Episode 19: How to Delegate PR Outreach to Assistants/Interns with Marketing Communications Specialist Emi Hockett
Are you ready to start pitching to and connecting with editors but feel overwhelmed by the amount of time it will take?
We’re joined by marketing communications specialist Emi Hockett, my former intern, to talk about her role in the development of my business and how she handles outreach.
Emi Hockett specializes in small business development and growth for female founders including coaches, consultants, strategists, and agency owners in the digital space. She manages everything marketing-related like social media, copywriting, branding, and sales, improving synergy and efficiency throughout the business while establishing trust and genuine connections with the target audience, collaborators, and potential partners and investors.
In this episode, we’re going through how to find and work with an assistant or intern so that they can do outreach for you while still getting press success. Emi is sharing her best advice on making connections, following up, staying organized, and so much more.
Topics We Cover in This Episode:
How to lead with value
The importance of making genuine connections with people
Why you don’t need tons of experience to get featured
Being strategic about who you’re pitching to
How to take advantage of social media
Finding the right person to join your team
The importance of having a good follow-up strategy
How to keep your outreach organized
Making it clear that you’ve done your research on people you’re reaching out to
Making a good first impression
How to handle rejection
Remember, it’s never too late to pitch to someone. Take control of what you can and let go of the rest. Don’t waste your energy worrying about people who don’t respond or what someone might say.
If you’ve been thinking about hiring an assistant or intern, I think you should go for it. I hope this episode helps you to do just that!
Do you want to implement a proven strategy so you can get your brand in front of thousands of customers for free? I am hosting a LIVE PR Masterclass on February 2nd & 3rd that will show you the step-by-step framework that has gotten entrepreneurs just like you onto the outlets of their dreams. Join me, ask questions, and get ready to learn what works and what doesn't. Head to www.gloriachoupr.com/masterclass to register!
Resources Mentioned:
Connect with Emi on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/emihockett
Follow Emi on Instagram: https://instagram.com/emi_hockett?utm_medium=copy_link
Additional Resources:
Join the Small Biz PR Pros FB group
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Transcript
SBPR Episode 19 Final..mp3
Speaker1: [00:00:00] Are you ready to start pitching and connecting with editors, but feel overwhelmed with the amount of time it might take? Well, this episode we will go through exactly how you can find and work with an assistant or intern so that they are doing the outreach for you, but you are still able to get press success.
Speaker2: [00:00:18] Hey, friends, I'm Gloria Chou, small business PR expert, award winning pitch writer and your unofficial hype woman. Nothing makes me happier than seeing people get the recognition they deserve. And that starts with feeling more confident to go bigger with your message, because let's be honest, we simply cannot make the impact. We're here to make, by hiding behind the scenes. So on this podcast, I will share with you the untraditional yet proven strategies for PR marketing and creating more opportunity in your business. If you are ready to take control of your narrative and be your most unapologetic and confident self, you're in the right place. This is the Small Business PR podcast.
Speaker1: [00:01:00] All right, everyone. I am so excited to have the one and only Emi Hockett on this show because she used to be my former intern straight out of college, and since then she has played such an important role in building my business. And in fact, she was the one that I was delegating outreach to to get me featured on over 30 podcasts in six months. I'm going to show you in this episode how you can do it too. But first, welcome to the show, Emi. Hey, Gloria,
Speaker3: [00:01:26] Thanks so much for having me. It's like so nostalgic. Every time I get to have this discussion with you, it's like, you know, this is how I built myself and my brand, and it hasn't even been like basically one full year. And now it's like, here I am teaching other people to do it. So it's like it's an honor
Speaker1: [00:01:44] To be part of that. And it's beautiful to see your journey going from being so shy. I remember our Zoom calls where you didn't even want to put the camera on, and now you've seen how I teach you how to how to delegate and actually pitch on my behalf. And now you're pitching yourself right? So tell us about some of the media and podcasts that you have been on.
