A Boy and His Tiger

Posted on by Christina Hamlett

 

sled

It’s hard to believe that the mischievous Calvin and his anthropomorphic pal Hobbes have been gone now for 17 years. On December 31, 1995, the 3,150th and final cartoon strip of Bill Watterson ran in newspapers across the country. Calvin and Hobbes were pictured in their sled atop a hill of freshly fallen snow. “It’s a magical world, ol’ buddy,” Calvin declares. “Let’s go exploring!”

Not only were fans crestfallen but critics a decade later decreed that Watterson’s decision to end the popular series created a void that no one was prepared to step up and fill.

So what possesses someone to walk away from not only a huge fan base but also a steady income? In Watterson’s words, “My interests have shifted and I believe I’ve done what I can do within the constraints of daily deadlines and small panels. I am eager to work at a more thoughtful pace, with fewer artistic compromises.”

The first day of a new year is often a time of reflection and reinvention – a “clean slate” opportunity that is as beckoning (and daunting!) as a fresh blanket of snow. Have you always wanted to start your own business and be your own boss? Type “Chapter One” or “Fade In” on that novel or screenplay that has been swirling around for years in your head? Throw caution to the wind, pack your essentials in a bag and visit those exotic ports of call that have long enticed you?

What’s stopping you?

Maybe it’s all about hopping on your sled, tuning out the naysayers and taking a bold leap of faith.

Back in the 1980’s I was running a touring theater company, The Hamlett Players. (Hey, with a last name like Hamlett, is it that surprising I’d do be doing something theatrical?)  I was writing all of the scripts, auditioning and training all of the actors, generating all of the publicity, booking all of the productions, and doing rehearsals four days a week and running shows the remaining three. It was grand fun but one day I woke up and asked myself if it was really something I wanted to be doing forever.

As much as I loved acting, writing and producing, only one of these fields – writing – represented not only the longest shelf-life but also the most portable skill set that wouldn’t tie me to a permanent address. When I announced my decision to my board of directors, my actors and the audiences we had served, the reaction was one of astonishment…and anger. How could I just walk away from something that had my own name on it and that I had built from the ground up? What was everybody supposed to do if I wasn’t there to put words in their mouths? 

Despite my offer to support anyone who chose to take over the operation, there were no takers. One of my assistants even went so far as to say that my decision to focus on writing full-time was a selfish one and that there were no guarantees I’d even be successful. The year I made that decision – 1986 – I had four published plays and five magazine articles. In the decades that passed, those numbers now reflect 150 plays, 30 books, 5 optioned feature films and thousands of articles and interviews that appear in trade publications throughout the world.

Yes, it was a bold leap of faith. It was also a leap of faith that landed me exactly where I wanted to be.

I guess the message is that when you want something badly and believe in it enough, it’s all because, once upon a time, the universe put that thought into your head and said, “What are you waiting for?  Yep, it’s a steep hill. Maybe it’s even treacherous. But you won’t find out unless you go for it.” 

For as many times as the fearless Calvin and Hobbes plunged headfirst down that snowy incline and paid for the experience with tumbles, bumps and bruises, one likes to think that their final, optimistic ride on December 31, 1995 delivered them to exhilarating new vistas they might never have imagined.

A blanket of snow – just like a blank piece of paper – is only awaiting a free and unflappable spirit to jump in, leave a mark and make a difference.

Here’s the lineup of this month’s blogs by my guest contributors:

What Color Is the Cow? – by Mindy Littman Holland

Creating a Social Buzz for the Movies – by Janette Speyer

Top 10 Reasons to be Thankful for Social Media (Part One) – by Brandy Wheeler

 

Coming Clean With Clarity

Posted on by Christina Hamlett

soap

As a media person, one of my favorite scenes in The Muppets Take Manhattan (1984) is when the amnesiac Kermit accidentally wanders into Mad Avenue Advertising, a frog-centric firm that has been trying to come up with a glam campaign and a catchy slogan to sell a product called Ocean Breeze Soap.

Introducing himself as “Phil,” Kermit listens to the lame ideas pitched by Bill, Gil and Jill but candidly rejects each of them before offering one of his own. “Why don’t you just say ‘Ocean Breeze Soap will get you clean’?” he suggests. By the reactions of awe and amazement from his fellow amphibians, it’s clear that the concept of just stating the obvious has never occurred to them. Now hopping with the excitement that their jobs in the ad game are no longer on the line, they welcome this visionary newcomer to the agency and all go off to a power lunch to celebrate.

