Kate Engler : How Entrepreneurs Can Get Free Media Coverage and Become the Go-To Expert in Their Field

How entrepreneurs can get free media coverage and become the go-to expert in their field. Now, whether you are spending money on ads or not, I bet you’re posting on social media every day and you’re still struggling to be seen as the go-to expert in your space. Meanwhile, your competitors are showing up on tv, radio, and in the press, and it’s not because they have a big PR budget, it’s because they know something you don’t.

My guest today, Kate Engler, is gonna spill the beans on this. Because she’s the founder of a Meet the Press Masterclass and has spent 30 years in the publicity and media space helping entrepreneurs earn free media coverage. That’s right. Not paying a PR agency a single cent. In this conversation, you’ll discover why earn media is more powerful than any ad you’ll ever run.

The one thing that will permanently get you black band by journalists. And how a finance expert walked out of Sky News with 120 new leads, $95,000 in revenue without mentioning his business once. This is a episode that all business owners, anyone in the thought leadership space needs to listen into because I can tell you.

That media and podcasting go hand in hand with one another. This is a robust, and lively conversation where we give you so much information and tips. You do not wanna miss it. I’m Anthony Perl. Let’s get into Biz Bites for Thought Leaders.

Hello everyone and welcome to the program. We are gonna have a really great opportunity to talk about how you might get some real publicity for your business and making that work and doing that for us is Kate, welcome to the program. Thanks so much for having me, Anthony. It’s great to be here with you and your listeners.

And I’m gonna let the listeners in on a little secret. We had some technical hiccups, so it’s the third time that we’ve actually doing this introduction. So Kate for the third time, let me ask you and the first time for listeners can you introduce yourself to the audience? Sure. I’m the founder of the Meet the Press Masterclass.

I’ve been in the publicity and media space for, oh, over 30 years, which makes me sound incredibly. Old. And I guess the most important thing for your listeners is to understand that when I worked in PR agencies on both sides of the country, I would see amazingly inspiring entrepreneurs, much like the people listening to this podcast, come into the agency.

So excited about the prospect of free media and what being interviewed. By a journalist as the expert in their field could do for them, and they’d leave the agency with their tail between their legs because they couldn’t afford the five, six, $8,000 month after month after month. That agencies typically charge.

And I love entrepreneurs. Like I don’t think there’s much sexier on the planet than an entrepreneur that takes their ideas and their credit card in one hand and their bollocks and their courage in the other, and they leap forward to create what they call their own business. And so as I watch these gorgeous entrepreneurs leave the agency so despondent, I thought there’s got to be a better way.

So 14 years ago, I created a better Way, and that’s called the Meet of the Press Masterclass. And we are definitely gonna dive into all of that, because I think, as you say I’m the same as you. And not just through the podcast, but through other things that I’m doing. You meet so many entrepreneurs all the time, and you just go, oh, wow, that’s just such an amazing idea.

Even earlier today, I sat in on something, whether it’s probably about 50 or 60 people online. Even just what someone was presenting and let alone the other things that people were throwing in and just go, oh my goodness. These are, there are just so many great ideas out there at the moment, so there’s so much opportunity but the reality is for most businesses, they’re.

Not getting the attention they deserve because they just dunno how to go about it. Yeah, that’s so true. And you’re so right when you talk about all these big brained entrepreneurs out there, it’s oh my God, that’s an amazing idea. But they don’t know how to go about it. And the reason I referenced the agency in my introduction is because if people contemplate.

Generating free media coverage or engaging with a journalist, they do think the only way to do that is through the front door of an expensive PR agency. And when that’s out of reach for them in terms of their budget, they sadly put a big fat red line through free media and think, oh, it mustn’t be for us.

And it absolutely is for all entrepreneurs. Yeah, and I think the, I think the thing that we need to make people aware of as well is that it’s not about doing it once. Oh, like once can work great. But it’s, I often used to say to people look, if I could get you the front page of, pick your paper Sydney Morning Herald Age, depending on where you are tomorrow to say, you are the greatest business ever.

Everyone should use you. Which of course there’s no way on this earth you could ever make happen, but just in theory that you did that. How much difference would it make to a business as a single hit? It’s not going to make that bigger difference. And the fact is you can’t get that. So you have to, this is about reputation building over a considerable period of time, which is why agencies in the PR space exist because they’re aiming at largely at larger businesses because they need a bigger budget, and it’s about being consistent.

But there is a different way about going about it and still getting some of that attention. Yeah, I think you’re right though. Consistency is super important. I had an application call earlier this week and the woman said to me, post masterclass, how much time should I set aside for this?

