk, so it'd be very unlikely that I would email someone a podcast in the us.
• 34:01
  It'd be good for my exposure, but it wouldn't necessarily get me prospects and clients.
• 34:06
  So I tend to look at it that way as well.
• 34:07
  Where does my audience look?
• 34:09
  My ideal audience?
• 34:11
  Because some of you might be marketing in the wrong place.
• 34:15
  Just because you're getting load of leads doesn't mean they're the right leads.
• 34:17
  So you might only be doing local advertising.
• 34:21
  And I've got no problem with advertising, by the way.
• 34:22
  Advertising is a really useful thing to do.
• 34:25
  But if you're only advertising locally and yet you have a national reach, well, you're probably messing.
• 34:29
  You're wasting your budget in that way.
• 34:31
  You should be going nationally.
• 34:33
  Whereas someone's trying to get you to put your marketing efforts beyond a national campaign and you only work with people within 15 miles of where you are, then rethink that.
• 34:41
  So it's trying to get that thing, your ideal customer Persona, to use horrible marketing jargon, nail that first and then think, right, if that is my audience and this is where they are and this is what they worry
• 34:54
  about and what they think about who writes about that and go that way.
• 34:57
  But you always go your market first and then your message and then the media.
• 35:02
  But a lot of people go, where shall I put this?
• 35:04
  It's like, well, who are you going to talk to?
• 35:06
  What are you going to say?
• 35:07
  Now we're worried about where you're going to say it.
• 35:09
  From a confidence perspective, I quite often recommend, and you may disagree with this and that's quite okay if you do.
• 35:15
  I often recommend to people to start with local press because sometimes that feels like the lowest hanging fruit in terms of terms of practicing and pitching because we know that it's easier to get in the Luton News or
• 35:27
  the BBC Three Counties than it is to get on Forbes magazine.
• 35:31
  Do you think that's good advice to, to start there or do you think that's not good advice?
• 35:36
  No, I think it's good advice because it does give you a confidence and it gives it, ideally it gives you a rhythm because you know, PR isn't this thing you do once a year because some guy on the
• 35:45
  podcast made a few amusing comments.
• 35:47
  You do it because it's actually works if you do it long term, but it will only work if you do it long term.
• 35:53
  The same with exercise.
• 35:54
  You don't go and do 50 sit ups this morning and boom, I've got a six pack tomorrow or three months time.
• 36:00
  It's a constant, constant thing and it's a trip.
• 36:03
  And if so long as you're, you're adding value and you're not nagging, you know, if you keep pitching your local press every week with the same piece, it's not changed, you're now nagging.
• 36:11
  It's not useful if you change it based on the season or based on one thing you spotted in the traitors last night, whatever that might be, or one thing that someone said on camera, you're an expert lip reader,
• 36:23
  for instance, and you spotted Donald Trump said this, you're like, oh my word, brilliant.
• 36:28
  So it's trying to find ways of practicing exercising that muscle.
• 36:31
  And local press is a great thing to do.
• 36:33
  And don't forget as well, most local press now is kind of owned by the same organization.
• 36:38
  And if, if they're not all sitting in a news desk in Luton, some are sitting in a news desk in Dunstable or they're sitting in the news desk in Dundee.
• 36:46
  They're still writing for that local paper, but they will kind of, they'll either forward it to their friends or they'll write about it themselves, posting on the local press.
• 36:54
  But because they're all linked together, you can suddenly find the piece that you pitched.
• 36:57
  And this happened to me last week.
• 36:59
  A piece I pitched in Birmingham ended up in Wales because for some reason, and it was more relevant to Birmingham than it was Wales, but Wales preferred the angle and that's what ended up in Wales.
• 37:10
  Online versus Birmingham.
• 37:11
  But it can go everywhere.
• 37:12
  But you obviously want to try to go to where you ideally want it to go versus thinking, if I put it here, it's going to go everywhere.
• 37:19
  It's like, well, let's assume if you pitch it here, it will go there.
• 37:23
  Anything else is a bonus.