I’m reminded of this scene every time I do feature interviews with people who are trying to promote their latest books, pitch their new products or encourage more customer traffic to their businesses. What I’ve often observed is a collective mindset that media opportunities are an excuse to engage in ambiguity, euphemisms, manipulative tactics to deflect criticism, and sometimes even a distortion of facts to put oneself in a more favorable light. Whether these approaches are intentional or just reflect a lack of understanding that “clever” isn’t synonymous with “clarity,” the result is the same: a thinning of trust that subsequently makes every claim seem suspect.

Consider your reaction, for instance, if every time you asked a salesperson about how an appliance worked, you received the answer, “Oh, that’s all covered in the owner’s manual.”  Yes, I’m sure it is, but why is this person in such a hustling hurry to make the sale that s/he can’t take the time to give me a straightforward answer about whether the appliance is easy to operate? The same goes for people who mysteriously shroud their replies in such heavy cloaks of industry jargon and doublespeak that customers feel too intimidated to confess they really don’t have a clue what was just said.

Authors, perhaps, are the worst offenders in this arena. I recently had occasion to do a feature interview with a writer about her book on Hollywood deal-making. As impressive as her credentials and experiences were, she answered almost every question with the curt reply, “It’s all in my book.” Instead of using this media moment as a chance to entice prospective readers – and potentially win trust – with selected tidbits and anecdotes to showcase her personality, she focused exclusively on pushing for the sale without providing any substance which might have justified that purchase.

Takeaway lesson: At the end of the day, simply tell us what we want to know in a way that allows us to make an informed choice.

Here’s the lineup of this month’s blogs by my guest contributors:

The Evolution of Crowd Funding – by Dr. Letitia Wright

How to Bring Your Brand To Life Through Video – by Tristan Pelligrino

The Myth About Being “Liked” (on Facebook) – by Penny C. Sansevieri

 Happy Holidays from everyone at Media Magnetism!

(And may 2013 bring lots of opportunities to shine in the spotlight)

Santa Watch

The Calm Before The Storm

Posted on by Christina Hamlett

“The next time you make travel plans,” a colleague told me, “you need to post your schedule on The Weather Channel so everyone can brace for disaster.”

Although she said this facetiously, there’s a certain déjà vu element in the fact that two of our getaways in the past 14 months have been cut short by a pair of hurricanes – Irene last August and Sandy just this past week. On both occasions, it seemed unfathomable that our best laid plans for R&R would get derailed by Mother Nature, especially in light of cloudless blue skies when we first arrived.

Had we not been judiciously watching the news throughout our cross-country flight to New York last summer, we’d have been none the wiser that Mother Nature was planning to wreak major havoc.  “I think when we get to the airport,” my husband suggested, “we should see about making a return flight for tomorrow evening.”

“Do you really think it’s going to be that bad?” I replied. Although we’d been following Bloomberg’s dire predictions about the MTA being shut down, bridges and tunnels being closed, Broadway cancelling shows, Con-Edison turning off power, and apartment residents being advised to move to higher floors, it all had a surrealistic feel to it.

There was a 6:30 p.m. flight available on Saturday. “We can pretend we’re rock stars just jetting in for a day of fun,” Mark said. As skeptical as I was – coupled with the fact that there are worse places than The London to be hunkered down during a storm – his intuition is something I’ve always trusted.

We went off to a wonderful dinner at Il Gattopardo, returning just in time to catch a newscast that both JFK and LaGuardia would start moving all their planes off the tarmac the next morning due to a flood watch. “Uh, sweetheart,” I said, “how are we supposed to leave at 6:30 if the airport is closing at noon?”

For the next three hours, my beloved was on the phone with the airline trying to book us on a flight to virtually anywhere on the west coast, just to escape the impending mayhem. As it turned out, we ended up on one of the last planes allowed to leave. Though there was still nary a raindrop in sight, ignoring our instincts would have grounded us for much longer than the original stretch of vacation we had planned.

Is it any wonder, then, that we experienced a “been there/done that” scenario as Hurricane Sandy swirled her wicked way up the coast? In every shop and restaurant in Alexandria, owners were laying in a supply of sandbags and making preparations to move merchandise upstairs. “What is it about us that attracts calamity?” I asked my husband, but he was already on the phone switching our Monday afternoon reservations to a crack-of-dawn flight on Sunday morning. As with New York, we would likely still be on the Eastern seaboard if he hadn’t acted quickly…and before the online booking system crashed.

If there’s a takeaway value to these misadventures insofar as your company’s marketing and public relations components, it’s that there’s no such thing as being “too prepared” for emergencies. How often have you said, “Oh, the odds of that happening are really remote” or “It won’t take us that long to grab what we need” or “Those things always happen to someone else”?

The reality is that it’s better to heed warnings, trust instincts and prepare for the worst rather than do nothing, hope for the best, and then be caught off-guard without any of the resources and contingency plans you need to weather the storm…as well as recover from its brutal aftermath.