And I said, if you did one hour a week, which isn’t a lot of time, right? If you did one hour a week where you were thinking about your pitching, some weeks pitching, but just had that consistent thinking about your business through that media lens, because it’s a very different lens through which business owners need to look if they’re approaching media versus approaching their customers.

If you just spend one hour a week thinking through that lens. You will generate a lot of ongoing coverage, which then you add to your website, you add to your proposals, you add to your social media. It’s not just about getting the media coverage in the first instance. It’s about then leveraging and ramping that up.

And I think there’s a few things to unpack here for business owners as well. I know what it’s like for some. I had a conversation with someone yesterday who was appearing on a podcast for the first time. And she said, oh, I can’t stand public speaking. I hate it. And I don’t, I’m really nervous about all of this.

And I’m like, this is just a conversation between two people. But a podcast is one thing, but I suppose that’s the hard part for people when they suddenly see the TV cameras and or even if it’s a phone, even if it’s on the phone and doing it to a radio station or to a journalist writing for a a written media.

It’s still that perception. Suddenly people think about the millions of people that may or may not be reading, listening, whatever and they just tighten up, don’t they? It’s really important to get them out of that headspace. Yes, absolutely. And I think the other thing that the feedback we get a lot from graduates at our masterclass is, oh my God, these journalists are just normal people.

And indeed they are just normal people and they want to showcase a story that their readers, viewers, or listeners can use and take away and apply. So one of the lenses that we introduce our graduates to is news they can use, and by they we mean the journalist and their audience. And y The listeners on this podcast, Anthony, they are the expert in their field, in their niche, in their category.

They know way more about what they are doing than the journalists. So allow the journalist to ask the question that give you permission to showcase your opinion on the issue. Your advice on the issue. It’s not about selling your thing, it’s about elevating you above your thing and have you talk like an industry leader.

It is such an important differentiation because I think business owners are so commonly I would say almost bred into this idea, particularly like from networking, where you go in and say, I’m gonna sell myself. I’m gonna do the elevator pitch in, 15, 30 seconds, a minute, whatever it is that you get.

And they’re really fixated on that. And often they don’t even do that particularly well, by the way. But I think that. The challenge is that when you are being called upon by the media, they’re not interested in you giving your life story on your business. They’re not interested in what you think you want to be talking about.

It’s about what they isolate as being the issue at the time, and they’re asking for your expert opinion on that. So even though you may wanna be talking about, all these other things you have to you, you can’t look at it like a politician does. So a politician is quite different. And I think it’s an important differentiation for people is in the media, politicians typically will answer the question that they want to answer and will frustrate the media.

But because they’re in public office, they’re going to get repeated opportunities. But if you’re in business. You’re not going to get another opportunity if you don’t answer the question and you don’t add value to to the audience that they’re targeting. Yeah, absolutely. But there is still a way within the questions that are asked where the business owner can put forward their key messages and bring the interview.

Back to the point they wish to make, but you’re so right when you talk Anthony about the interview not being about the thing, the product, the service, the business. One of our masterclass graduates who’s a finance expert, was on Sky News talking about the inflation figures and what he felt.

As an expert, the inflation figures meant for the market. Now, interestingly, he did not mention his business once his name and business name of course came up on the super on the screen. By the time he’d left the studios at Sky News and got to his car in the Sky News carpark, there were 120 new leads in his business that he turned into $95,000.

So you don’t need to be the hard sell in a media interview because that means you won’t be asked back. We must, as you say, give the journalists what they want. The interesting thing that you say about that actually applies outside of the media as well, which is, so many businesses owners, as I saying before, are conditioned to try and sell.

But in actual fact, when you offer value, when you offer an opinion and people see you as being the expert, then the opportunities then present themselves because it’s actually the counterintuitive to sales. It’s that if you don’t sell. But you elevate yourself, then you actually are selling. I’m not discounting the fact that there’s plenty of avenues for businesses to do proper selling, but when it comes to this kind of, open environment and the media is the perfect example.

You have to be elevated as an expert. And that’s the great thing is that the media are actually doing that for you. They’re coming to you as the expert. So all you have to do is fulfill that based on your knowledge and your stories, and give them something that is going to talk to their audience. I think that’s the key as well, isn’t it?

You have to know who the audience is so that what you are offering is gonna resonate. 100%. Yes. So an example of that exact thing is we have a. Masterclass graduate Luke, who’s a former detective, really important. He’s a former detective, so he is no longer restricted by the badge. He. With the escalating crime spree in Sydney.