• 37:24
  Okay, so that's a good place for people to start.
• 37:26
  Okay, Becca's advice will continue then, that that is a good place to start.
• 37:29
  Let's just talk about this exposure word for a moment and the idea of return on investment.
• 37:35
  Because as a business owner, as a small business owner, people have to think really carefully about where they spend their time, time and their money.
• 37:40
  Sometimes they'll get people coming to them who some Instagram celebrity saying, can you give me a free cake for exposure?
• 37:46
  It'll be an okay magazine for exposure.
• 37:49
  Or they're thinking, oh, I want to spend some money on getting some press working with someone like you.
• 37:53
  But then how do I know if.
• 37:55
  Whether it's working or not?
• 37:56
  So just give us some thoughts on exposure and how we measure whether something's worth doing and how we measure return on investment.
• 38:03
  I mean, thankfully you weren't asking me about exposure.
• 38:05
  On a different topic there.
• 38:06
  I was getting slightly nervous.
• 38:07
  But the thing is, is with most marketing, what people don't do is they don't measure it in the first place.
• 38:13
  So they don't actually know it's working or not.
• 38:15
  They just feel it's not working.
• 38:17
  And so I'd say to someone, if they stop hiring me, I'm saying, just ask a quick question.
• 38:22
  Why are we talking right now?
• 38:23
  Are you running towards something or you're running away from something?
• 38:26
  Because if you're running away from something, I'm not your guy.
• 38:28
  If you run towards something, let's have a chat.
• 38:30
  And then I'd ask, what other marketing are you doing?
• 38:34
  Because PR isn't a magic bullet that you go, right, stop all the Facebook ads, no more local ads.
• 38:39
  We're going to do some PR stuff.
• 38:41
  PR is kind of the rocket fuel on the stuff you're already doing.
• 38:45
  So it accelerates.
• 38:46
  It's the trust bit.
• 38:47
  And people think, you've heard of know, like and trust, right?
• 38:50
  In marketing, everyone thinks PR is the no bit.
• 38:53
  Oh, it's the like bit.
• 38:54
  Is the guy who does this.
• 38:55
  No, it's the trust bit.
• 38:57
  Because someone else is saying, you're great.
• 38:59
  Because I could make anyone famous in the next half an hour, not necessarily for what they want to be famous for.
• 39:04
  I can make you very well known by taking a great big advert out on Times Square.
• 39:08
  I become painfully aware of who you are.
• 39:09
  But if I look at your PR and I don't see anything, I just think, not sure about these guys.
• 39:14
  So PR is the bit that makes them go, oh, them, like them.
• 39:18
  So you need to come from that point of view.
• 39:20
  It's the sentiment bit.
• 39:21
  It's not going to necessarily make a sale, but it will make a sale more likely because you've done the other bits and bobs.
• 39:29
  So if you're looking at your marketing and you, you should hopefully be measuring it, going.
• 39:33
  Every week we do X posts, we do one blog, we have a newsletter that goes out and then we do such and such and such.
• 39:39
  Such.
• 39:39
  Right.
• 39:40
  You're doing these things consistently.
• 39:41
  Yeah.
• 39:42
  And you're seeing where you're doing well, where you're not.
• 39:44
  Then you add PR into it.
• 39:46
  You will then see an uptick based on the other stuff you're doing.
• 39:50
  Not the magic bullet.
• 39:51
  You might get one story that gets in the Daily Express having no marketing whatsoever, ever, and your business takes off from that.
• 39:57
  You might.
• 39:57
  But you're better off doing all the other things as well.
• 40:01
  And the PR bit, because obviously if you hire someone that does cost, if you don't yourself is free.
• 40:07
  It's just time.
• 40:08
  No money changes hands at any stage.
• 40:10
  And if it does, it's not.
• 40:12
  It's not editorial, it's an advertorial.
• 40:14
  So I would say don't do it.
• 40:15
  I would do the work on a proper editorial that's free, that's useful.
• 40:20
  So it's not so much that, it's the cost, it's a time thing.