Speaker3: [00:02:04] Yes, so I think not even not even a full six months after we started working together together and I started seeing the results we were getting for you. It really gave me a lot of confidence like, Oh, this is really this is really doable. Like, I'm doing it for someone else. And I think people always have an easier time implementing things for other people than themselves because then all their mindset blocks get in their way. But you're you taught us well, so I thought, you know, let's just try it out. Start building those relationships, especially because I have nothing to lose like I don't really have. I didn't have a business at that point, so there was nothing really riding on these features. It was just I kind of looked at it as a practice, you know, for your business. But I started pitching myself the type of work I do with female founders, you know, the college intern angle. And you know, I started getting asked to be on podcast and pitching for features. So I think I've had features and like Medium Authority magazine Thrive Global and I've been on a lot of other mindset coaches, life coaches, PR podcasts as well.
Speaker1: [00:03:12] So kind of a
Speaker3: [00:03:14] Variety just kind of testing out, seeing what I like to do and what converts well. But yeah, I think the main point was just that those methods, even for someone that didn't have a business that wasn't making money like can get featured like there are absolutely no requirements. You just have to know how to lead with value and how to really connect with the person you're trying to make a connection with. And so I'm excited to go over how to do that today.
Speaker1: [00:03:42] I'm so excited that you found me on my masterclass, and even because I don't think you were even studying PR, you kind of were just looking for an internship. And now you're such a confident business owner. And for anyone that's listening that thinks that they are not experienced enough to get featured or that they don't have someone vouching for them, you are the prime example of why anyone can get featured. I mean, you said you were an intern out of college and you had experience and that people wanted to learn from insight, right? So tell me a little bit about how that has shaped you and the way that you view yourself and the value that you give to the world, because it's only still been like only two years since you graduated.
Speaker3: [00:04:19] Right? Yeah, just about two years now. You know, like I said, when I saw your master class, I was an unpaid intern. I had no business. And it's just the methods made so much sense. I'm like, Why does not like, why doesn't everyone do this? I didn't even know what PR stood for when when I came to the class. So it was a really quick. It was a really quick transition. Like that kind of opens up those opportunities like, OK, I see that it's possible now. Just how do you make the best use of it? So for people that already have businesses, most of the people on your master class, they're there for a more strategic reason than I was. But you know, we've seen before people getting featured right after the class. It's like, this is a common like a common occurrence. So I think for the people that actually implement what the strategies are like, there's really no excuses. Unpaid intern, jobless, it's like you just you just have to be strategic with who you're pitching to and your relevant angles. But it's a big confidence booster when you can get that first feature. But I think a lot of people get discouraged when they're pitching their pitching. Forbes straight off the back and they're not hearing the results. It's like, take your time practice with the smaller outlets, the more local ones and build up to it. Like, there's absolutely nothing wrong with that.
Speaker1: [00:05:34] Yeah, and for anyone that has not watched a masterclass that Emi encountered me for the first time, go to gloriachoupr.com/masterclass at Chou and you'll learn exactly about the CPR method. And actually, if you go to episode, I think it's three or four. That is the framework that I teach on there. So but the point of this episode is really about the business owners who know they need PR, who know that they want to get featured, but they always talk themselves out of it because they say, I don't have time or PR has always been done by giving all your power away to an agency. And so what I want to talk about is how I was able to work with me, who was my in-house team member. She was sending emails from my email address and we were able to get the results. So Emi, can you talk to me a little bit about the kind of limiting belief that people are like, Well, I don't have time and I need someone else to do it for me? So how can we still like get someone to do it? For me, for example, you were doing it for me, but the benefits of owning that relationship and having that on my email and not a PR agency email.