He started pitching into the Today Show ’cause he’d met the producers at the masterclass. I can make a comment on that shooting. I can make a comment on that car accident. I can make a comment on that home invasion. And he gave them like an insight into what the police may be doing from a former insider’s point of view.

And now the Today Show. Contact him regularly. For that expert commentary because he gave them what they want in the first instance. So it’s really important that you make your first media interview an absolute winner. And I think what’s always fascinating is, having watched the media over the years, and I remember, that we are going back a little while, but, people like Dick Smith and even Pauline Hansen, who, the reason that they’ve got so much attention over the years is because they’ve said something different and been prepared to stake their reputation on it and be out there with an opinion.

So it doesn’t mean you have to be out there and say something ridiculous. You actually have to believe in it. But the thing is that if you don’t say anything of interest, then they’re just gonna pass you by and go to the next one. And that’s why a lot of these people, you see them keep getting media attention that’s almost disproportionate to, the level of people that are actually, following them.

Particularly or supporting them directly, and and I think that’s an interesting aspect as well, is that you have to have something interesting to say and be prepared to say it in a way that is going to be entertaining to a degree. Yes. You’re so right. It reminds me, when I was at uni I was doing another course, personal development course and I became friends.

Research fellow at the Walter and Eliza Institute of Research at Melbourne University, and the media would always come in when they had a medical breakthrough and they would speak with my friend and they’d also speak with one of the other scientists, and they always used. The other scientist. And so my friend was, went home one night and was complaining to his gorgeous wife about, they never quote me, they never use my vision, they never use my interview.

And she said, I’m sure she had milk and honey in her voice when she said this. But she said to him, that’s because you don’t say anything quotable. Which sounds nasty on the surface of it. But he said he was able to reflect and go. Actually, you’re right. I want to be really safe. He’s a researcher, he’s a scientist.

Very wanted to be very factual. So he never deviated from the actual facts. He never proffered an opinion. He never went off script. And so of course his colleague who was able to proffer a different opinion, perhaps a controversial one, was always the one that got quoted. Not the vanilla guy. As nice as he was a bit vanilla.

And it’s funny you say that. I don’t wanna keep referring back to politicians. This is not a big hobby horse of mine, but I recall working in a newsroom and we are going back longer than I care to remember. Let’s not talk about that. And a former premier that then became a premier and went on to other things.

But he used to ring the newsroom at whatever it was, five 30 in the morning when he knew there was only one person in the newsroom and would say. I’m here, I’m available. I’m going to give you a quote on something. And all he would give them would be 20 seconds. So they had no choice but to run exactly that.

And he actually. Manipulated is a strong word, and I don’t mean it in a particularly harsh way, but he utilized the media or manipulated them in a way that meant that his specific idea was always getting across consistently. Almost on a daily basis because all he gave them was that to work with.

Now times have changed a little bit more and there’s more social media and more other things that are happening. But the point is still there that you need to get that good grab across so that’s what they’re going to use. ’cause that’s what they’re looking for. ’cause I think that’s the other point people have to remember is that particularly if you’re doing TV or radio.

It’s a very limited time that you are going to have, here we are doing a podcast. It’s a, 45 minutes where you don’t get that on a, on a news grab at all. You get a fraction of that. Absolutely. A fraction of that. And to your point, this gentleman of whom you spoke knew how to play the media game, and that’s something I’d really love your listeners to understand.

It is just a game. Media is just a game. It’s a competition for eyeballs and eardrums. That’s. All it is Channel seven want more eyeballs than Channel nine, than Channel 10 than a, B, C, et cetera. But once you know the rules of the game and you have the tools of the game, you can play the game effectively with any journalist anywhere at edit time.

And your politician was a perfect example of knowing the game and playing it with a plum. Yeah, I think that that, that’s a really important point is that you have to know the game. You have to understand what they’re trying to trying to achieve because if you are not aware of. The audience, you’re not aware of what they’re trying to get to and the headline, and they want a great story.

They want a headline of something that they can use. Then they feel like they’re wasting their time. And even though in business we’re under pressure for deadlines, the media are under extraordinary pressure because it’s, the news is at the top of the hour. Yep. Top of the hour. The news doesn’t wait for anybody.

And if you listen to talk back radio. You’ll hear a caller that’s banging on and banging on, and they’ll say, I’m sorry to cut you off, Anthony, but the news waits for no man and almost cut the person off because the news, as you say, waits for no man and in it’s really important that.

People understand the difference between pitching for news, whether it’s TV news or radio news, versus pitching to a program like a breakfast TV program or a current affairs program. And then that differs again from print. So each media outlet has its own rhythm and its own wants and its own must haves.