• 40:22
  And what you're measuring is I would go to your audience in the first place and actually say to them, we've got some interesting things going on our business over the next six months and we can't wait to show
• 40:31
  you about them.
• 40:32
  However, we're not sure where best to tell you.
• 40:34
  Could you tell me if you are on this platform, that platform?
• 40:37
  That platform, which publications you read?
• 40:40
  And I'd get that information first because then if they say all of these different things here and then you measure whether you appeared in any of those publications in three months, six months time, then you'll know whether you're
• 40:49
  successful or not.
• 40:51
  And then you can start asking people, have you heard about us recently?
• 40:54
  Were you aware of this?
• 40:55
  Or when they phone you, you just simply ask, where do you hear about us?
• 40:58
  The PR will always be the one.
• 41:00
  I'm biased that people go, I read it.
• 41:03
  And you sounded really interest.
• 41:04
  I love the way you did that.
• 41:06
  An advert is really hard to put that across because a PR thing would be formal.
• 41:11
  Nurse does this, now does that.
• 41:12
  An advert would be, our balloons are amazing.
• 41:15
  You wouldn't put PSI on a nurse, would you?
• 41:17
  It wouldn't be in there.
• 41:18
  It'd be all about balloons.
• 41:19
  Whereas the editorial would be meet the former nurse who now loads up 300 balloons a day.
• 41:23
  Yeah.
• 41:24
  And I think seeing it as that know, like trust, which a lot of people have heard of, but knowing it's the trust part will resonate.
• 41:30
  And I think that's what people need to hold onto.
• 41:32
  It's the authority building piece for sure.
• 41:35
  I want to talk to you about jumping on current news stories because that's another way that people can get in the press.
• 41:40
  And in the last couple of months, there's been two different situations where wedding industry and news have overlapped.
• 41:48
  So instance one is with the marriage reform laws that have been going through lots and lots of coverage about the fact that they're looking at marriage reform for the first time in hundreds of years.
• 41:58
  Definitely something for the celebrants and the venues to think about.
• 42:01
  And then also I saw just in the last few weeks a lot of people talking about this story around children's school photos and how people are putting them into AI to remove the watermark and the impact that that
• 42:12
  has on photographers.
• 42:14
  So from my marketing head, I'm seeing two lots of stories in the news where I think, well, this is wedding industry specific.
• 42:21
  So obviously now that those stories have passed.
• 42:24
  But if someone in the wedding industry was listening and heard that at the time when it first came out out, what can they practically be doing to try and kind of jump on that story that people are starting
• 42:35
  to talk about?
• 42:36
  Well, the first thing, I would absolutely go on socials and give my 10 path on it.
• 42:41
  But I would then also have the press version statement that goes out to my prospects and suspects in the media based on what you've seen, what you've heard with your take.
• 42:50
  And it is a pretty quick turnaround.
• 42:52
  You have to imagine this as, I mean, I'm spinning around in my chair as I do this in a kind of an evil Bond villain way, but if you're making yourself in a newsroom room as a journalist, you
• 43:01
  imagine someone goes, hold the press.
• 43:03
  This has happened.
• 43:04
  And you shout across the other reporter who covers that, and they spin around their chair and they start front researching it.
• 43:10
  You need as a business owner to spin around in your chair, practically research it, and go and tell the guy or the girl on the news desk, figuratively, what you know.
• 43:19
  And it is quick.
• 43:20
  You can't sit there and go, oh, that's interesting.
• 43:22
  Yeah, I might, I might write something about that next week or week after or no, I don't like my hair today, so I'm not gonna do that post.
• 43:29
  Well, you could do the press release release without worrying about how you look right now.
• 43:32
  Get it out.
• 43:34
  Speed is of the essence when it comes to.
• 43:36
  This.
• 43:37
  Kind of thing.
• 43:38
  And presumably having an opinion that's different to what you've already read, is that helpful?
• 43:42
  Yeah, it is.
• 43:42
  I.
• 43:43
  This is the thing.
• 43:44
  I would always be that if I haven't got anything to say on it, don't say anything on it.
