Simple Trick to be Memorable in a Media Interview

While on his media training travels to South Dakota, Predictive Media Network trainer Russ Rhea stopped to show an example of one of the most effective techniques to be memorable and encourage a reporter to use the quote you want them to use.

 

Russ Rhea:
Hi, I’m Russ Rhea and this time we’re going to be talking about one of the most simple, yet one of the most effective ways that you can get your message across and enhance the chances that a reporter is going to use the quote or soundbite that you want them to use from your interview.
This time we’re coming to you from central South Dakota along the beautiful Missouri River. This is a historic site where the Louis and Clarke expedition passed through in 1804 and in our Predictive Media workshop here in this area with one of our clients, we spent a lot of time talking about the technique of flagging. Now flags are short little phrases that draw attention to what you are about to say. So the reporter is listening attentively before you deliver your important message. Now flags are phrases like, “the bottom line is,” “what’s important here is,” “first and foremost.” They’re simple phrases, but you can be very strategic with this in a media interview.
I came across a great example of this recently. A spokesperson from Uber who travels around to different cities on the West Coast and does media interviews talking about the various things Uber is involved with in those communities, and it really proves up the point how flagging works in media interviews.

TV CLIPS:
So we asked Uber what they expect to get out of these task force talks.
We’re excited for the progress that we’re hoping to see and at the end of the day this is about providing folks one more safe reliable choice to move around town.
At the end of the day, it’s made an impact and people are responding hugely to it and today we’re here showing our things to the people that made that happen.
Yeah, at the end of the day what we’re doing is creating rules of the road for ride sharing and you talk and what’s important is that we’re best serving folks who need safe reliable rides.
We look forward to providing one more option. At the end of the day, this is people’s choice in terms of how they want to get to and from the airport.

Russ Rhea:
You notice there that every time he used the term “at the end of the day,” that’s the soundbite that the reporter or editor picked to use in that story. Now it’s always better to mix up the flagging phrases so you’re not sounding too repetitive, but in that case, he was doing interviews in different cities and that particular audience was the only ones who were going to see it anyway.
Probably the most important flagging phrase is this one, “what’s important is.” That works almost every time because it’s exactly what the reporter is looking for from you. What’s most important for their audience to know? So when you preface your message with “what’s important is,” you’re going to grab their attention. Now that flagging phrase can also serve as a transition when you get a bad on the spot “gotcha” type question where you really don’t want to answer, but you want to transition into one of your proactive messages. “What’s important is” can serve as an excellent transition to get back to the message that you want to get across.
Use flagging to be memorable and to enhance the chances that the reporter is going to use the quote or soundbite that you want. Thanks for watching.