And knowing those nuances is really important for people. Yeah, and I think that’s where you have to get, as you offer some training in place to do that, because I think just walking into that and thinking you can do it doesn’t come naturally to most people, and so you do have to understand and go through those trial situations and be prepared for that, but also understand that as you said earlier, that the journalists are there to do a job and they are just human beings and unlike.

Something where it’s a current affair. Knocking down your door saying you’ve done something wrong. This is the complete reverse. You are going to them and offering an expert opinion on something, so you are actually helping them. So they’re not going to be antagonistic. They’re going to be probably demanding and wanting something.

So understand that there is a time pressure. Understand that they want. You to deliver something really quotable and think about that in advance. What is the key thing that you want? But also listen, I think that’s the other bit that I find so often that people go in, they go, this is going to be my message, and I’ve nailed it.

Don’t try and memorize stuff. I always think that’s terrible. And, but. You go in thinking that you’re just going to deliver that, but if you don’t listen, you don’t know that there might be another opportunity to say something even better or different. Yes, and follow. These journalists are professional at asking questions.

They are inherently curious. There are some journalists that we work with and I just love their curiosity. It really warms my heart. Just how genuinely curious they are about our masterclass graduates. They want a great story. They want to produce a great product, whether that product is print, radio, or tv, but knowing what they want is crucial.

And I think that leads me to talk a little about tv. TV because often people don’t understand that TV is a moving. Medium. It sounds really obvious, but it’s a moving medium. So if you are going to pitch to tv, think about what vision can the journalists come out and shoot? Or alternatively what B role vision, which is vision that plays while the person is being interviewed?

What overlay or B-roll vision can you provide? But most importantly it is what can the journalists shoot if they do an interview with you? Yeah, it’s so important. I know my background originally started in radio and spent some time in TV before going back to radio, but the fundamental difference between the two is the pictures that in tv, if you don’t have the pictures, they’re not really gonna run the story because sitting and staring at people’s faces for three, four minutes is not what they want to show. They need to be able to have some kind of vision going, even if it’s a short bit sometimes where they show it three or four times in the case of one’s one little segment.

But it is important to have something there because if it’s. There’s no visuals, they will struggle to put the story to air because they’re fundamentally built on the idea that people are watching. Yes. TV’s a moving medium. I once had a woman, she wasn’t at the masterclass at a keynote that I did, and they had this accommodation.

Place in regional Australia and she wanted the Today Show weather to come out and shoot from her property. And she was explaining to me that they have wild kangaroos then come and eat out of the hands of the guests. And I’m like, that’s amazing. That’s really cute. What else have you got? She goes no.

I don’t think you understand. These are not pet kangaroos. These are wild kangaroos and they don’t come up to us. They come up to every guest and eat from their hand, and I said, that’s really awesome. What else have you got? She said, I don’t think you’re listening. I said, I think one of us isn’t listening.

I’m not sure it’s not me. Because if The Today Show was going to go into Regional Victoria, which means an overnight stay for their crew, which means a satellite truck at the cost of about $25,000 if they are going to spend that sort of money. They need more than Skippy. They need more than Skippy. Yeah.

So it’s got to be a really visually rich pitch if you are contemplating approaching tv. Yeah and I think that’s it’s an important thing, but even if sometimes then if TV isn’t, your, isn’t going to be the thing that’s relevant. Radio is an incredibly powerful option as well, and doesn’t require that kind of investment.

That’s the great thing is that it is the cost of a phone call, which is nothing much these days. If anything, if you’re. Calling someone on a WhatsApp or a Zoom call, so the, there’s no cost almost involved in that. And so then there’s the opportunity, but then you have to counter that with, you have to be a great storyteller in order to make it interesting.

So if you haven’t got the pictures, you have to be able to tell a great yarn in the Australian vernacular, and you have to be able to put a spin on it. That makes it interesting and worthwhile and takes whatever they’re talking about to another level. Yeah, absolutely. And just to pick up on the cost factor, that $25,000 I was talking about, that was a cost to the network, not a cost to the client.

Absolutely. So just to be clear, we’re talking free media coverage, but to your point about radio, the great thing about radio and the perfect way for your listeners to showcase their expertise is to offer to take talk back. Questions because that shows the producer that you really do know your stuff.

You know how the radio game is played because the key to talk back radio, funnily enough, is people talking back and it may, it showcases you as somebody who really understands. What their listeners are wanting, and that is engagement with the expert online. And it also shows that you’re willing to back yourself because you don’t know what the talk back caller questions are going to be, right?