• 43:47
  You don't just sort of go, this happened.
• 43:49
  Here's our take.
• 43:50
  It's the same.
• 43:51
  There's nothing to say.
• 43:52
  Watch this space.
• 43:53
  That's not very useful.
• 43:54
  You can use that in your social media content, your blog.
• 43:57
  I would actually take the mick out of that in my newsletter to say, I've got nothing to say on this, but I thought you should be aware about it.
• 44:03
  But if you went to the media with that, that's a total meh pitch, isn't it?
• 44:08
  Thing happened that you're aware of, just reinforcing the fact that it happened.
• 44:12
  Kind regards.
• 44:13
  That's not helpful.
• 44:14
  So you've got to come in with a different angle.
• 44:16
  As long as you have a different angle, don't fake it.
• 44:18
  If you don't have a different angle, then don't like pretend to be all contradictory to everybody else because that's gonna be.
• 44:24
  At some point.
• 44:25
  You'll get found out by doing that.
• 44:26
  Yeah.
• 44:27
  And you'll dig yourself a hole.
• 44:29
  People forget is that people do actually read and see the media.
• 44:31
  And so if you go on the media and say something,.
• 44:34
  Yeah,.
• 44:34
  People in your life will hear it.
• 44:36
  Funny enough, I was in the car on the way to the airport, five o' clock in the morning the other weekend, and I heard one of my clients being interviewed on Radio 5 live money.
• 44:44
  And I.
• 44:45
  And I messaged them and I was like, I heard.
• 44:46
  And she said, I didn't think anyone would be up at that time.
• 44:48
  People are always listening.
• 44:50
  And.
• 44:50
  You have to know that, you know, if you are on the media and you're saying something, people in your life may hear it and therefore, like you said earlier, you have to be able to stand behind it otherwise
• 44:59
  you will get caught people out fairly fast.
• 45:01
  And also with that though, you know, people are on, on a certain obscure time of the day.
• 45:05
  I mean, I listen to 5 Live a lot actually, as it happens.
• 45:08
  Don't assume just because you've got national press that everyone on your database of prospects that you've got quotes out for are going to hear it.
• 45:15
  You need to tell them you're on it, but you don't tell them on it by just, you know, just repost.
• 45:19
  I would say, oh my God, what was I wearing?
• 45:22
  And then I'd say that's what the first thing I thought when I got into the studio at the BBC the the day.
• 45:27
  However, as time is of the essence, I need to talk about X, Y and Z.
• 45:29
  I have no choice.
• 45:31
  You can read about more about it below.
• 45:32
  Meanwhile, I'll try better next time.
• 45:34
  Smiley face.
• 45:35
  Kind regards.
• 45:36
  Greg, you're going to read that newsletter and it's basically a humble brag that you were on the 5 Live episode, whatever it was, that topic, but it's a far more human way of doing it than just resharing it.
• 45:48
  Okay, well that brings me beautifully onto my next question because I wanted to talk to you about what we do if we do get the coverage.
• 45:55
  So we get the radio appearance, we get the podcast appearance, we get the piece in the newspaper that we've been hoping and praying for and we've been knocking on the doors.
• 46:02
  Once we've got it, what do we then do to get the most out of that opportunity?
• 46:06
  So this, this I'll come to something about once you've got the coverage, but there's a trick I use quite a lot and people, people can follow me on my social go.
• 46:14
  Oh, he's done that thing again.
• 46:15
  So if I've got a journalist, if I've got a client that's announcing something, I've normally got my professional photographer with me.
• 46:22
  Shout out to photographers.
• 46:23
  I use professional photographers.
• 46:24
  I don't use my phone.
• 46:25
  I'm a writer, not a photographer.
• 46:27
  So I have my photographer set up and I have my clients client behind the photographer as well.
• 46:32
  And I will ensure you cannot see what it is they're doing, but there is something going on and I will take a photograph of the back of my photographer's head, much as he hates it.
• 46:40
  And I'll say, I'm over here at Acme Limited and I can't tell you why, so I start hinting about things before it's happened.
