Media Platforms

10 Ways To Become A Go-To Media Expert In Your Field

10 ways to be the go-to media expert in your fieldWant to tell thousands of people about your practice? Tips to landing regular media interviews.

What do you think of when you think of professional networking? Private practice therapists who I’ve worked with in business consultations usually consider networking to be meeting with other like-minded professionals for lunch or handing out business cards to physicians offices. While those are important ways to make connections that build your therapy practice, there are other ways to get the word to thousands and thousands of people in one shot, instead of just a few folks at a time.  Rarely do therapists think of networking with producers, reporters and journalists.

Over the last few years I’ve focused on developing relationships with producers, journalists, and reporters in various media platforms. There are a few who now contact me for quotes when they need expert quotes or interviews. I've landed regular local TV, radio, and news interviews as well as interviews with top-tier publications and shows: Wall Street Journal, Fox News, Parenting, Woman's Day, Women's Health, and others. Here are some things I’ve learned about what works when building relationships with reporters, journalists and producers.

1) Seek out opportunities

Keep an eye out for opportunities to interview with local and national reporters. Sign up for services that notify you of reporters looking for interviews, like Reporter Connection, ProfNet Connection, Expert Engine. Contact local radio, television, and newspaper companies and offer your expertise on newsworthy topics.

2) Know what’s ‘newsworthy’

When pitching stories or interview topics to local journalists and reporters it’s crucial to know what they’re looking for. Sorry, but the fact that you’re going into private practice specializing in family therapy is not newsworthy; however, news and other TV programs might be interested in getting your thoughts on a new study showing how cultivating self-compassion helps individuals manage divorce. I suggest getting into some “media-minded” habits:

  • Watch national news headlines. Pitch a local spin on those stories to local TV producers.
  • Suggest seasonal topics. Pitch interviews around managing holiday stress, or Halloween safety tips for children in October.
  • New research is “news.” Keep an eye out for interesting research that’s relevant to your practice and offer to interview.

While what counts as newsworthy must be modified to your particular practice and community, MediaCollege.com generally defines a story as newsworthy if it has the following characteristics:

  • Timing – News is all about stories that are current and new
  • Significance – Something that affects large numbers of people
  • Proximity – An event happening close to home
  • Prominence – Involves someone famous or well-known
  • Human Interest – Appeals to emotion, novel, off-beat, interesting

3) Know how to write a press release

When pitching to media you need to speak their language, which means learning how to write a press release.

4) Respond to requests ASAP

I’ve come to realize that journalistic deadlines are incredibly tight, and the sooner I respond, the better. I’ve interviewed one afternoon for an E! Online article and it posted that same evening. When I get an email request for an interview I will respond right then on my smart phone with comments off the top of my head. I’ve been known to pull over on the side of the road while driving carpool to respond to an interview request. If a reporter or producer contacts you, respond immediately or the opportunity will pass you by. Decide ahead that you’ll say “yes” (and think about how you can make it a positive and confident “yes”).

5) Speak in layman's terms

Talking with the popular media is different than talking with colleagues. When speaking with therapists we can talk in short hand with acronyms like DBT, CBT and EFT; we know what transference and countertransference are, but most people don’t know and don’t care. In pitches and in correspondence always use layman’s terms that can be easily understood even if someone’s never taken Psychology 101.

6) Let your passion show

I think part of why I’ve been successful in getting quoted in national publications is because I show my passion for the work and for the topic of the story or article. Even in email correspondence, don’t be afraid to show your personality and to be approachable. I also openly share my gratitude for the interview opportunity and how much I enjoy media interviews.

7) Make your contact info easy to find

In all correspondence make sure that your name and credentials (the way you’d like them to appear if you’re quoted), your email address, and your cell phone number are easy to find in any correspondence or voicemail. Reporters don’t have time to hunt you down.

8) Know how to make their job easier

Reporters, producers, and journalists are extremely busy and always on multiple deadlines. They don’t have time to calm your anxiety or to walk you through the interview process.

  • Send only relevant information. Highlight the most important information you’d like to talk about and a brief line or two about you and your practice or your “basic professional practice message” (see my elevator speech post). Through a brief stint as a producer and host of a local lifestyle TV show I learned what makes a good and a difficult interviewee. One of the hardest parts of screening potential guests was skimming through too much information hunting for the relevant points. You can always add more information as needed.
  • Limit your correspondence. Respect the reporter’s, journalist’s or producer’s time. Though getting an interview might be a big deal for us as the therapist, it’s just one of many details they are trying to juggle.
  • Know their demographics. Understand the demographic for a given newscast TV show, newspaper, or magazine so you can pitch relevant and helpful topics (have some “audience awareness”; if you don’t know the primary audience, ask).

9) Ask them to contact you again

At the end of each interview or correspondence, whether you interview or not, be sure to ask them to keep you in mind as a resource in the future and to keep your contact information should they need your expertise in the future. If you’re an easy expert to work with and you are eager to interview, my experience is that many journalists will take you up on your offer to interview again.

