|
Public Affairs Officer -
Developing Media Relations
Local Media
As a squadron PAO, your local media is invaluable to you.
Make a date and meet the editor of each of your local papers, especially
the weeklies. Find out what each editor wants, what focus they like, how
they want you to give them the information ... then send it in as asked
for.
Dailies are time-conscious. Occasionally, a daily will
take an article covering a two day old event, or even older, but that is
a rarity. Generally, if it's over a day old, your chances of getting an
article published in a daily are extremely slim.
Weeklies are more flexible, and will publish an article
covering a 4- or 5-day-old event. They might even have a "focus" section
where they can take a "backgrounder" describing what your squadron does.
In all cases, when you have a big event coming up, you'll
be better off if you contact the editors and let them know about it, so
they have the chance to send a reporter.
All of the above is also applicable to TV stations,
except that usually they'll only carry what they shoot themselves. Stock
film won't make it to the air unless you've captured a disaster than no
one else has. Should you be this lucky, your footage is likely to make
it to national distribution.
Byline
Often, the newspapers will steal your byline and pretend
that they wrote the piece themselves. Occasionally, they might give you
a token credit reading, "Parts of this article were provided by XXX,"
where XXX is your name and rank. Never mind that, you got published. So
keep feeding that editor. If you get well-known enough, eventually
they'll keep your byline -- or not; many editors have big egos.
Do not be upset by the above, nor "punish" the editor by
not submitting other stories. Remember that our mission is to get the
CAP story out, by hook or by crook. If the paper steals your byline, and
the Group III PAO knows that you submitted the story because you passed
the story through Group III for editing first, you'll get the credit in
CAP's books.
Heads Up
When you have a good working relationship with an editor,
and you have a nice event coming up, give that editor a heads up and
offer the story before it's happened. Newspaper editors like to plan
their issues, too -- a luxury they seldom enjoy.
|