Speaker3: [00:06:35] So. I mean, like you said, like the. Exactly. Having that relationship to yourself is so is so key because it gives you kind of like endless opportunities when say, something does pop up like a current event or something, you're you have that opportunity to to reach out to them so you can reach out to them. Hey, I saw this happen in the news. Here's how it's affected my business or and kind of just on a more personal level, give them those like very specific details because journalists love that, right? Like they would have to be doing that work themselves, like when a current event happens or whatever they would have to go do their research. Ok, how is this affecting you? How is this affecting you? But if you own your media relationships, when something does pop up last minute or spontaneously like, you can take advantage of it so much more quickly rather than dialing your agency like, hey, maybe we can pitch something like this because, you know, at an agency, they really have control over the story over the contact. So say, for especially a lot of the founders are in your community, are very like creative. They don't really have that opportunity to take advantage of that if they're working with an agency.
Speaker1: [00:07:48] Yeah. And let's be honest, it's the pandemic times. No one is going to fancy networking hours. Everyone's at home. So the time is now to get into that editor's inbox. Your shot is just as good as someone else's, right? We have social media, we have LinkedIn. We have so many ways and you've seen it. I mean, because this is exactly how we were able to do with me. So now that, you know, the benefits of actually taking this in-house and no, you don't need to hire a PhD PR person or someone that has worked in a big PR firm. Again, I hired you straight out of college and we were able to implement these methods, right? So it could be an assistant, it could be a paid intern. It could be someone who is a little bit junior. But as long as you have a pitch and you have the media list and the media contacts, you can delegate that outreach just 15 minutes a day. So that brings me to my second question is how do people find an assistant? A lot of people are like, I don't know how to find these people. So how how can we make this easy for them?
Speaker3: [00:08:40] Right, so. I think taking advantage of social media is huge. I found a lot of my clients just through Instagram, through Clubhouse, even LinkedIn has been getting more traction lately, so I really love Instagram. But I think finding those kind of strategic groups, VA communities like there are such niche communities now because everyone is trying to be aligned with their mission and goals. So you have you start seeing in Facebook a ton of these, like very, very specific groups popping up with very specific purposes. So, for example, like tech VAs for car truck course creation. Ok, well, now you have 50 people to choose from for that one very, very specific thing. So I would definitely take advantage of those types of groups. And, you know, because a lot of them have standards for joining the group in the first place, you have to go through answer questions to make sure you're a credible person. So I do think looking in groups like that are a good place to get an idea. And then when it comes down to the actual like interview process, I feel like that's where a lot of people. It could be done a little bit better because, you know, you can write anything down on paper, right? You can put any type of credibility, tasks, experience, but you don't know how that translates to your specific working style and business environment because it's so customized for every person. So I would say the biggest thing for me is especially when you're looking for someone for outreach on your behalf, you really have to find someone that one hundred percent believes in what you're doing and believes in your mission and understands it otherwise. Because it is, it can be kind of repetitive work. And if you're not like obsessed with the business model and the person you're working with, it's it's not going to be fun for that person and it's going to get old really, really quickly.
Speaker1: [00:10:42] Yeah, exactly. And this is not really about like level of experience. We don't need like a professional copywriter. We need someone who, like you said, is bond to the mission and is not afraid to keep pitching and pitching and pitching because a lot of it is in the follow up, right? And you know this too, because you've you've done this outreach for me and a lot of times it's the first email and then the follow up and then on Instagram and then boom, it's like, Oh yeah, I have an opening in my calendar right here. So, so again, just to reiterate, you can find them on Facebook. You can find VA, which stands for virtual assistant communities on Clubhouse and Instagram on LinkedIn. And you can also go back to your university, right, and send that position to the university, maybe a PR or marketing communications major. So I think that that is absolutely huge. So now that we've basically found one, we know that we want someone who is a good writer but doesn't have to be like an expert writer, but someone who has that hunger has that passion. What are we supposed to do first in terms of setting them up for success to send those emails?