So if you say to the producer, you do your pitch and say, and I’m happy to take questions from your listeners, it instantly elevates your expertise because you’re willing to back yourself. And I think what’s important there is you don’t know what opportunities present themselves from that situation.

I’ve certainly worked in radio where we’ve had exactly that, the intention, oh, we’ll get this person on. It’s quite interesting. They’ve offered to come into the studio. You take one or two calls at the time and suddenly the switchboard lights up and afterwards and people say, can we do that again?

And suddenly becomes a, a semi-regular segment. Yeah. You go from one small opportunity to something being larger that can lead to other things. ’cause I, I, I know someone that for example, came on and was doing, video movie type reviews and it was a one-off segment and then it turned into a regular segment.

And I think at one point he even had his own dedicated program. So it’s you don’t know where these things land and it’s and I’ve seen it done on antiques and all sorts of business things as well. So there’s always opportunities out there to to take on. And I think you have to be prepared that’s the hard bit.

If you’re taking talk back, you have to be prepared for. All sorts of questions that are going to come your way, and you have to have an opinion or at least be able to confirm that you’re gonna be able to come back with an answer sooner rather than later, because there’s nothing worse than having someone come in and say.

Yeah, I’m not really sure about that. And then you’re not going very far, very quickly. So yeah, you need to have that confidence and it does take a fair amount of confidence. So let me ask you that as well, that, how do you actually go about building that confidence? ’cause you, we talked about before, someone sitting there going, oh, I’m scared to death of public speaking, let alone being in front of the media to having the confidence to be able to.

Push their opinion and do it in a structured wage. Yeah. I think preparation is the key there because they will ask you questions about the pitch that you’ve made, about the subject matter of that particular. Pitch. So if you prepare all of your key messages around that central theme, they’re not suddenly going to ask you if you are a nutritionist, for example, talking about malnutrition through chemotherapy, which a lot of people suffer from.

And we’ve had somebody at the masterclass do that. So they’re talking very much about the nutritional requirements and the side effects of chemotherapy and how you can keep yourself nourished. During that time, they’re not going to go off script and suddenly ask you about what you think of the NRL being in Las Vegas or what you think of the geopolitical situation in the world at the moment, they’re going to stick to the pitch.

So in preparing the pitch, you also prepare your key messages and know them. Know them, not just in your mind, but really know them in this. Cells of your body because then it doesn’t matter what questions you get asked. And I did this exact preparation with the woman I’m speaking about, Alex.

She was on today Extra and on radio, but when they started asking her questions, they weren’t the questions she thought she was going to be asked. But because we had done so much preparation. She just took a breath and like I know this, and she just settled in and it was a beautifully authentic, honest, raw, very human interview because she had done the preparation.

So that’s the key for any media interview. Prepare. And I think the good thing too, that once you are in a situation where you have cracked it a few times and you’ve been on a Today Show or sunrise, and any of those programs, the once you’ve done it a couple of times, they will call upon you again.

So they might call upon you with not much notice. I know this happened not that long ago with a client of mine. In fact, we were a shout out to Andrew. We were. About to record his podcast and literally got a phone call from Channel 10 saying, and this was, the project was still on air, so it was going back about a year or so and saying, would you be on the project for a short segment?

Can we send someone around to you like now to do that? So we, pause the recording of the podcast. So in order for him to be able to do that, it wasn’t a particularly long piece, but because he. Knows his stuff. He was able to deliver that and he’s, because he is had experience being on a number of those programs in the past, it wasn’t a difficult thing of saying Sure, yep.

Happy to do that, and away we go. And it was interesting because it was a topic we were going to be covering on the podcast anyway, so it worked hand in hand, which is an interesting little tidbit for people as well, that often you talk about being able to, not being able to sell yourself.

Because it’s not a sales job. One of the great things is that if you do have a podcast, most media outlets are prepared to also put up on the screen host of such and such podcast, or put it at the bottom of an article because they don’t feel like they’re selling a business. They’re selling another.

Option to hear more information from them. And that is a really great way of bringing people into your universe further because it isn’t a hard sell. So it’s a really nice way of doing that. That’s why, I do what I do, but it’s, it is an important aspect that it does work. Really nicely to help get more publicity.

Yeah. It’s a really subtle sell, and it’s another channel to market. It’s another channel where their viewers, readers, or listeners can learn more about that particular topic without saying Buy now with a 30 day money back guarantee. We are not DeMel. It’s not, this isn’t paid advertising.

