How do you deal with a biased reporter or biased journalist? The question I get a lot and the question I always toss back to my clients is, why do you care? Well, but of course, I don't want someone to be bias in the mean, again. How does that have an impact on the quotes you get in the final story? And typically, they don't have a good answer to that. Here's my experience.
Of course, there's bias in the reporters are human beings, all human beings have bias. And reporters can have a left wing bias, a right wing bias, a corporate bias, a bias in favor of one party over another. But the biggest bias most reporters have in most places in the world is a bias in favor of anything interesting enough to get on the homepage of the website or to get on the evening news. Their bias in favor of something interesting. So if you know that you can now focus your energy on figuring out what messages of yours are really important, and then how to make them as interesting as possible to the reporter to play to that bias of the reporter. Now, here's the real problem.
If someone has some sort of ideological bias against you, and you don't have great messages, and you haven't planned your messages, and you're just winging it, you don't have any planned soundbites. What will happen is the reporter will say all sorts of provocative negative things. And you say, Well, no, it's not true that I just teach people to lie and demagogue. And then they use that. So it can hurt you if you don't prepare. But if you follow the techniques, as outlined throughout this course, it simply is not going to matter.
If the reporter has a huge bias, does that mean every story is going to be great if you follow my techniques? No. There will be negative stories about you from time to time In all likelihood, but what you can control the messages that come from you the quotes that come from you what people see and hear from you. That's what you can control. And that's the focus of this course. So, left wing bias, right wing bias, all sorts of biases.
Plus reporters can be smart, stupid, Ill informed. Again, why do you care? I love smart reporters who know everything about my industry in my business. But I love down reporters too. It's that much easier for me to get the quotes I want in the final store. Remember, you're not looking for your new best friend.
You're not looking for your new best dinner companion. What you're trying to do in a media interview is get the messages you care about. In to the final story if you focus on that. These other issues of Oh reporters by Esther done None of that will matter.