How to survive the national crisis news cycle

In a national crisis like the current one, with breaking news or rumors dominating traditional and social media seemingly every few minutes, PR professionals and their clients must tread very carefully and rethink their media pitching plans for the immediate future.

The tragedy is less than 48 hours old and there are still patients in critical condition in the Boston hospitals. In addition, a media frenzy is jumping on every tiny detail and rumor as it appears and spinning the cycle around it, for hours.

So what’s the best way to make it through this news event?

1. Adjust your media release and social media schedules.
Several brands and SM practitioners were publicly slammed in the first few hours of the Boston Marathon crisis because they didn't stop posting their regular news or marketing pitches to Twitter and other sites while the events were unfolding. Although the immediate crisis is over, the after-effects and the investigation are ongoing. Carefully examine your schedule to see which posts could be in considered inappropriate or tone-deaf, and suspend or amend them until things return to close to normal.

2. Get out of the way.
Unless your client offers a product, service, knowledge, or insight that is TRULY relevant and helpful, delay pitching for at least a few days. Even if they are not covering the breaking news, the media’s time and attention is largely tied up right now. Beat reporters in your specific field may be responsive to your pitch, but may not be able to carve out the time or space for coverage until crisis coverage calms down somewhat. 

3. Offer to help—that’s all.
If you think you have a pitch that can add to the conversation in a meaningful way, approach the media from that perspective. (Offering an expert with fresh insight into the situation or tying it to local preparedness or relief efforts would be some examples.) Make a simple, straightforward offer and then let them decide if they can use your client. You don’t want to seem as if you are trying to capitalize on a national crisis for your client’s benefit. Become a resource, not an annoyance.

4. Be patient.
Whether it takes days, weeks, or years to resolve, it won’t be long before the public and the media will tire of all-crisis stories all the time. Be ready to step in with pitches that offer a distraction and return to normal life we will all be craving. Although it might be frustrating to see the news cycle come to a screeching halt right when you had the perfect pitch ready to go, it spins quickly, so it won’t be long until you’ll get your crack at it again. In the meantime, be grateful you weren’t in the middle of a major launch on Monday afternoon.

When Should You Send Your Press Release?

These days, email and posting online ensure your press release is delivered almost instantaneously—although, unless it's super-important breaking news, there’s no guarantee the recipient will open and read it at that moment. This means the day and time you send releases have become much more important than when we used to send them out by snail mail. (Yes, I’m old enough to remember folding, stuffing, and mailing press releases. Youngsters, you don’t know how good you have things.)

There are several factors to consider when deciding on when to hit Send on that release. If you’re announcing a future event, your release needs to go out far enough in advance that the media can take action, either by advancing the event or making plans to attend it. This also depends on the type of event, of course, and the type of media outlet you’re sending to. Just as in the old days, monthly magazines or weekly newspapers need longer lead times than daily papers or websites. This is P.R. 101 and I’m going to assume you’ve got that already figured out.

That being said, within your send window, which day of the week or time of day is best to ensure the most recipients will actually open your email and read it? A recent study from Shift Communications and MarketWire showed that (for agencies using their service, which are probably pretty representative) the highest number of releases were sent on Mondays and Tuesdays, and regardless of the day, most were sent between 8 a.m. and 9 a.m. This makes sense, as you’re going to want to get your news to the media early enough to make it into their news cycle, whether weekly, daily, or hourly.

Think of your own work patterns. Unless they’re working the overnight or weekend shift, reporters keep more or less the same work hours as the rest of us. They come in early and want to tackle the pile of work in front of them. As the day progresses, they work on ongoing projects, attend meetings, go to appointments, take breaks for lunch and coffee. Near the end of the workday they get tired, just like you do, and start to think about wrapping things up and heading home. 

The same goes for the average workweek. Most people spend Monday and Tuesday getting caught up and being productive after the weekend. By Friday many have mentally checked out for the weekend already. In fact, especially in summer, it’s hard to even reach anyone on Fridays (such as in New York City, for example) because they often take the afternoon off. There’s a reason it’s an age-old tradition to announce bad or unflattering news quietly on Friday afternoons (even at the White House), hoping most of the media will be gone for the week and it will drop unnoticed until it’s too late to call it news. We call this “taking out the trash.”

On the other hand, think of how many releases are landing in reporters’ email inboxes at the same time and on the same day. Yours might well get lost in that shuffle. As mentioned earlier, if the reporter has a pile of emails to get through, you can’t assume they’ll open yours the instant it arrives. This means it will sit unopened as more and more land on top, getting shuffled farther and farther down the screen until it disappears altogether. Reporters lose track of unread emails just like the rest of us. The key is to find the sweet spot, when they will be paying attention but everyone else in the world isn’t vying for it along with you.

Some reporters will let you know (especially if you ask them) when they prefer to receive your news releases. These days, everyone has email at home or on the smartphone, so if you send something out on the weekend, they will receive it before Monday. (I still wouldn’t necessarily recommend it, though—reporters, like everyone else, like to preserve the illusion that they still have some downtime away from work.) Watching click and open rates, response rates, and trial and error will help you decide what works best for you and each of your clients, and reporters. Like everything else in this business, so much of it depends on relationships and human interaction. But in the end, just remember that no matter how perfectly you time the press release, the one factor that will most determine media response is how interesting, important, or entertaining the news inside it really is. When it lands in the inbox can’t change that.

Five P.R. Reminders

(We hate the word "rules.")

1. If you have a blog, post to it fairly regularly. (Oops!)

2. If the client has to call you for an update, you've dropped the ball.

3. If your call to a reporter is going to begin "Just wanted to make sure you received my email," don't bother unless you have an added tidbit of info or angle to suggest that wasn't in the email.

4. If you're not sure you have the right email address, call the reporter before you send the email to confirm, not afterward.

5. If you're contacting the same reporter about two different clients, send two different emails.