Editorial and that distinction is really important, and I often describe it as two sides of the media coin. There’s the paid side. You pay this, pay the money, you get the space or the time it runs. You can say what you like within reason. And it’s guaranteed to run. Editorial is the other side of the media coin, the free side of the media coin.

And it’s in, it’s so much more powerful because it’s not you showcasing how great you are. It’s actually the media and the journalists showcasing how great you are. And suddenly in people’s minds, you’re the expert. And I think it’s also important for people to understand as well that the media’s changed so much over the last, 30 years that you and I have been doing this stuff, that it’s it’s scary how long it’s been, but it’s the kind of investigative long term journalism where, there’s stories that will take weeks to, for them before they’re going to come to air.

Doesn’t really exist as much anymore. Mostly what they’re after is something that’s going to happen fairly quickly and and so that being able to understand that there’s a quick turnaround time and an opportunity to capitalize on things and therefore staying on top of what’s happening in the.

In the news for your universe. Yes. As you said before, you don’t need to un, you don’t need to be on top of what’s happening in the NRL or in politics on the other side of the world, but in your space, you need to be on top of it because there’s nothing worse than getting that opportunity and say, would you be happy to speak about X?

And you suddenly sitting there and going. Okay, they want me on in five minutes and I now have five minutes to research it. And if you’re using AI or something like that to do the quick research, in that scenario, you’re probably not gonna be in the position to tell them anything that’s interesting or new.

You need to stay on top of what you’re doing 100%. And that is where news jacking comes in. The and setting up Google alerts. In fact, there was a piece of publicity published today by one of our graduates. She had a Google alert come in, she news jacked that she gave the journalist and.

Extension to the story, something that the journalist hadn’t considered and it was published today. So staying across what’s happening in your industry is super important. But you did mention AI and I do have a very timely AI warning for people. We have there’s this brilliant. Brilliant business journalists Ali Kane, and she has written for the Financial Review.

She’s written for accounting magazines. She’s a brilliantly smart sharp woman. And she sent an email as a bit of event to the founder of Source Bottle and I last year just bemoaning the fact that people are using AI to create their pitches. And here’s the thing, if the journalists just wanted to know.

What opinions were already out there. They’d search AI themselves. What they want is your opinion, your unique take on that. And no AI bot on the planet is yet implanted in your brain. Knowing what your thoughts, your opinions, or your take on a particular matter is. And that’s what the journalists want.

They want something new. They want something fresh. They want something that’s authentically your original. Thought so, Ali actually said if any pitch comes across her desk with any hint of ai, she not only doesn’t pick up the pitch, but she black bans that person. So there’s a real reputational killer.

At people’s fingertips called ai, and most journalists will not run something that they know is AI generated. And even on source bottle, which for those of your listeners who don’t know what source bottle is, it’s like a dating site for journalists and experts. There will often be call outs on source bottle with journalists looking for particular experts, and they will specifically say, no AI submissions.

So ai, whilst it’s, making a whole lot of PE areas of a whole lot of people’s lives much more streamlined and much more efficient when it comes to the media, you are the star, not ai, and your opinion is the one that matters most. And I think there’s such a true point in that because people forget that what differentiates you from the next person is your stories, your insights, the way you’ve seen things and even to the point where, I think we can all relate to this, that we’ve been in a conversation where maybe it’s you and your partner having a conversation together.

One, here’s one thing and one, here’s the other thing. You end up in a nice little argument as a result of that because the other one, SWOS swears you said this, and the other one said, oh, I didn’t say that. And that’s the point is that your experiences and the way you perceive things and do things is different.

And it’s different to the next person. That’s why I always say to accountants, for example, an accountant is not the same as the next accountant. You all have different experiences and different ways of perceiving things, so there’s always an avenue to do that. And the other thing about our stories is that we tell them differently every time.

We might have a favorite top 10 stories that we’ve probably told a hundred times each. It’s almost certain that you haven’t told it the same way each time. That each time is finessed a little bit different depending on who’s in front of you, how long you’ve got, other variables that come into the equation.

So when you comes to the media, so long as you say to them. I’ve got a great story about X. That’s gonna be a nice way of showing them that you have some insights and some expertise that is 100% not going to be AI driven. Yes, absolutely. And those human stories, those personal experiences and those personal opinions, that’s what the media is looking for.

They don’t want a rinse and repeat of what AI has turned out for you. And what’s interesting about that as well, of course, is that it’s not what the audience wants either. Yeah. And that’s who your businesses are trying to attract. Like not many businesses I think are doing businesses with other ais, like you are actually doing business with a human being.

