Business : Award Winning International Publicist On How To Use Media To Elevate Yourself To Top Of Any Industry
The following is a transcript of an address by Lamourie Media Founder and Managing Director Tracy Lamourie for a forum reaching an international business audience of 100,000 listeners per day. This segment will air in early 2021 and this story will be updated with the audio link at that time.
Hello listeners! I’m Tracy Lamourie, the founder of Lamourie Media and I am thrilled to be here talking to all of you today! I work internationally with accomplished and high profile leaders across industries, and also with entrepreneurs of all kinds who want to get there. And today I’m here to give you some tips you can benefit from… you’ll hear some of the secrets publicists like myself use to amplify our clients messages, differentiate them from their competitors, and get media - and new clients - to their doors. I’ll give you some tips on what you can do for yourself, what you might need a professional to do for you - and how you can instill in yourself the confidence you need to make it all succeed. If you’ve wondered how others in your field get air time while you watch on TV - THIS is the episode for you. As I often say… LISTEN Up…. you’ll be glad you did...."
So let’s get right into it. We’re going to be talking about letting the world know about you and what you do. But you can’t let the world know how fantastic you are if you just don’t believe it yourself. One thing that’s really indicative of what I mean is this - and It’s happened to me many times. I first noticed it happening a lot with my female clients - this is what you often hear called imposter syndrome - but its not exclusive to women - you find it in men, too. It happens like this - I’ve written up a bio for one of my clients,- Not a word of a lie- not only is everything I wrote in each of these instances verifiably true but the information actually came from my client who presented me a page with a list of links and accomplishments for me to put together. And when I do - I can’ tell you how many off these hugely accomplished people - often women, but not always - have said to me - “ Wow, I was so amazed when I read what you wrote - Thank you! You made me sound so good.” I’ve heard this so many times and I always laugh because I didn’t make anything up. I literally worked from the links and the work details they sent me, nothing else. I didn’t find any other information. I just wrote up their accomplishments. But they don’t think of themselves in the same way they think of other successful people, so when they read their bio written up magazine style, they were amazed - and saw themselves in a different light - as the successes that outsiders see when they look at them. And this is a lesson I want my listeners today to really process : the first step to branding yourself is to build yourself up instead of tearing yourself down - and recognize your own accomplishments and to remember that you do not have to be shy about letting the world know about those accomplishments.
Which brings us to the next part, what to with that. Branding yourself and branding your business. So, we talked about branding your business, understanding yourself as a power player, and presenting the things you’ve done professionally. Whether you’re a business, the sole provider of a service, or the face of a brand, or brand ambassador, if you don’t believe in your own story. Like really believe that you’re just as accomplished and just as skilled or if not more than your peers. If you don’t believe you have worthy ideas the world needs to hear. If you don’t believe that you are truly an awesome expert. If you don’t believe that, why would anyone else believe it? If you don’t believe it why would someone choose you over the competition, why would the media come to you for your expert opinion instead of someone else in your industry? Those two things are key. How are you going to get customers and how are you going to get the media? I’m going to talk about the media because that’s what I do. So, this raises another interesting point: once you believe in yourself and your branding, the most effective way in my opinion to do that is to NOT buy an ad. Of course, you know advertising has its place in business too, but with today’s sophisticated consumer, public relations, which in my view is not spin and not lies but the relations you and your company builds with the public and your potential consumer. The stories that you tell about your company and its values are much more effective in reaching and building a loyal audience or customer base than words that anyone can buy in an ad. Really one way to tell the story is, you probably watch TV a million times and see an expert in whatever field you’re in. I’ll show you an example in a moment.
You might have agreed with them or you might have disagreed with them and wondered “Why is this news person interviewing that guy?” “How did that guy get up there and why not me? They didn’t interview me or interview my friends,” So, most people when they see that will assume that the answer is the local reporter looked far and wide for the best guy in his field, or the best doctor and that who they are on air. Chances are that’s not the case. That’s the credibility the media brings but the true answer is they probably have a publicist who pitched that particular story to the media and that who was quoted in the story.