Speaker3: [00:11:41] Yes, so I think just being super clear with them on the importance of what they're actually doing, like why we're doing it, the benefits and the end results we're trying to see from it because obviously, like it's so much more than just sending an email so much more than just pushing send, copy and paste. So I think if they really understand the why and the reasoning behind what they're doing, it makes it a lot easier to do the work and be proud of the work they're doing because I think people, you know. Don't want to just be known for copy and pasting sending, because that's not what it is, that's really not what outreach is about. Like this is a very it's very integral especially to to your goals. So kind of like getting clear on that first is really important. And I think when people think, oh, like it's just an intern, oh, it's just a part time worker, they're not really looking at them as a core team member yet. But we mentioned this earlier. Even if you're just working with someone for one day, you need to see the value that they're bringing to your company and as a person.
Speaker1: [00:12:48] Yeah, one hundred percent, I think I think especially this person is going to be doing the outreach for you. That's going to get you visibility. This person needs to have have that respect and you need to have that relationship where you trust them to outreach on your behalf. That brings me to my next question. A lot of people ask me is, OK, so I have someone on my team now. Do they send emails on their account or my account? And do they pretend that they're my assistant? Or do they just write as if it's me that's writing?
Speaker3: [00:13:14] Yeah. So I think when you're starting out it when, like with a new person, it is good to use like a separate team email and actually have it as. Like written from your assistant or from whoever it is, and I only say that when, especially when starting out is because there's going to be like a learning curve. There's probably going to be mistakes that are made. We've seen it before. You spell somebody's name wrong. You get the business name wrong because you're sending out so many emails, things can get crossed over. So when you're sending it from the perspective of the assistant, if you do accidentally offend someone or make a mistake, it doesn't reflect directly on you. Like, Oh, that was my intern, we just brought them on and they're trying it out. I'm so sorry for this mistake, but it doesn't reflect like directly as you the one who made the mistake, so I think it is good for practice and when starting out at once, you've decided that this person really understands your messaging and your tone of voice, then I think it is good to switch over to first person because I think it just gives the other party like, Oh, this person is taking the time to personally contact me and do their research. I think it's a better look when you can do it yourself. But when starting out just to kind of give you that onboarding time and buffer, I think it's good to have someone else.
Speaker1: [00:14:44] Yeah, that's actually really brilliant because I think at first you were sending emails for me and then we just you just started sending emails as me, you know, from like, mad email. So for anyone that's listening, feel free to set up a new email. I don't like press at. I don't like info at. It's a little spammy. I like team at company.com or maybe hello at, but we send out all of our email outreach from team@gloriachoupr.com. That's how I was able to get on to all the podcasts and things. And then obviously you give your assistant that access to that Gmail Gmail account so you can use things like LastPass. You can have lots of different softwares where you don't actually share the password with them, but it's kind of a password protector. So obviously you also want to give them the LinkedIn and Instagram because as I say this all the time to my PR starter pack members, it's not just an email, it's also following up on social media. So to that end, I mean, what do you have to say about kind of the follow up strategy? Like what have you learned in terms of when is the best time to send an email? What is the best way to follow up? Because we all know that follow up, follow up, follow up is what makes the feature happen.
Speaker3: [00:15:47] Right, so I think it's a little bit different for email versus social media, so email, I definitely think earlier in the day, early in the week, so it's at the top of their inbox type of thing and they kind of have the work week to get through it if they're like you need to go further back down in their emails. But on social media, I found a little bit later in the day is actually helpful if you're trying to build a connection with someone because during the day people are busy, they're working. So if you can catch them kind of like when they're transitioning over into their like nighttime social time, I've actually found that you can have more genuine conversations like a little bit later on social media, then you can like earlier in the day when everyone is working.
Speaker1: [00:16:32] Yeah, that's good. So definitely, you know, and I say this all the time too, and my starter pack is you want to send the email around like eight to 11 a.m. at their time. So that way it's kind of at the top of their inbox, right? And in terms of follow up, you probably want to follow up either right after or like within twenty four to forty eight hours because you want to stay top of mind. So so that's that. And then a couple of other do's and don'ts in terms of like organizing the media list and kind of like how do you make like a column and just just keep your outreach organized? Like how what did you do for me, for example?