Yeah. So if you’re doing business with a human being, they want, we all want and crave that original, authentic engagement. There’s nothing that’s. Better than that gives you that experience. And, we’ve lost that whole idea of service and other things that we could go onto on about for ages.

But the main thing is that if you bring that human element to the table and you bring your unique stories, you’re going to be a step ahead of everybody else, or, yeah, absolutely. I think it was Simon Sinek that said, people don’t buy what you. Do they buy what you stand for? And I’ve had that experience myself with media coverage that has not remotely been talking about my business or the Meet the Press masterclass or anything to do with work.

Some of it’s been quite personal publicity that I’ve generated for myself over the years and I’ve had, with this particular example I’m thinking of, I had women contact me and say, we don’t even know what you do, but we just liked what you stood for. Tell us more because. They saw something in me that was real, that was human, that they could relate to.

And then they went about exploring whether even the business was a fit for what they were doing, but they were just keen to connect. And that’s the true power of great publicity, is people feel they know you and they can trust you, and that you’ve been held up as the expert and there’s a trifecta that is really hard to beat.

I always give a little tip to people having spent so much time in TALKBACK radio in the past is that the trick to building an audience is pretend that you’re having a conversation with one person. And the whole idea is that the people that are listening in. Is that person, if you’ve got an audience member that’s sitting there and going, oh, they could be talking to me, that’s ideally what you want.

And it’s no different when you are having that conversation. Even if you’ve got a journalist standing at the other end, you, they’re a medium. You are just, you are talking to who they’re trying to talk to, not necessarily talking to them. And I think that’s an important part as well, because the journalists.

Is not necessarily your key audience. Yeah, exactly. And that’s really important to understand when people are preparing that written pitch to get the ball rolling, they’re not, in that case, they are speaking directly to the journalists because the journalists will decide whether the pitch sinks or swims and if their audiences are going to be interested in what that pitch is.

So they’re re. Assessing the pictures and reading the pictures with a mind on two things. Does this fit and will my audience be interested in it? But you’re so right Anthony, when you talk about when you are actually face to face with that journalist, whether it’s in front of a TV camera in the radio station, doing a phone interview, you are just having a conversation and you’re just exploring the issue at hand and having a conversation from one human to another.

I wanna bring you back full circle to where we started this conversation as well. And I think that it’s so much, there are so many great entrepreneurs out there, and I often say that, that his program is Biz Bites for Thought Leaders. And yet there are so many people who would classify themselves as thought leaders because they’re unique in their space and they.

Are going ahead with their business, but they’re not really thought leaders ’cause they haven’t got an audience, right? I don’t think you can be a thought leader if you don’t have an audience. And that means sharing with it beyond your small, immediate workforce. People need to understand.

Your brilliance, what you are capable of, what your insights are, why you might be different, all of those things. And it comes from being prepared to speak and being prepared to speak in the media is a really important aspect for how you might actually take your business beyond rather than just having to think, okay, all I can do is try and pay a fortune for advertising, which is a really expensive path to go down.

Often not affordable for most businesses and very difficult to get the return on investment for for so many. Whereas this is an avenue that is so much easier in that to, to get your opinion across. Yeah. And it costs zero, right? Free media is free for a reason because it’s earned media and what we mean by that, it’s not paid.

It’s earned and the journalist sees something worthy in what you have pitched, and we are really big advocates of, once you secure that media coverage, what do you then do with it? How do you then leverage that expert voice to expand your audience? And we’ve great, got great social media channels that we can do that.

And most people don’t fully take advantage by leveraging their coverage. They so they think they get the coverage. Yay. And it is, yay. But there’s so much more that can be done with the media coverage, post it appearing. Yeah, there is. And think I think one of the favorite things that’s happened more and more today is that people love the behind the scenes stuff.

I actually, I don’t think it’s all that new, but I go back to my early days in, in Channel 10, and I remember was working on the late edition news and a friend of mine who was studying medicine at the time and. Since a very, quite a well known doctor had caused to want to come in and he said, oh would it be possible for me to come in and watch in the newsroom and I’ve got it cleared?

Not a problem. Come in. There were many people there at that time of night. He was high on that story for years afterwards because seeing behind the scenes in a newsroom and everything, which was. Straightforward to me ’cause I’d grown up on it was exciting. And I’ve seen similar things where people, it’s the, almost the publicity of, here’s the selfie of me about to go on the Today Show is more important than actually appearing on the Today Show in terms of the leverage that you can get in social media, for example.

’cause people get excited for you. So it now it draws more eyeballs onto the whole thing. Just because all you’ve done is taken a selfie in front of the, with the cameras and the studio set up behind you. Yeah, 100%. And I always recommend that if you can go into the studio, even for radio interview Yes.

