HarveyLeach Media Training

How to make media contacts

March 14, 2012 By Graham Leach Leave a Comment

One of the first ways to establish contact with the media is, of course, the press release about a news story for which you’d like some publicity. Many press releases are appallingly written, with the real news buried in paragraph 19, preceded by a lot of organisational mumbo-jumbo. Write a sharp, snappy press release, therefore, [...]

Filed Under: Media relations, Public relations

Ricky Gervais to play Sepp Blatter in “FIFA – the Movie”?

November 17, 2011 By Graham Leach Leave a Comment

England and Manchester United defender Rio Ferdinand has joined others in calling for FIFA president Sepp Blatter to resign following his remarks on racism. In two TV interviews Blatter said that racist incidents between footballers could be settled with a handshake at the end of the match. The head of the players’ union Gordon Taylor, [...]

Filed Under: Crisis management, Media relations, Public relations Tagged With: fifa, Sepp Blatter

Make a move on the media: How to court journalists

November 3, 2011 By Ann Bird Leave a Comment

As journalists on national newspapers, as well as at the BBC, ITN and Sky News, the tutors at HarveyLeach have been “courted” by press officers and PR agencies for years. Whether those public relations people wanted us to feature their product or interview their client on a major topic, they have faced a huge challenge: [...]

Filed Under: Media relations, Public relations Tagged With: media relations, writing headlines

The right way to produce video content

June 13, 2011 By Graham Leach Leave a Comment

A story in the FT about Nissan using video instead of traditional press releases. They are on the right lines with this venture. Video content is slowly overtaking written PR – but will be effective only if it’s done well. That’s why Nissan, while retaining editorial control over the finished package, did not try to [...]

Filed Under: Communicating messages, Public relations, Video Tagged With: media training, nissan, public relations, video content

Don’t have your say on FIFA

June 10, 2011 By Graham Leach Leave a Comment

It’s hard to top Sepp Blatter’s now-infamous news conference as evidence that FIFA and its communications people seem to be living on another planet. Whoever let Blatter loose to unleash his invective on the world’s media clearly won’t be winning Press Officer of the Year Award – unless its handed out by FIFA itself of [...]

Filed Under: Communicating messages, Public relations Tagged With: blatter, fifa, media training, twitter

Stitch up? No, just a masterclass in how to buttonhole an interviewee

February 4, 2011 By Ann Bird Leave a Comment

The boss of a top fashion PR agency must surely have given himself a real dressing down after falling into one of the most common media interview traps. On Wednesday’s BBC2 documentary “Who Gets The Best Jobs?” presenter Richard Bilton investigated whether class restricts access to professions and well-paid careers. Can only the children of [...]

Filed Under: Communicating messages, Public relations, TV interviews

What seems to be the hardest word?

January 10, 2011 By Andrew Harvey Leave a Comment

It would make a very tough but effective crisis scenario. You are fined £8m for misreporting figures on safety maintenance work you are contracted to carry out. How would you respond to the media? Unfortunately this is no make-believe scenario. It happened to National Grid last week. It is interesting to study the response of [...]

Filed Under: Communicating messages, Public relations

The hidden story

January 6, 2011 By Andrew Harvey Leave a Comment

2011 will be a year of uncertainty, that’s for sure. But one thing can be predicted with absolute confidence. Organisations, large and small, will consistently miss opportunities for valuable publicity, simply because they fail to recognise the newsworthiness of what they are doing or achieving. It is not easy. Those managing a company, for example, [...]