Speaker3: [00:17:04] Right. So I think it's definitely good to. Kind of prioritize, especially we are working off your media lists, which are giant, right? You get in the PR starter pack. You have thousands of options, so that can be really overwhelming. So you kind of want to prioritize what are the main type of outlets? Are they big size, medium size, small size and kind of have like a strategy before you start? Because I think people see all these contacts, you know, they have their pitch and they're overwhelmed. They're like, Well, it doesn't really make sense to, yeah, you can just throw spaghetti at the wall randomly. But if you want to track how your emails are doing, who's responding, what types of outlets are showing more interest? It's better to be a little bit strategic with those categories. So I would say if you're working with an intern, don't just throw the list at them and say, Go, because that's overwhelming for anyone. There's a reason you don't want to do it yourself and you don't have time to do it yourself. So if you take that initial time to work out a strategy, take 10 medium size outlets and 10 top tier ones and 10 very, very local niche ones. And then your outreach is going to be a little bit different for each like how personalized you want to make it, versus how much data and statistics you want to add in, because different outlets will look at that type of different content. So because we know how important it is to customize the pitch, right? So if you kind of group things together, it's going to be a lot easier on the intern and a lot easier to track response data. If you're kind of working in groups and not having to customize and change everything all over the place because that's that's chaotic, right?
Speaker1: [00:18:55] And in terms of setting it up like we have over 60 to 70 media lists. And so if you are in a beauty, for example, right, the gift guide media list is going to be a little bit different angle than like someone who covers general wellness. So the gift guide one, it might be a little bit more specific as to what is the best selling product and why you were trying to pitch this gift guide. Let's say it's Valentine's Day or for Mother's Day, rather than an all year round pitch about your product. So that's definitely a way to do it. And after you get the media list in the PR starter pack, you can definitely highlight and kind of like pick your top 15 or 50 out of each list and put it into a new list. So that's kind of like just tactically how how you can do that. So what are some of the what are some of the don'ts, right? So we talked about the do's, right? So so like, optimize your LinkedIn spend 15 minutes a day to organize and send the email DM follow up transfer contacted editors to a new sheet. But what are some don'ts?
Speaker3: [00:19:50] So I definitely think when you're starting out, when you're hot, like onboarding a new person. Yes, there is a certain level of copy and paste because your base pitch and your personal info is the same, right, but you do need to be careful with that because when you're sending so many emails, there's a lot of like easy things that you can miss. You can forget to take somebody's name out, you can leave a statistic in or even something as simple as, oh, like, I mainly work with women founders. Like if you're pitching maybe a, you know, a men's magazine for something that isn't going to be a good point to include, like, maybe like. So I mean, maybe that's not a great example, but you know what I mean? There are like very like key like niche industries for people. So if you attack the wrong niche or the wrong keywords for somebody else's industry, they're going to be like, Did this person do their research? Why is this the points they're presenting to me, even though those might have been really great for other outlets? So you do have to be a little careful when you're copy and pasting and making sure you know, just basic editing things, making sure you're reading through, OK, I didn't make any mistakes. It's good to go. But I think when things can seem repetitive, that kind of stuff can get skipped over.
