By Jerry Brown, APR
Communicating With Impact
Reporters love exclusives. Except when they belong to another reporter.
And reporters HATE having to match a story another reporter's already
written.
Reporters aren't bashful about asking for exclusives. Or complaining when
you give one to someone else.
When -- and whether -- it's okay to give exclusives to reporters is one of
the questions that comes up frequently when I'm doing media training and/or
workshops.
My answer? It depends. Here are the guidelines I use when trying to decide
whether to offer a story as an exclusive:
-- If the story involves "hard" news, the kind of story that's time
sensitive and you know will get widely covered by the media who cover you, I
generally don't like to give exclusives. You want reporters to treat you
fairly. Don't they have a right to expect the same from you? Every
reporter who has to match the story that you gave out as an exclusive will
resent it.
-- If the story is an announcement that's financially material, you may also
run afoul of full disclosure requirements if you play favorites. Give these
stories to everyone at the same time unless you get reliable legal advice
that says you can do otherwise.
-- If you have a "soft" feature story, you'll probably get better play if
you offer it as an exclusive. In fact, that may be the only way you'll get
anyone to do anything with the story. Go for it. Other reporters probably
won't be asked to match this kind of story or have to explain to their
editor(s) why the competition got it first. So, they won't care.
-- If a reporter's been following a story for a long time when no one else
has, I'll often (but not always) give them first shot at a story even if
it's one I'd normally treat as a spot story to be released to everyone at
once.
-- If a reporter's working on a story idea they've developed themselves,
they'll expect you NOT to tell other reporters about it. I always honor
that expectation. The ONLY exception (rare, in my experience) is if the
reporter is someone I KNOW won't treat my client fairly and it's important
that a fair version of the story gets told during the first news cycle.
Those are my guidelines. I know people who play the exclusives game much
more broadly than I do and seem to do it well. But why would you want to be
exclude-ive on a story you know everyone who covers you will write?
Check in with you next week. Some future topics coming from MMMM: Skip the
News Release--Why You Don't Always Need a News Release to Make News; What to
Do When the Reporter Gets the Story Wrong; Remember Your Media Miranda
Rights; the CEO's Role During a Crisis; How to Communicate With Impact;
Changing the Approval Process to a Positive Experience.
(c) 2001 Jerry Brown, 303-781-8787 / impact@rmi.net
Spokesperson Training/Media Consulting/Message Development/Crisis
Communications Get your story heard, understood and remembered