• 46:46
  Then I'll email the journalist and say you might spot a few things with me of our own.
• 46:50
  Such and such I can't actually tell you, but Tuesday I think I can.
• 46:54
  So I'm already teasing a story and it's teasing it to the audience as well.
• 46:58
  When it happens, I tend to go other than, you know, resharing it.
• 47:02
  And I would say here's a bit more of what I couldn't tell you last week.
• 47:05
  Ta da.
• 47:07
  So that's how you make sure you got out there.
• 47:09
  I try to get clients to think a bit more old school with things and this is something that I got a lot of pushback on.
• 47:16
  If you get in a magazine, let's say it's a business magazine and it's a feature on you or whatever it is, or it's an interview, I would just put it in the post because no one gets post.
• 47:25
  And I would do it really, really, really, really, as if it's the most casual thing you've ever done.
• 47:30
  And I'll go and get 50 copies and someone goes, oh my God, that's going to cost me £200.
• 47:34
  It's like, yeah, but your average client's £4,000 and your average conversion is 25%.
• 47:39
  So if you do the math, he says, using the mechanism.
• 47:41
  So I go and get the magazine and I'd put it in a nice envelope.
• 47:44
  I wouldn't put it in a brown envelope, it'd be a colored envelope.
• 47:47
  That's not necessarily with my branding on it, but I'd hand write it on the front to my prospects in there.
• 47:51
  On the front card cover I put a little post it note and I would scribble page 19, oh my God, smiley face GS and I would just send it with a comp slip so they know who it's come
• 48:04
  from.
• 48:04
  And then what they'll do is say what is on page 19.
• 48:06
  It's like, oh, it's that.
• 48:07
  It's that guy who I spoke to.
• 48:09
  This is interesting.
• 48:10
  And even if you don't read the whole thing, you.
• 48:12
  You're now painfully aware, or not painfully nicely aware that there is coverage going on and they got in this magazine, they must be doing some good things.
• 48:19
  And the post Note approach, old school as it is, is far more trusted than some clever automated funnel that people probably get lost halfway through and comment more why they're in it anyway.
• 48:31
  Yeah.
• 48:32
  And is that it comes Back to the same thing we've said all the way through.
• 48:34
  It's just breaking through, isn't it?
• 48:36
  It's finding a way to stand out, is getting in front of the right people to be a bit different, but not annoying because no one gets posts anymore.
• 48:43
  And we all love posts.
• 48:44
  I love it when someone sends me posts because it means it's not a bill.
• 48:46
  And that's the only other thing that ever seems to come through the post.
• 48:49
  Or spam.
• 48:50
  Just trying to sell me something.
• 48:51
  So, yeah, I think, yeah.
• 48:53
  So many great tips.
• 48:54
  Before I let you go, we have to briefly touc on AI.
• 48:57
  We talked a little bit about it, but actually I think it's an interesting thing when it comes to PR and press.
• 49:02
  One of the things I've heard recently is that the brand mentions are now the new backlinks.
• 49:08
  So whereas before with SEO, we all wanted to get links from other people's websites, actually in a world of AI and AI search, brand mentions are becoming more important.
• 49:17
  And one of the ways we can get brand mentions is through press, PR podcast interviews.
• 49:21
  So how do you think AI search is shifting the importance of press for small businesses owners?
• 49:26
  It's funny because when, when this whole AI nonsense started and people were saying to me, aren't you terrified because, you know, you, you write for a living, it's like, yeah, no, but I, I write in a certain way
• 49:36
  for a living and I can interrupt people's patterns for a living.
• 49:40
  And AI needs to base its content on content, right?
• 49:44
  So I'm feeding AI.
• 49:46
  When I'm writing a piece, I'm not writing it for AI, I'm writing it for the press, knowing full well the AI will pick it up.
• 49:51
  So it's, I still think press first and I still think customer first and client first first.
• 49:55
  But if you can become that trusted source that's explaining every single month, you're explaining something useful.