Speaker1: [00:21:13] Yeah, it's definitely not rocket science with the methods that we have, but it's not as simple as just copy and pasting. And I know this now because I have a podcast and people pitch me. I can tell right away when they're copy and pasting, get my name wrong. Or there's like a weird font size for my name and they just switch it up, right? So you want your intern, VA or contractor to have attention to detail, but they don't have to be an expert copywriter. Again, it's really not about the writing skill set if you know how to write a pitch. And obviously I teach you that like all my masterclass and in with the CPR method, but it's more about like that persistence, right? Do they feel comfortable following up? Like I always say, like, I am like the most persistent person I know, like I will knock on every single door like you want to have a bit of that energy because that's really the energy you need to get featured. And so you want to make sure that your intern or virtual assistant or in-house assistant, they have that tenacity that they're going to keep following it because that's literally, I think, 80 percent of what it takes to get featured is like, are you willing to keep following up because so many people just stop at the first email or the second email? Is there anything else that you think we should be cognizant of as like as leaders, as bosses, when we are picking the person who we want to delegate this important task to? I mean, I think.
Speaker3: [00:22:30] It's really great. Well, I think first impression is really important, right? There might be someone you interview that has a ton of skill and a ton of experience, and they really seem like they know what they're doing. But I think that the passion and drive to work with you specifically and because virtual assistants, they work with client after client after client, it's just that's their business, that's their mindset. But maybe someone who has less experience like an intern is just getting into the the working field. You know, they're a lot more impressionable and I think a lot more eager to have experience with you personally. So that's what it was for me. I like you said I wasn't a PR intern, but I was just so blown away by you and your methods. It's like, this is the kind of person I want to work under. So I think if you had a choice between, Oh, this person has so much skill versus, Oh, this person is so enthusiastic about me and my business, I would go with that because people like someone who just has skill like they can leave whenever they want, they have no attachment to you. They can go anywhere with their skills, right? But someone that you personally invest in, it's just going to you're going to be able to build like a lot better relationship and understanding with them.
Speaker1: [00:23:53] Yeah, and that's why, like, I have a lot of different experts I hire in my business, but this outreach one is the one I prefer to hire, really eager to intern. I give them a stipend because I think there's a lot of skills to be developed here. So it's there's something in it for them to write or it's like they're learning while I'm learning as well. And they can see the story go from the pitch to the follow up to getting on the phone to schedule the interview. And then they see that reward. It's like a win for them, whether it's really quick, like the one you've been able to get from me, or it might take a little bit longer and then that gives you confidence to do it for yourself. And now you're doing this for other people. So I mean this, this stuff works. I want to get a little bit about kind of like the pay, because I think a lot of people kind of talk around the subject. They don't really want to talk about it. And I have a very strong feeling against like unpaid interns like I don't really believe in, like completely unpaid work. So I always give some kind of stipend like financial stipend on top of whether it's like a trip or a retreat. But how do you feel about because now you've worked with different founders about, you know, how much you should pay like an intern versus the VA versus a contractor? And how do you just be a good human?
Speaker3: [00:25:04] So actually, that's a really that's a really great conversation point because I don't I don't get to talk about it too often. But now that I have worked with multiple clients and seen multiple different interns brought on, it's it is really interesting because for me, I started out doing like almost like three or four unpaid internships, and I was personally really OK with that because money was not my driving factor. I wanted the experience. I really wanted to work with you. It's not like you didn't have options to work with other people. And I think also I'm also the type I get. I get stressed easily or pressured easily. So I was actually it's kind of a feeling of. A little bit of relief, like when someone is paying you a lot of money, you want to be producing really good work and showing results, and then if you're not showing results like I have that kind of guilty feeling like, oh, like what am I getting paid for? But I also think. You know, now that I've worked with more people like knowing my value like it is an investment like when even if you're brand new and you know, nothing like that, like kind of the responsibility of the founder, it's like they're investing in you. So if your mindset, like my mindset, for example, was, was that like, Oh, if I don't do a good job, I don't deserve to get paid. And that's like, I don't think you want to have that mindset. I think if you recognize that, that's the mindset people are having, you really should try to bring them out of that. And that's what you do with everyone in your community like know your worth and your value, like everyone has that learning curve. So you need to kind of understand in the beginning, it's like how you pay someone.
Speaker1: [00:26:56] And the expectation.
