What Gets Through
DEALING WITH PR PEOPLE SOME GOOD SOME BAD
Recently I dealt with PR people in two memorable instances.
One situation was terrific.
The other, awful although they did do one very good thing.
Here’s what happened.
I was assigned to cover a breakthrough study at OHSU’s Primate Center in Beaverton. They found that giving baby monkeys a dose of powerful antibodies cloned from humans who had a strong immune system response to HIV—a day after they were infected---killed the virus.
Not held it in check, as drugs do with humans. Killed it. Wiped it out. Gone.
By the way, yes, I do hear some of you protesting the testing of anything on animals but let’s save that for another day.
As I was writing up my story for the 4pm, 5pm and 6pm news I got confused and had a question, as I recall, about where the antibodies came from.
I called the PR contact but got voice mail.
I called a second number and talked with someone who told me the PR person was not available. With the clock ticking towards 4p, I shared my question and stressed that I needed to talk with the PR person ASAP! Again I was told, she’s simply not available but we can pass on the message you are trying to reach her.
Steam was coming out of my ears.
This will be a perfect example for my blog! I fumed.
Or not.
A few minutes later the Director of the Primate Center called and patiently answered my question.
I wasn’t really looking for the Director. I figured she was busy trying cure aids.
But the quick response from the very top told me the organization understood media relations and made it a priority.
Yes, yes they may have learned that after years of being under attack by the animal rights folks but again—another day for that okay? This day they moved quickly and helped me inform the public in a clear and accurate way.
Please, my PR friends remember this. When you have done a story with a reporter earlier in the day and it is going to air or appear in print or online five or six hours later, keep your phone handy!! You wouldn’t believe all the things that can go wrong in a reporter’s head on deadline. You are the lifeline to keeping things straight.
Now for the not so great example.
It happened in Southern Oregon.
The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service decided to do a media show and tell after the armed occupation of the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge. When the occupation was over, law enforcement took control of the place for weeks. Now they were done and Fish and Wildlife wanted the public to see that the refuge is safe and open again.
Just one problem. The Service would not start “tours” until 2pm.
That’s awful timing for TV folks like me who have a 4pm show and try to be done shooting video and interviews by 2pm.
I shared my concerns with one of the PR folks and he said, sorry that’s the best we can do.
We almost cancelled the trip because of the timing.
In the end we decided to go and I’m glad we did but it could have been so much more.
The tour was not really a tour. We wanted to see inside the buildings and the groups where the occupiers were holed up. No, you cannot go there, I was told.
I spent two weeks covering the occupation. I told the Fish and Wildlife folks, only half joking, that I had more access when the armed occupation was underway.
We did get to meet a couple employees who were moved out of town when the siege began and they were wonderful. They helped humanize the story. And the Director of the agency was there too and surprisingly good. Often agency leaders are not great. They generally tell us how proud they are of their workers and not much else.
But Dan Ashe is no ordinary bureaucrat. He knows the Refuge system inside and out, is passionate about it and not afraid to speak his mind. He was one of the things that went very right on this trip.
The other very smart move was creating poster boards with pictures that showed some of the mess left by the occupiers. The Service also sent links with the pictures to news agencies but we were in the middle of nowhere, I worried whether we’d have a strong internet signal and we were so slammed for time I did not want to fool with trying to download them. It worked really well to have something right there to shoot.
But because the tour started so late, we were not able to settle in and get majestic shots of the refuge and the wonderful choir of the birds filling the area with song.
If we’d started at 9am the story would have been a hundred times better because of all the elements we could include.
Instead, I did nothing in the 4pm show, a 45-second report at 5pm and a minute fifteen seconds at six pm.
That’s not much time, not much coverage. With an earlier start the story would have been a thousand times better and much longer.