10) Be a resource

I’ve learned that offering myself as a resource is a great way to build bridges with the media. I often tell reporters, producers, and journalists contact me whenever they need someone to interview on a mental health or family relationship topic, and that if I can’t do it, or don’t feel qualified, I will find them someone who would do an excellent job.

 

What The Heck Is Social Collaboration?

New trends in PR encourage online collaboration. Embracing new platforms can help therapists build professional presence and grow their private practice.

I recently attended an amazing conference in Park City, Utah called "Evo '12" The Evolution of Women in Social Media Conference. What's a shrink doing at a social media conference? In addition to being a therapist, I am a self-professed social media junkie and tech geek. So there.

A conference highlight was a workshop called "The Evolution of PR: A Culture of Collaboration, Connection and Community" taught by PR guru Sarah Evans and search technology innovator Jennifer Gosse. Both presenters work with a new social collaboration platform called Tracky (which you'll be hearing more about in an upcoming posts as I get more familiar with it). There was so much good technology and PR information that I couldn't take it all in or write it all down. I didn't want to miss anything so, I turned to social collaboration.

What is social collaboration?

At this point you may be asking "what is social collaboration?" Social collaboration involves processes that allow people to interact, work together, problem solve and exchange information online.

How can social collaboration help private practitioners?

In short, online social collaboration is a way to raise the visibility of your practice by producing more content through compiling and curating information. It's a way to engage your online social media followers, and also a method of gathering and sharing information with other like-minded professionals. Another use for therapists is in collaborating on notes from conferences and workshops as you'll see later on in this post.

An example of social collaboration: Storify

Storify is an easy to use online platform that allows anyone to tell a story through curating online articles, links, photos, and social media posts.

After attending the PR workshop my head was buzzing with new tips and tools. Why not try out social collaboration to document and share the stuff buzzing in my head? I logged in to Storify.  In about 15 minutes I had curated my favorite tweets, posts, photos, tips, tricks, and notes from many social media platforms posted by workshop participants and published a story on Storify.

I've embedded the story below so you can get a feel for what a rich experience social collaboration can be. Also, in addition to noticing the collaborative format of Storify, check out the content and the creators I've included. Notice that throughout this story I'm also sharing  the names and profiles of many who attended the workshop - social collaboration also means free PR.

[View the story "Evolution of PR: Building A Collaborative Culture " on Storify] How cool is that? Did you also notice that every element within the Storify article is easily sharable on social media? And you can post a comment right in the story. Try it out. That's the fun of social collaboration - synergy of ideas and energy. I love it.

Here are some possible ways you can use Storify in your practice:

  • Create stories relating to new research in your specialty areas
  • Curate current news topics that relate to your practice areas
  • Collect favorite quotes
  • Compile links for interviews you've participated in
  • Embed Storify articles in blog posts on your practice site

The possibilities for shareable content creation are endless through social collaboration.

Later this week we'll do a social collaboration exercise together. You in? Be thinking about your favorite mobile apps for your practice so you can jump in and share your thoughts!

5 Tips From My Trip To Guest Post Heaven

How my guest blog post landed a feature spot on Yahoo! front page and 5 things that you can learn from my experience.

Last week I received an email from Anne Krueger, the Editorial Director at Sharecare, letting me know that my Sharecare guest post Empathy: The Secret Sauce To A Happy Marriage was being featured on Yahoo front page in the #1 slot!

By the end of last week my article was featured again on Yahoo! front page as "Popular This Week." As of today, the article has had 6.8K Facebook shares and 468 retweets on Twitter. Yes, I am basking in the glow of guest post heaven.

So, how did this happen? Last Dec. Sharecare (an interactive social media health Q & A platform founded by Dr. Oz, WebMD's founder Jeff Arnold, and Discovery Communications) named me the #1 online influencer making a difference for depression online. They determine the online influencers by calculating influence "including disease-area relevance and online syndication, presence and reach" throughout the past year and "across multiple online channels, including Twitter, blogs, forums, mainstream news and video." (Sharecare)

At the time I was blogging regularly on JulieHanks.com, WasatchFamilyTherapy.com, PsychCentral.com, also contributing to local NBC affiliate KSL.com, regularly going news interviews, and actively sharing content on several social media platforms.

After being named the top depression influencer I got acquainted with some of the folks at Sharecare, including their always delightful and witty Sharecare editorial director Anne Kreuger. I asked Anne if I could start submitting guest blog posts on mental health and relationship topics that might helpful to their readers. Anne has generously published several of my articles on Sharecare's main blog, one of which ended up on Yahoo last week.

What can you learn from my accidental trip to guest blog heaven? Here are 5 things I did right that landed me on Yahoo! front page last week -- my guest blog heaven.

Tip #1 Publish killer content on your own website

Create great content on your own website to prove to "big shots" that you can deliver a good guest post for their readers. Post new content at least once a week on your own blog about your specialty areas and topics of interest to your ideal clients.

Tips #2 Tweet, post, like, & share every day

Share your blog content and other relevant articles on multiple social media channels to build your social media following and reputation as an expert. I share my articles, Q&A's, and website links daily on Twitter, Facebook profile, Facebook pages, Youtube, iTunes podcast, Pinterest, Google+, StumbleUpon, Ning, and LinkedIn.