My colleagues and I send our thoughts and prayers to all of our readers and their families on the East coast during this unsettling and cataclysmic tragedy. May your lives – and livelihoods – return to normal as soon as possible.

******

Here’s the lineup of this month’s blogs by my guest contributors:

It’s Not How You Look. It’s How You See – by Lori Bumgarner

How to Recruit Volunteers – A Volunteer’s Perspective – by Amandah Tayler Blackwell

A Smorgasbord of Affordable PR – by Melody Friberg

Webinars: Both a Marketing and Sales Solution –  by Leanne Hoagland-Smith

The Things That Come Back to Haunt You

Posted on by Christina Hamlett

If you’re a parent, you’re probably familiar with the following conversation, a scene that takes place at the breakfast table on a weekday morning

CHILD: My class is having a Halloween party.

MOM: That sounds like fun.

CHILD: We all have to wear costumes. Can you make me one?

MOM: Sure, honey. What do you want to be?

CHILD: (with a shrug) I dunno. Maybe a dinosaur. Or Spiderman. Or a pirate.

MOM: Okay. So when do you need this?

CHILD: Today.

On the one hand, maybe your child thinks you have super-powers to just whip these creations up in a nanosecond. On the other hand, forgetfulness on his part doesn’t constitute emergency on your part and maybe this is an opportunity to impart a lesson. In either case, you’re still the one who comes off looking badly to your child, his peers, and his teachers if your first reaction after panic is to mumble an apology and then do absolutely nothing.

It’s the resourceful mom who takes a pair of scissors to an old shirt and pants, pats flour on his face and arms, rims his eyes with dark eye shadow, musses his hair and sends him off as a zombie. Crisis averted. And maybe he even comes home with a prize, no one the wiser that the whole ensemble was improvised in 20 minutes with items already on hand.

So what does this have to do with the media biz?

If you’re the owner of any type of business – including those in which you promote your talents as a writer, artist, musician – it’s only a matter of time that you’ll get a last-minute call from a journalist asking if you’re available for an interview. This usually occurs when a scheduled story falls through the cracks and there’s suddenly an opening that has to be filled. Under these circumstances, the worst thing you can say is, “Uh, can you call me the end of next week so I can throw something together?”

Trust me, you will not get called back. Why? Because there are enough other people with the wits to have anticipated this moment and assembled whatever a journalist needs to move the story forward – a press kit, plucky quotes, photos, a professional website. Not only does such preparation save them the stress of a zero-hour scramble but also averts the scary tragedy of a flaky reputation in the very circles they can’t afford to ignore.

*****

Here’s the lineup of this month’s blogs by my guest contributors:

How to Make Your Advertising Appetizing – by Brandy Wheeler

Your Business Elevator Pitch – by Noelle Sterne

Your Brand as an Adjective: How to Define Your Brand with Design – by Pete Kelly

Choosing a Professional Photographer – by Devin Ford

 

Try to Remember

Posted on by Christina Hamlett

According to the calendar, it will be Autumn in just a few weeks. The view of blue skies and palm trees outside my office window, however, is evidence that Summer clearly has no intention of leaving gracefully. Still, my longstanding fondness for September goes back to the early 1970’s. I had just started out in theater and was hopelessly crushing on J.H., one of my fellow actors (“hopelessly,” I should point out, having much to do with his own crush on a dancer named Charles).

Of all the productions he directed, the one I most poignantly recall – The Fantasticks – embodies themes that I realized only recently have a correlation to modern media practices.

Specifically:

  •  “Try to Remember,” the show’s most popular melody, speaks to the nostalgia of what our memories often label as a blissfully uncluttered past. Yes, we’ve adopted all manner of complicated technology to make our lives – and our communications – spin at the speed of light but when did you last write an old-fashioned letter or make time for a face-to-face conversation?
  • “Never Say No” is a whimsical truism that it’s not just children who are drawn like moths to whatever flame they’ve been warned is bad for them. In order to create a call to action, an effective sales pitch often translates to the customer thinking it was actually his or her own idea.
  • Lastly, take away the golden moonbeam and the tinsel sky – the glitzy trappings of a campaign that promises more than it can deliver – and “This Plum Is Too Ripe” becomes the signature song of buyer’s remorse. Anything can look enticing when it’s masked in shadow but can it stand up to the scrutiny of bright lights?

If you want to attract a following as enviable as what currently reigns as the world’s longest-running musical, you don’t need a lot of song and dance, just a message that is simple…and unapologetically authentic.

*****

Here’s the lineup of this month’s blogs by my guest contributors:

How to Tweet With a Purpose – by Jeremiah Sullivan

The New KISS is Keeping It Real, Pure – by John and Katie Stellar

Twenty-Four Things To Do in the Dark – by Shannon Mouton

Being an Author Goes Far Beyond Just Selling Books – by Anthony Kirlew

I’ve also added a new page this month called “Meet the Experts” in which you can acquaint yourself with the men and women who contributed such fabulous chapter content to the book.