Speaker3: [00:26:57] Yeah, exactly. I think maybe just knowing what their driving factor is, right? And so I think it's really great that you ask, what are you looking to get out of this? But at the same time, I feel like no one goes into any interview saying, Oh, well, money or income, because it just doesn't look good in the interview process. If you're if that's what you're saying, you're motivating factor is. But so I think it takes a little bit more like digging deeper and making sure the person is comfortable, right? So I really like shorter term contracts that leave opportunity for that review period to discuss pay. So once I started working with you, every contract we had was OK, now we can discuss your task, discuss your pay, and every time it was more and more because I was getting more confident. You were seeing results. So starting out, it can be tricky because there are a lot of people that are willing to work for free just for experience. And then there are a lot of people that need internships, but they don't have that opportunity or that luxury to be working for free. So it really depends, I guess, who the intern is. But yeah, that's hard because. We don't have we don't always have that luxury, but at the same time, what is your what is your driving factor? So it's definitely it's definitely a bigger conversation. I'm really thankful that I was fortunate enough to be able to start out for free. So I think even if there say there are younger people listening, it's just you have to know your value if you can. If you're OK with working for free, then maybe you don't know your value and that's something you need to work on first. And that's a lot of mindset work. So yeah, it's definitely. Take it case by case type of thing, but I think it's really great that it's something you prioritize because a lot of people don't and will take advantage of free labor.
Speaker1: [00:28:57] Yeah. And it's also like it's a lot of energy, like what you put in and what you put. And let's look, maybe you don't have the funds to pay a lot of money, but then really trained this person and let them be an equal partner. So having conversations like, what do you think about this pitch? What do you think that we should do in Q1? How can we do this? And that way, they feel like they're not just doing some like copy and pasting that they have an actual hand in shaping your company, right? For example, for you and Ainsley, like we flew out twice to New York, right? That was like after working. And now you now you have like, like a really awesome business now where you're working with people, you produce results, but always, always think about what is in it for them and what you invest in a person. That's exactly what you're going to get out of it. So like even now we have we work together now since the beginning of my business in two years. And you know, you have your own business and I'm able to call you up and be like, Hey Emi, I need help with this. Do you mind coming back for like a few hours a week now? Granted, your hourly rate is like, like five times what it was, but I'm willing to pay it because like, you know, I know that you have the experience that you're invested, and it's so much better for me to invest in someone like you who understands my mission than just get someone else who looks like they could do the same thing. But they really they really don't understand my tone of voice, you know,
Speaker3: [00:30:12] And it's really trial and error. It's hard what I've noticed a lot with every client I work with team building and leadership. It's really difficult because it's not something like, OK, you work on a team project in school, great. Like, we don't really learn these skills like when you are in charge of other people and there's a lot of money on the table because of it. There's so many moving parts. It's a learning process for everyone. So I think from like a worker's point of view, you invest it in me. But I also made the decision to invest in you like I could have left at any time to go work with another client, but I saw the investment of staying with you and growing with you. So I think it's both ends need to kind of make that investment in each other for it to actually be like a successful long term team.
Speaker1: [00:31:03] Yeah. And the upsides are so much, right? Because it's like not only you're saving tens of thousands of dollars like you are yourself doing this exercise of finding out how you are able to master your own story. So we're kind of getting to the top of the half hour here. What do you want to leave my my audience strip with? What is the one thing you want to remind them or the question that you think that they're asking that? I haven't asked yet. Hmm.
Speaker3: [00:31:25] Do we cover rejections
Speaker1: [00:31:27] Or that's a big one. Yeah, let's talk about rejection because people are like, Oh, I want to send the email and then it's like, silence. So yeah, what happens after the email? I talk about that.
