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PR Lessons | |
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Improve your interviews |
New rules of media relations | |
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PR professionals need to interview their corporate spokespeople and customers for articles and newsletters, or for news releases, speeches, briefing papers, and so on. In our view, there is no reason why corporate writing cannot be as good as that of top-notch journalists. Effective interviewing is about asking the right questions, and that means doing your homework, then gently leading your interviewee on a journey to tell a good story. Brilliant interviewing is about getting your interview subject to part with private musings and personal or industry "gold nuggets," and asking pertinent but overlooked questions. This is what all great interviewers strive for. |
Remember the mantra of all media training for executives in the 1980s? "Just get your three Key Messages out. You’ve got a live microphone, a TV camera and an audience. Never mind what the reporter’s question is!" Some PR agencies still stick to this out-dated mantra. The result of these "conversations" on-air is predictable: disjointed and confusing! And offensive to viewers. Frustrated anchors and reporters at all the major Canadian and U.S. networks are pushing back on over media-trained corporate executives. Increasingly, I’m hearing: "That’s fine Mr. X or Ms. Y, but you didn’t answer my question. My question once again is …." |
Read the lesson 
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Read the lesson
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| Six tips
to improve your feature writing |
Transitional words
and phrases for writers |
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As public relations professionals today, we spend a fair bit of our time writing for the web. One of the dangers of this is that we forget the skills of good feature writing. Use it—or lose it! There will always be a need for good feature articles for the simple reason there are subjects that cannot be explained adequately on the average web page. And, oh yes, even in our over-communicated world, people like reading features. O.K., they may print out a 4,000 word article rather than reading it on-screen.
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Writing is the foundation of all public relations. Frequently, the things that separate the Journeymen from the Masters are transitional words and phrases. Good transitions are the easiest way to improve your writing. Why? Because they can be easily learned. We have had this list on our bulletin board for more than 30 years. Good writers know transitional words provide directional clues for the reader, and they show the relationship between sentences in a paragraph, to anticipate the writer’s development of ideas. Transitional words and phrases help the reader get from here … to there … smoothly and logically. |
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Read the lesson
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Read the lesson
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| The art
of the commencement speech |
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| We at First Principles
Communication find that commencement speeches are a wonderful source of
personal stories from the lives of fascinating people, astute
observations about contemporary culture, inspiration, as well as wit and
humour.
And, best of all, each year there is a fresh
crop of commencement speeches to enjoy. Here are some of our favourites.
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Read the lesson
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