As always, we look forward to your comments, questions, and suggestions on media topics you’d like to know more about.

Tell Me More, Tell Me More

Posted on by Christina Hamlett

Grease is the word as we roll into August, courtesy of a friend with whom I was reminiscing about the years I spent on stage. Within a few minutes of our hanging up, I discovered she had sent me a YouTube link of John Travolta and Olivia Newton John singing “Summer Nights.” She wickedly did this, I think, because she knows I have a penchant for getting show tunes stuck in my head and not being able to dislodge them for days or weeks at a time.

Unwittingly, she also supplied me with a PR-themed observation about this catchy duet that I hadn’t realized before; specifically, how two people can experience exactly the same event and yet spin it into whatever context best fits their respective listeners. As business owners, this is something you’re likely to do on a regular basis.

If there’s a crisis in the works, for instance, the way you frame the situation to your family and friends is quite a bit different from what you tell your employees, your customers, your board of directors…and members of the media. The challenge, of course, is keeping the various versions straight, especially if there’s any chance of these people ever getting together and comparing notes.

Here’s the lineup of this month’s blogs by my guest contributors:

Crisis Management – Who Needs it Anyway? (Part 2) – by Andrea Obston 

The Joy of Making A Difference – by MJ Pedone

Avoid Looking like a Stalker on Social Media with a Professional Profile Picture – by Amandah Tayler Blackwell

Mum’s Not the Word! – by Andrea Stradling

We look forward to your comments, questions, and suggestions on media topics you’d like to know more about. (And as long as “Summer Nights” is still stuck in my head, it may as well be stuck in yours, too: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aXlnMveRt-Y)

(Not) As Easy as Pie

Posted on by Christina Hamlett

A former friend once remarked in reference to the books and stage plays I had written, “It can’t be all that hard since you’ve done so many of them.” Although I can say that the journey has grown somewhat easier with practice, my publishing projects still don’t write themselves while I’m sleeping nor do I just casually toss out bunches of words to see which ones stick. Writing – like media relations – is an exercise that involves careful thought, focus and a deep understanding of what, exactly, you want your message to accomplish. Our blogs this month are all about random acts of stupidity – the “thrown-together” potluck that looks messy, the speaker that talks without first engaging his/her brain, and the call for immediate damage control when the integrity of your company has been compromised. For your enjoyment:

“PR 101 – Fabulous Impression!” – by Wendy Anderson

 “What Were You Thinking?” – by Lori Bumgarner

 “Crisis Management – Who Needs It Anyway?” (Part I) – by Andrea Obston

We look forward to your comments, questions, and suggestions on media topics you’d like to know more about.

The Summer Game Plan

Posted on by Christina Hamlett

“Summer” is often synonymous with “vacation” but when you’re the one solely responsible for promoting your company’s image, products and services, there’s usually no such thing as “time off.” This month’s guest blogs are here to ignite your imagination and reframe your strategies for success:

Catching Flies With Honey – Lori Bumgarner

An Out-of-Date Bio & URL Can Lead to Disaster – Amandah Tayler Blackwell

Always Be Authentic In Your Marketing: Forget the Bait & Switch of Years Gone By – Leanne Hoagland-Smith

The Urban Legends of Social Marketing – Shannon Mouton

We look forward to your comments, questions, and suggestions on media topics you’d like to know more about.

Welcome!

Posted on by Christina Hamlett

 

 

 

 

If you’re a business owner, author, artist, entrepreneur or nonprofit organization, learning to attract the favorable publicity you want and deserve in a competitive marketplace is no easy task.

In a perfect world, we could simply hang out a shiny shingle, invent a fun product or write a page-turning novel and our target buyers would be falling all over themselves just to be the first in line. In an imperfect, noisy and chaotic world such as this one, however, the quest for consumers’ attention moves at such a feverish pace that s/he who hesitates to compete will quickly get lost in the shuffle.

While there are certainly merits to word-of-mouth PR in starting a buzz and sustaining the early momentum of a new enterprise, it should by no means be your only publicity platform. Nor should you limit your definition of “media” to TV, radio and print and be daunted by the high advertising costs typically associated with them. In reality, today’s media not only covers a much broader spectrum of opportunity but also brings it within affordable reach of anyone seeking to maximize their industry presence on a minimalist budget.

This site is your invitation to discover that an effective media campaign is both an art and a science. This site is also a companion resource to my upcoming release, “Media Magnetism,” a book that features the “been there/done that” tips of over 20 industry experts and succinctly covers all aspects of modern media relations. The goal: To make your spin in the spotlight the best it can possibly be.