Those Who Hesitate Are Lost

Our media has Attention Deficit Disorder. Like the rest of America, it remembers only the last thing out of Anderson Cooper’s mouth—and because of this disorder, everything else is a giant yawn.



The point is this: When something comes along in the media that relates to what you do or what you’re about as a company, don’t sit around. Pounce on it, because if you haven’t made the story your story within a few hours, producers will simply hang up mid-sentence when you try to get their attention.

Today’s TV, radio, and print news is already 24/7. When combined with the Berrys and iPhones of the world, as well as what we humble bloggers produce, one can easily see why so much “news” is forgotten – there is simply too much to digest and process!

In an average day, thousands of stories that pose as news pass our eyes, but we remember only a couple because someone gave them life past the first headline. The media is a machine that you must crank up to the highest level!

Because there are so many different types of media competing for the public’s attention, it is your duty to grab the one news story that relates to you or your product right out of the memory hole, put your mark on it, and catapult it to the rest of the world—today!

If your local paper reports something about your industry or about the need, say, for a product just like yours, clip the original, add a quick annotation about your company and products, plus your basic expertise, and send it to the nation’s wires, reporters, editors, and columnists before the clock strikes noon.

Take advantage, too, of the fact that different media fuel each other. For example, a story in today's paper was likely born from a missive online, be it an e-mail report or a wire-service tip fed to AM news shows. TV broadcasters will scour the morning papers and overnight online reporting to see what they’re going to report on. Then, TV headlines translate into drive-time radio babble, the morning shows beget the noon news, and so on. The never-ending news cycle!

Therefore, if you see something in the morning that you can make an opportunistic yet crucial comment about, pitch yourself as the expert to every TV station around. Without an expert to add knowledge or insight on a topic, TV producers will pretty much skip on to the next story. Making yourself available (quickly!) will give the story—and you—a new and hopefully energizing life with the media.

Yes, the window is indeed small, but if you see the opportunity and seize it, coverage will come your way.

Coverage is the thing we crave.

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