• 50:01
  There's a guy I met a while ago and you might have covered his stuff, I don't know, called Marcus Sheridan.
• 50:06
  He wrote this great book called they Ask youk Answer.
• 50:09
  It's now called Endless Customers.
• 50:10
  And he built an entire business of installing swimming, swimming pools based on answering the awkward questions people ask and that no one ever writes about.
• 50:19
  Is this right for me?
• 50:20
  And he would put people off saying, no, it's not right for you, because this, how much does this cost?
• 50:24
  He would actually say, say, whilst it depends, you're looking at somewhere between here and here.
• 50:30
  Whereas most people say, I'm not putting my prices on my website.
• 50:33
  So we'll put a guide on your website and be open.
• 50:36
  And if you become this person who's always sharing something useful, how to look natural on camera, what do modern ceremonies reveal, which budgeting mistakes happen repeatedly, that kind of stuff, you keep that going, the AI will find it.
• 50:51
  Then you've got this whole thing of journalists will find it on AI because they're googling and going, I have no idea who to ask about this thing.
• 50:58
  And the AI will find it with the journalists and they kind of.
• 51:01
  There's this whole content morass out there and the only way you're going to become part of that is if you start.
• 51:07
  Join the conversation.
• 51:08
  Yeah.
• 51:08
  So it's a full ecosystem, really, isn't it?
• 51:10
  Everything.
• 51:10
  Is.
• 51:11
  Everything is talking to everything else.
• 51:12
  And actually, there's no harm in writing specific things for your website that are more for the AI than for even the humans sometimes, I think, because we know that the AI is looking for certain kinds of content as
• 51:24
  well, and it will link you with the humans down the line, just not necessarily via the direct route via the AI.
• 51:29
  And I think it'll be interesting to see how this changes over time.
• 51:33
  But at the moment, AI definitely seems to like sources that are trustworthy.
• 51:38
  So a.
• 51:39
  Bit.
• 51:39
  A bit like SEO has always been.
• 51:41
  So if it's the BBC saying it or if it's the time saying it, it's always going to be more powerful than just if Becca Pountney's website says it, but also everyone.
• 51:50
  But then if lots of people are talking about you in lots of different places, that also holds weight.
• 51:55
  Does that make sense?
• 51:56
  Yeah, it does.
• 51:56
  And there's a phrase I've been using quite a lot recently in a world of AI, be more I.
• 52:01
  And by that I mean actually say what you think.
• 52:03
  Don't be vanilla, don't be just, oh, I need to do some piece on this.
• 52:06
  Because that guy said I should write 500 words.
• 52:08
  That'll do.
• 52:10
  It needs to sound, you know, I'm doing it right now.
• 52:12
  This is how I sound all the time.
• 52:13
  This is how I write.
• 52:14
  You're more likely to pay attention to someone who's a bit ranty here and there than someone who goes, let me give you 10 examples of best practices in PR, like textbook snore fest.
• 52:24
  It's the same with all the content journalists want.
• 52:27
  If I'm writing a piece now, as a journalist, I'm thinking, what am I going to write for Halloween about the wedding industry?
• 52:33
  Or let's say I know household security because I've got a client to do that on later.
• 52:37
  They can Google that and find it on AI.
• 52:39
  They can find the article without citing anybody.
• 52:42
  It's all there.
• 52:43
  But they need to put someone's name to it for credibility and to add that human voice.
• 52:47
  So they're always going to try to find someone who goes, I've just found this thing about this, on this trending thing.
• 52:53
  What do you think?
• 52:55
  Not trend exists, ends it's trend exists.
• 52:59
  Here's what expert thinks.
• 53:00
  The expert they'll go to is the person who's been doing other comments about that trend.
• 53:04
  So opinions, opinions, opinions matter.
• 53:06
  Greg, it's been such a pleasure chatting to you.
• 53:08
  You've given us so many good insights.
• 53:10
  I always end my podcast with the same question, so I'm going to pose that to you now.
• 53:14
  And that's what's one one thing you personally wish you'd known sooner in business?
• 53:19
  The power of a silence?