It’s easy to pick up the phone. Yes. It’s easy to stay in your gym jams and do that interview from your couch. Sure, but you don’t get the leverage that you’ve just mentioned, Anthony. So wherever possible, even if it means flying up to the studios in Sydney, I always recommend that people go into the studio physically, if they possibly can, because of all of that behind the scenes content that they can get.

And then they’re also connecting with the producer. That has put them on the air and building that relationship time and time again, it’s invaluable. I cannot stress how important it is where possible to be physically in the studio. Look, there are so many more things that we could talk about here for hours, but we can’t do that.

But I do want to I do, I would love you to share a little bit more about how people come to work with you part, particularly in terms of the masterclass that you offer, but also just the initial discovery session and things, because this is such an important avenue for businesses and I think too often is neglected.

So I’m hoping that. Lots of people listening in today are going to be wanting to jump on the bandwagon, say, this is something I can do. Yeah. We actually have an offer at the moment, a free 30 minute media angle discovery call, so you can, we will explore what your media angles. So there’s that’s an option.

People can also apply for the masterclass. It is an application only process. Anthony, because we only take one business per category, the journalists don’t wanna hear from five physios. They wanna hear from one. So we only have one business per category, which means if you are not in the room, your competitor probably is.

So we do have an application process. At the masterclass we train people on day one to within an inch of their life about that lens of news they can use. And then on day two, they shoot a TV interview guaranteed that goes out on the Ticket TV network. And they actually get to pitch to between 10 and 12 of the country’s top journalists.

So the major daily papers in each. Each of the states, Melbourne and Sydney, major radio stations, mama, me, and Money Magazine, smart company inside Small business body and Soul. All of the big guys are all there actively leaning in. Looking for new experts and looking for new stories. So it’s a complete fast track, and unlike most events where there’s a big, sneaky, cheeky, little $30,000 upsell and a Fijian cruise and a set of steak knives waiting for you at the back of the room, the masterclass is an upsell free zone.

So in terms of knowing the media game, we teach you the whole shooting match so that you can go forth without needing us. Or any other PR agency. Again, it’s really the teach you to fish model, so it’s a bit of fun. I love it. And I know having been involved in watching people going through these kinds of things in the past and being on the other side where I’ve been in the media and watching people coming through that it’s a fun journey and and I encourage people to definitely have a go at it because I think there’s so much to be gained from it, and there’s very little negative that can come from it.

You’ve just got to get out a little bit out of your comfort zone to do it. Just to wrap things up, there is a question that I love to ask all my guests, which is what is the aha moment that you wish more people knew they were going to have when they come to work with you? That’s a great question.

I think there’s several. I think it is the lens of news they can use that it’s not about their thing, whatever their thing happens to be, their product, their service, their thing. It’s oh, I need to fall out of love with this a little bit. Yes my darling, you do. So I think that’s a big aha moment.

I think the other bigger aha moment, because people are literally belly to belly with a dozen. Journalists, they do realize that they’re just human beings and they’re just doing a job. And because the news cycle, as you mentioned earlier, is now really pacey, it’s a genuine 24 7 news cycle. The journalists do need new experts and new content all the time.

So that’s why journalists love coming to the masterclass. Mum and Mia very kindly calls us the best content farm in Australia because they actively need new stories and experts. And I think when people realize that. That they are just as much of an asset to the journalists as the journalists are to them.

I think that’s a real aha moment, and that’s just gorgeous because they build relationships. They have their first dance with the journals at our masterclass, and they continue dancing with them for years and years to come, which is just awesome. I. I love it. It must be so much fun when you turn on various media and go, I know that person.

I know that person. They’ve been through this class and that class. That must be that, that It’s like having little children out everywhere, isn’t it? I love Little Tick. I get so excited. I know they’re excited that even after 30 years of doing this, I bloody love seeing them on the air. It’s just very thrilling and very exciting for them.

Kate, thank you so much. It’s been an absolute pleasure to talk to you and I know we’re gonna do it again and in fact we’ll do something again on my other podcast. So I’m gonna cross promote my other podcast done for you show. And we’re gonna talk a little bit more in detail about source bottles, something you mentioned there.

We’ll do that another time very soon. But for now, Kate, thanks so much for being a part of the program and we will include all the details on how to get in touch with you in the show. Fantastic. Thanks so much for having me, Anthony. It’s been a blur. And of course everyone don’t forget to share and subscribe and leave your comments and make sure you never miss an episode.

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