So, you know that’s just a fact.
The one thing to understand the media and how to get their attention because they have a billion different things to deal with. They’re not experts in anything they don’t really know. They don’t have time to do deep research unless you talk to an investigative reporter. As a business owner, you’re hopefully never in a position to deal with investigative reporters! Trying to keep things ethical so we won’t go there.
But generally, reporters are just taking the information they got when it comes to your average story, checking on the face, and then publishing it.
It can rock and change your entire career with one good media. I once got someone on CFRB 1010 for a 20-minute interview and the audience and host loved her so much they brought her back as a monthly guest. Years later she’s still being asked to be a guest. The first week that happened her phone rang with over a hundred new clients to do a consult with her.
So, I could only imagine how much that one little email to that one reporter, to get her that one interview, how many clients it would bring her. Reaching out to the media can literally rock your career but I wanted to hone in a little bit on the perfect example in the career.
I’ll take real estate as an example. Everybody knows at least 10 real estate agents, right? No matter where you live you can barely leave your house without seeing an ad for a real estate agent. They spent a ton of money on advertising on bus shelters, magazines, everything!
There’s no way to really differentiate themselves one from another. So if a journalist wants a quote frm a real estate agent, which I can tell you happens every single day.
You’d think they’d literally turn around and just grab one, right?
But they don’t! That’s not what they do at all. They do not pick up the phone and dial, they don’t send an email, they don’t call them. mean, what they actually do, they call me because the media isn’t just looking for an agent. They’re not looking for the best agent in the land either. What they’re looking for is somebody who gives good quotes, who understands the media, who’s not going to be afraid of the camera. Someone who has credibility as an expert because they’ve spoken before, which usually if you have a publicist or groundwork that’s been done that’s gotten you some media. It’s because they’re looking for the same thing, someone who can speak authority on the topic, somebody who can slip quickly into the story easily.
This literally happens, I call it the “Opposite of a press release”. It happens with anything you can think of. No matter what you come to me as an expert in, I can get you in media that way.... In the last few months alone just responding to reporers outreaches, I got clients into Reader's Digest, Good Housekeeping, Oprah.com and NBC. These are just without even having a press release . So, that’s what we are dealing with there and that’s a little bit of an insight into some of the avenues a publicist has to help you elevate your brand and your presence in all kinds of impressive ways.
So to recap … These are the most important takeaways :
You have learned to Believe in yourself - really believe in yourself. This sounds easier than it is, there are executives of all kinds that are great at what they do but who don't have the real confidence it takes to speak with authority- something that is essential to build trust in your brand . This will help you build, to attract more customers and to attract things like media attention and speaking engagements that will elevate you ahead of your competitors.
- You have learned a little bit about how to find existing media opportunities you can insert yourself into before you read them in the news and wish you had been included
- You have learned that you need to Learn how to tell your own story, how to get the attention of the editors and producers, how to speak "news" how to avoid being one of the 99 percent of the emails that go straight to the recycle bin without even being considered
- You’ve learned a little bit about the Art of the Pitch - how to interest radio, TV, newspapers editors, podcasters and other media gatekeepers in your story, how to convince them what you have to say truly is editorial not advertorial, how to make them realize your message really IS relevant to their audience
--And you’ve learned not to be afraid of the media, and to have a media strategy - Once you have that interview - what do you do? Remember it’s more than what you know - it’s also important to know how to give good TV or radio, how to make a compelling segment that people will want to listen to and that hosts will want to hear...
And that’s the end of my message for today. This was a lot of fun to do, and I hope you found the information valuable! If you want to learn more about how a publicist looking for media opportunities for you can benefit and elevate your brand, I’m happy to offer a free 20 minute consultation that you can book.
Visit our website at http://www.lamouriemedia.com or find me on instagram or linkedin.
Watch for the episode with this message featured in the new year on the international business podcast The 100 Dollar MBA featured in Forbes, Fast Company, Huffington Post and more with daily audience of 100, 000 listeners.