I've learned that social media sharing is more than just broadcasting information into cyberspace. It's about having meaningful conversations online. I ask questions, respond, and genuinely care about making a difference for good in their lives of anyone who follows me online. Follower engagement (comments, shares, retweets) was a big factor in getting recognized by Sharecare. It still blows my mind.

Tip #3 Create win-win relationships

Consider how you can provide value to the site that you're pitching to, not just how they can provide exposure for you and your practice. Do your research on the website's readership before you pitch a guest post so you can provide something worthwhile to their readers. Nurture those relationships as you would other important professional relationships through an occasional email, tweet or phone call.

Tip #4 Pitch BIG

When you pitch a guest blog post to another site make sure they are A LOT bigger than your own website. Target high traffic sites and appeal to your ideal clients, particularly in your geographic area. You can find out how the site ranks by searching Alexa.com. Remember, that on Alexa a lower score mean a higher traffic and the more desirable it will be to guest post there. You provide excellent content for them and they provide you with additional visibility and visits to your practice website.

Tip #5 Promote the heck out of your guest post

When you land a guest blog on a big website share it everywhere -- social media, newsletters, websites, email, and press releases. By directing more traffic to the site that publishes your guest post you demonstrate your value and your influence. This increases the likelihood that you will able to continue to guest posting for them, which helps drive traffic to your website.

Tip #5 Think long term growth

Did being featured on Yahoo front page directly impact my practice last week? No. We haven't had thousands of phone call for new clients this week at Wasatch Family Therapy. Though this blog post had thousands, maybe millions of hits, it hasn't, and won't translate immediately into growth of my practice. What it does do is add credibility to me as an expert, add more value to my article, and demonstrate that my guest blogs appeals to a wide audience. All of those things are valuable exposure that will help open up additional opportunities over time.

Now, here's what I did wrong. There's NO LINK to my website on the Yahoo article. When this article posted on Sharecare it was accompanied by my author bio which linked to my websites. So, from now on I'm going to request a link at the end of each guest blog article in the text area, and not in a separate author bio. I guess something had to bring me back to earth.

(c) Can Stock Photo

To Tweet or Not to Tweet? Using Twitter To Grow Your Therapy Practice

What is Twitter?

Twitter is a popular social media platform where users can send short updates that are up to 140 characters long.  Twitter is basically the equivalent of a Facebook status update newsfeed. If you have no idea what a "newsfeed" or "status update" is, then you may want to stop reading here and start by setting up a Facebook account.

Facebook is THE social network site and is the most effective way to build your practice through social media because of it's high number of daily users. Here's an article on how to set up a Facebook Page for your practice.  If you want to know how to use Twitter, here are a few suggestions on how to effectively tweet to build your practice.

How can Twitter help you build your practice?

Twitter, like all social media platforms, is a forum for conversation and connecting with other people online. It is also a great way to spread the word about your practice, to educate the public about issues you care about, and to share your areas of expertise. The point of social networking sites like Twitter is...uh...the social networking. If your Twitter followers find value in your tweets they will share them by retweeting your information their Twitter followers. Over time you can grow a network of people who are sharing your tweets which helps you get the word out about your private therapy practice.

Ways to Build Your Therapy Practice Through Twitter

1) Follow local businesses and professionals

Following potential referral sources on Twitter can help you build referral sources.  If you specialize in helping clients with chronic pain, then you may want to search for pain clinics, chiropractors, and other health professionals in your geographic area and start a conversation with them about your services.

Don't limit who you follow to only mental health or other psychotherapists. Referrals can come from any kind of social networking relationship. Let your definition of an ideal client help guide who you follow on Twitter so you can attract the kind of client you want to work with. Twitter can also be used a search engine to find other businesses or people in your area and see what they talking about.

2) Don't just tweet, have conversations

Don't just send out information or tweets into the social network universe. Take a few minutes each day to respond to others who mention you or who retweet your tweets. "Mention" other users by using the "@" sign followed by their twitter handle and it will show up on their Twitter page. This builds rapport and relationships. For example, my user name is @julie_hanks. If someone posts a tweet and mentions me, I will be notified of it and it gives me a chance to respond to them.  I've found Twitter to be a source of professional support too, meeting therapists all over the world and sharing ideas. I've found some therapists in private practice featured in recent articles on Twitter.

3) Tweet links to your practice website

Increase traffic to your therapy website by tweeting links to your website. If you have a website blog, you can automate your site to tweet every new blog post. Here's a screenshot of my Twitter page. The yellow text are links that mostly go to on of my websites or blogs to increase visitors and provide helpful information.

4) Use hashtags to attract followers interested in your expertise

A hashtag is a "#" followed by a topic. For example, if you're specialty area is parenting, you can use #parenting on tweets about anything related to parenting to make it easier for others interesting in parenting to find you. When you click on a hashtag it will bring up other tweets mentioning the same topic. Hashtags make it easy to find, follow, and converse with others who have similar interest or expertise.

Do you use Twitter as a mental health professional? What are your suggestions for using Twitter to build your practice?