Tips for media relations for local IYA events

•    Build a relationship with the reporter(s) covering your topic.  They may also want your opinion on wire stories they get about astronomy, particularly IYA.  Then they can report “local astronomer Bill Smith really excited by latest discovery” and get your perspective on what the story means.  Building this relationship helps you get their attention when you need it

•    Go to the web page of every radio and TV station and local paper in your area, and find the email for the news desk, the weather person, the entertainment reporter, and the events person. Email the press release to all of them; once you get some responses, just send it to the ones who responded. Reporters dislike finding out someone else in their place is working on the same story.

•    Emphasize human aspect of what we are doing; e.g. awestruck local children looking through a telescope in a local park will be more interesting than stories about the object they are looking at (unless it is something really novel, like a new planet discovery).  Or “local astronomers join international program of observing the heavens”.  The one I hope Ottawa RASC could pull off is “PM Stephen Harper shows the heavens to his kids outside his official residence”.

•    Think about what kind of graphics or pictures will be possible, to make the coverage more attractive.  Highlight local people doing interesting things in visually appealing ways.  Doing interesting things in the dark may be more problematic… but the press can bring the lighting they will need.

•    Give a week or two notice of your event

•    Some news people prefer phone calls, some prefer emails, and for some, FAXed media releases will work.  You can find out from your contact what they prefer. Almost everyone uses email nowadays.

•    If you use a media release, including information for the reporter such as the fact they will need warm clothing and a flashlight, etc.

•    The release is about your event, not about IYA or astronomy in general, so make sure it’s about that. Have a one-line explanation of IYA at the bottom, as well as a one-line tagline for your club. Make sure it’s well written and proofread by someone else before you send it. Write it like a newspaper article, including a quote from yourself about the event – smaller papers and weeklies may just print it verbatim.

•    Remember that weekend coverage is going to be more difficult to get reporters to attend

•    Make sure that you or your contact person are immediately available to the media whenever they call you back; you may only get one chance as they have many stories they could report on

•    Get a cell phone, and always answer it. Only have one contact person in an area – reporters won’t call several people to try and find you. And it needs to be the same person for all of IYA if you want to build up any sort of relationship with the media.

•    Once they have your cell phone number, they may call you spur of the moment to go live on the AM radio show with no warning, so make sure your cell rings quietly or you have an understanding family.