By Wes Pedersen
Besotted by blogs and visions of more technical venues for your PR output? Well, why not? PR visionaries are figuring out new uses for them all the time, so surely you can make them work for your shop.
But don’t forget the opportunities that print offers via op-eds and letters to the editor. They still offer you unparalleled cost-free opportunities for significant distribution of payload messages for your clients.
Is that a guarantee? Of course not. Often your offerings will produce little or no feedback. The op-ed you buffed for days may make it into print but lie there and die on a weekend when a new political, economic, or, say, health issue has captured readers’ attention.
Sure, it’s a crapshoot. But isn’t everything a public relations professional does an “if”?
The wonderful thing about op-ed pieces and letters, of course, is that all you will have to expend is time and effort. And given some experience, you’ll find over that you will develop a sixth-sense about the type of topic that’s likely to appeal to specific editors.
General-circulation papers and magazines welcome a sweeping range of contributions, whereas publications targeted at specific audiences, interests and professions are more tunnel-visioned. Your job is to pick the publication that is most likely to be to be read by your target audiences.
Are the people you are trying to reach markedly erudite? Teetering on the economic ledge or not, the New York Times is an outstanding newspaper to try with a think-piece, particularly one with a political or economic bent. Even though it’s liberally liberal and, with Barack Obama’s election, now more Democratic than ever, it draws readers of all political faiths. It’s really a “national” paper, giving extensive coverage to an amazing variety of subjects beyond politics.
The Wall Street Journal, Murdoch-ized over the past year, is liberal with space, but still trying to find its way between conservatism and whatever else is out there from the middle to the right. Read Peggy Noonan’s columns for a guide to the proper political posture of the week.
USA Today, which thinks of itself as the real national paper, is considerably more free-wheeling than most of the other well-reputed papers. Thus, it’s eager to consider contributions on all manner of issues. Ditto magazines such as Time and Newsweek, though both have, in recent months, demonstrated a marked affinity for Obama if not his party. US News & World Report professes to be hungry for reader comment. The Financial Times oozes prestige, but it’s Brit-touchy and it’s tolerance for criticism of its articles and editorials is slim.
If your letter or op-ed article is targeted to a hometown issue, you stand a pretty fair chance of making it into print.
Many times you’ll be able to make a speech do double duty, converting it into an op-ed.
A lot of editors like the notion of carrying a text that’s been delivered at an important conference. And, of course, Vital Speeches of the Day is always interested in speech texts.
Naturally, you’ll have to follow the “rules.” With letters to an editor, you’ll be expected to keep them short and very much to the point. If you can focus on one particular element, and perhaps inject a touch of levity, you’ve got a leg up on the writer who thinks he is going to score with a flock of details that will set the record straight. A finely crafted one-to-three-paragraph letter held to 100 or 200 words is welcomed by many editors, because it will fit better – literally – on the page that day.
Op-ed pieces are different. You can often go fairly long if your topic is genuinely interesting, and if it is well written and devoid of spleen. Ranters need not apply.
You will find that you can cover a great deal of op-ed ground in 500 words, and, with a bit of effort, you can tighten your message far more, and improve it as well. But if you’re convinced that you need more space to get your points across, go ahead – take a shot. If your piece is really meaty and well constructed, an editor may grant you a little extra leeway. Most likely, though, he or she will get back to you with a request that you make cuts. Or the editor may simply have a whack at your piece, trimming whatever he considers fat.
Whether you try a letter to the editor, or an op-ed piece, be prepared to have your uncuttable, untouchable prose worked over. Sometimes the editor will advise you of the changes, and possibly even ask you to review the alterations.
Unless changes have done significant damage to your offering, you won’t want to call and denounce the publication and its hirelings as insensitive, ham-handed hacks. The odds are that the clumsy oafs have actually improved your masterpiece. The typical editor will assume that he or she has done you a favor just by giving you free space. Don’t cut yourself off from future placement possibilities by berating anyone. Swallow the bile and pen a nice thanks-for-publishing-my-words note.
Oh, yes. If days go by and you haven’t heard from the publication you’ve targeted, resist the urge to call and ask why it hasn’t been printed or when it will be. There are two explanations: (1) The editor thought it too similar to work by other contributors, or just plain didn’t like it, or (2), it’s been scheduled for publication in another week or two. Editors do like to plan ahead.
Now, what do you do if your think-piece is published? Hope that everybody reads it, of course. But just to be sure, help things along by having reprints run off. Distribute them to everyone you want to read your message. Having your copy published by a reputable publication, or used on a Webzine of note, gives that extra cachet of message legitimacy to your statement.
If you’ve done the piece for your boss, for use under his or her byline, be sure that that lady or gentleman is the first to know it’s in print. And don’t boast to too many people that you were the actual author.
“Ghosts” shouldn’t have egos.
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Wes Pedersen is a retired Foreign Service Officer and principal at Wes Pedersen Communications and Public Relations Washington, D.C. |