• 53:20
  No, it is.
• 53:23
  You need to spend a consistent amount of time getting and keeping customers.
• 53:29
  So most people get up on a Monday morning and they open their inbox and start based on what's on their inbox.
• 53:34
  They don't start based on what's on their agenda in terms of moving their business forward.
• 53:39
  They get.
• 53:40
  There's my business manager sort guy called Nigel Bottle refers to it as getting stuck in the weeds.
• 53:45
  You're faffing about putting out fires, responding to other people's issues.
• 53:48
  No, you said you were going to find 20 prospects and get in touch with them.
• 53:52
  That's what you're doing first thing every day.
• 53:55
  Then you can go and answer the rest of the emails and do the rest of the stuff.
• 53:58
  If you do that consistently, you'll power your business forward bit by bit by bit versus I've done no marketing for three months.
• 54:07
  I'll do it on four.
• 54:08
  Friday.
• 54:08
  Yeah, super helpful.
• 54:09
  And I think there's a lot of people listening that definitely get stuck in the weeds and can learn a lot from that.
• 54:14
  Greg, there'll be people listening that think, yes, I want to go and do this.
• 54:17
  There'll be other people thinking, I'd love to do this, but I need some help.
• 54:20
  If people want to find out more about you, your services, what you can do to help them, where are the best places for them to go and what's the best place for them to look?
• 54:28
  Oh, I mean the best place to go and pick my brains outside of this, actually, I've got kind of a virtual me which is trained on all the stuff that I written.
• 54:36
  That's called Dr.
• 54:37
  Spin.
• 54:38
  You can find that on my website but I can send you a link and that is.
• 54:41
  It's actually worryingly accurate.
• 54:42
  I had to train it how to answer like me.
• 54:45
  But every piece of content I've ever done on YouTube and blogs and my book is all fed into Dr.
• 54:50
  Spin.
• 54:50
  So if you ask Dr.
• 54:51
  Spin a question it will reply with me.
• 54:53
  So it'd be a good place to start.
• 54:56
  Otherwise you can follow me on, on socials.
• 54:58
  I am on Instagram but I'm more prolific on LinkedIn because I'm being to be or just.
• 55:03
  Yeah, go to my website, subscribe to my.
• 55:05
  My newsletter.
• 55:06
  Fantastic.
• 55:06
  And do you have services for all sides of business?
• 55:09
  Is it just people that need you to do everything for them or have you got a thing which helps people get started?
• 55:14
  Yeah, I've got the.
• 55:15
  The most get started one is I have a service which is an alert service which is I'm.
• 55:20
  You are my guru in such and such and I will only come to you on this topic and that's kind of the entry level.
• 55:27
  It's reactive.
• 55:28
  It's not Greg comes up with cunning plan to take over the world's part of his client's domain.
• 55:33
  But it good way of kind of tipping your toe in the water.
• 55:36
  If you are kind of a bonafide expert in what you do, that's where you best starting.
• 55:40
  And I've got a.
• 55:40
  I've got a test you can do online called the go to guru and you can fill that in and get your little score and I'll send you some links to that so you can share it.
• 55:48
  Love it.
• 55:49
  I will put all of those links in the show notes.
• 55:51
  Greg, it's been a pleasure.
• 55:52
  Thank you for being so open and honest and I will make sure that I put those links for people to find more about you and I'll see you very soon.
• 55:59
  Thank you so much.
• 56:00
  You so much.
• 56:00
  Cheers.
• 56:01
  Loved that episode with Greg.
• 56:03
  He was very open and honest and I hope that it's inspired you to not be afraid of the media but to start thinking differently about how you can actually go out there, reach out, knock on those doors and
• 56:13
  have an opinion and not be scared to do so.
• 56:16
  Yes, you might get people ignore you, but you only need a few of those doors to open for something big to happen.
• 56:20
  If you need accountability on that, we'll do that inside of my members lounge.
• 56:24
  And if you need more professional help from Greg, reach out to him in the show notes.
• 56:28
  I'll see you you all next time.