Speaker3: [00:31:36] Yeah. So I guess after the email, I'm personally a bigger fan of connecting on social media. Like, I definitely understand the value of an email because that's its long form. You can put a lot more information on there, but I really do like heading over to social media sometimes. Even first, I head over to social media and say, like, Oh, could I send you more information on this and then send the long form email? So it kind of depends on what type of pitch you have, I think, and how much time you have. So I think a lot of people are looking for super quick wins, but that's not that's just not how it works. You know, like journalists have thousands of emails to go through. If you want a super quick win like you pay for it, that's just how it works or you can get lucky. We've seen plenty of people get a response in 12 hours. Twenty four hours like it happens, but I don't think you should have that expectation like, oh, because I send an email and follow it up, like, there's no reason they shouldn't be responding to me, especially if it's a more top tier outlet like you should put in the work for their attention, obviously, because you haven't gotten featured before. It's not enough just to have an amazing product and amazing story like you yourself have to put that work in and make that connection just because there's so much competition like it's so I don't think you should get discouraged and I always try to when I if I get upset that like someone's not responding, you know, of course, in your teachings, you know, tweak your subject line.
Speaker3: [00:33:12] There's a lot of tweaks you can make. But honestly, I go more the mindset route, just to put it in perspective, like, look, this person gets eight hundred emails a day. It's the holiday season. Everyone is getting sick and kind of just remind myself like, OK, it's not me. There is a million other factors that are going on at the same time. So kind of just putting it in perspective to not get down on myself, but also balancing with that like, OK, maybe it is my subject line. Maybe it is like it's. Too wordy, so it's kind of a mix, there's so many other factors it could be. It's never just you, but take control of the things you can control, like I can't control who's sick or what holiday it is or how many emails they're getting. But I can control when I'm sending mine and how I'm connecting with them. So just take advantage of what you can control and don't stress about all the things you can't because it's just wasted energy.
Speaker1: [00:34:09] Exactly. And you're just such a prime example of kind of our scrappy approach to PR and Tanisha from episode two or three where she was not even launched and she got on like 10 plus outlets. And what kept her going know after we work together was like, I don't know this person on the other end. So so what if they say no? The upside of them say yes, or maybe or even responding so I can then go back and say, this is not a good story for you. Do you know anyone else? And that's exactly how she got into shape. Actually Shape magazine that just remind yourself that it's it's really not personal and you need to keep following up because journalists are so used to getting emails. And if you're going to want to compete with the ten thousand a month agency, you need to be able to be OK with rejection. So on that note, thank you so much for being here. I so appreciate seeing your journey from fresh out of college, attending my master class, not knowing what PR is to now being your own CEO and working with other founders and getting press for yourself.
Speaker3: [00:35:12] Yeah, no. I really didn't know where today's conversation was going to go. We had a lot of really interesting points that even I'm like, OK, maybe I do need to take a step back and think about this for myself as well, too. But it's like, very OK. Now I want to be inspired, like New Year, new me. Let's kind of get back into it, right? Because I can say, OK, I did all these things last year, but kind of been sitting at home this year. So we got to we got to get on it. I'll get some pitches out next week.
Speaker1: [00:35:39] It's never too late to pitch again because remember, the journalists will go back to their email and dig up something. Even if they don't respond, they are keeping it in there because they're getting assignments from editors, and you never know when they're going to do that search. And that's exactly what my friend Jennifer Dawkins said. But Business Insider says as well as she doesn't respond to every email, but whenever she's tasked with something, she'll go back into her inbox and do a quick search. So please, please, please, my friend, if it's one thing we want to both tell you is you deserve, you deserve to pitch and pitch office or throw your name in the hat.
Speaker3: [00:36:11] You have nothing to lose. Absolutely nothing to lose. There is zero downside.
Speaker2: [00:36:22] Hey, small business heroes, I am so excited that you just finished another episode of the Small Business PR podcast. You are one step closer to getting featured on your dream outlet. Each time you finish an episode now, if you love listening and make sure that you follow the show and let me know what you think about it by leaving a review, it's going to be able to help more people discover the show and also get the benefits like you are now of listening to this episode. Thank you so much, and I'll talk to you next week.