10

BREAKING NEWS

How to Get Media Without Knowing Anyone

If you don’t like the news, go out and make some of your own.

—WES NISKER

A booming voice shouted at me: “Excuse me! You can’t go in there!”

I kept walking as if I didn’t hear him.

“Hello?”

Luckily, the security guard didn’t get up from behind his desk. He cared enough to shout at me but not enough to actually chase me down. Everything was going according to plan.

As he continued to yell, I was still pretending to be on my cell phone, and me and my crisp-lined pantsuit (yep, one of the leftovers from the banking days) continued to zip right past him. I had my hair pulled back, and I felt I could be cast in the part of a young business journalist (Lois Lane—the ethnic version). I was so glad I thought of the cell phone move at the last minute. I quickly turned the corner, getting out of his visual range, and ducked into an elevator that was just closing. I was in.

The New York Times Building was big. I had one more front desk checkpoint to get past (what was this, the Pentagon?), but it was so important to get through. I needed to convince a Times food writer—any Times food writer—to accept my package and, hopefully, to write about my new restaurant. So what if I didn’t really have an appointment with—er—any of them?

Game on.

 

It was September 2005 and my restaurant was being built on the Upper East Side. In the meantime, I had put together a map of the city that included every single newspaper, magazine, television station—anywhere and everywhere that could possibly feature the restaurant in their New Openings or Food sections. I put together a list of my favorites: the New York Times, Time Out New York, Daily Candy, the Food Network, the New York Post, New York magazine, ABC, NBC, Food & Wine, and a few others.

I thought about what could possibly make them want to write about an unknown, first-time restaurateur? I wasn’t a chef, I wasn’t a TV personality, I was just little old me. I would have to get creative.

I created a press release for my grand opening and made it sound as exciting as I could. I remember Rich Wolf had worked with a PR firm on his press release, so I used his as a model. I used phrases like exclusive opening and intimate event. I sent the letters to the addresses I found online, crossed my fingers, said a prayer . . . and waited. This was a different proposition than inviting people to a brainstorming session.

My response rate was a big fat doughnut.

I suppose the press wasn’t clamoring to get an invitation to the “exclusive opening” of a pizza shop. It seemed that unless the Kardashians were showing up, the media didn’t really care. What could I do that would make them care?

Wait, what if I showed up and delivered an invitation to these people at the press houses myself? Maybe then I would get a better success rate. It would be rude to reject someone in person, especially if I’m smiling and holding a boxed offering of freshly baked pizza . . . right?

It made me think of one evening when I was still working at the bank and finally spending my first weekend at home after working twelve consecutive weekends. (Yes, the math you just did in your head is correct. That’s three months without a single day off.) As I walked toward my couch to zone out and enjoy the simple things that sustained me, such as my grilled salmon, sautéed veggies, and reruns of Seinfeld, I saw a note slide into my mail slot and fall on my floor. For the most part, I loved having a mail slot and not having to walk to a mailbox, but there were those few times when I slipped on my mail and almost fell on my ass, which certainly is not fun when you walk in, late at night, possibly a little tipsy from an evening out.

I picked up the note. I was especially curious as it looked like something I’d receive from a friend. I looked outside my window to see who brought it and nobody was within visible distance. The note was handwritten. It read:

Hi, Neighbor!

We are pleased to let you know that our place is finally open for the neighborhood to enjoy! Please come in with this note and try any appetizer on us. We look forward to meeting our friends around the corner and we can’t be more thrilled to be here. Enclosed is our menu.

Best,

Susan and Dave

Owners of Café Around the Corner

I remembered thinking how cute this was. It was so sincere, personal and homemade, and it made me want to give them my business.

Now was the time to use this idea. I called Richard to help me come up with a really creative package to deliver to the media. I didn’t want to create the standard press kit, which basically consisted of a folder with a bunch of boring papers inside that talked about the new business. It clearly hadn’t worked when I sent the press release and invitation the first time.

I wanted to create something different. Something memorable.

Together we decided that we needed to have something with a bit more shock value because mom-and-pop restaurants were cute and all, but they didn’t get reviewed in the New York Times. No, we needed something totally different and entirely weird to get the big guns behind us.

We threw out a bunch of ideas. I thought that sending the press kit in a nondescript box would be cool and intriguing. Richard thought maybe we should tell people to not eat anything until our place opened. No idea was too weird.

We both went home to think about our ideas. Richard called me a couple of days later, excited to share what he and his smart branding buddies came up with over a few pints of lager. “What if we created a nondescript brown box that you would then hand deliver to each press outlet? In the box, we would have a note that read in neat, old-school typewritten letters: ‘The perfect food will be arriving shortly. Until then, don’t eat anything.’

“And below the note, put an IV bag in it, like one from the hospital. And let’s make stickers to stick onto the IV bags that read: ‘Should the lack of sustenance prove to be debilitating, please insert tube into vein.’ ”

(Wow, totally weird. And memorable!)

“And then beneath the IV bag, we’d put the menu and opening-day invite. This box will make people stop what they are doing and at the very least tell their friends about it.”

I thought it was totally brilliant.

I had a giant sign printed on white paper that said in big bold letters, “The perfect food will be arriving shortly. Until then, don’t eat anything,” and hung it in the window of my future restaurant. Within minutes, people started coming over and taking photos of it. It was working! I was getting buzz!

I called one of my friends whose dad was a doctor, and he offered to give me fifty IV bags. They arrived at my doorstep one week later.

Next, I bought fifty craft brown boxes and printed the notes and menus to add to the box. I printed out a New York City map, penned in every location I needed to sneak into, and with my bike tires freshly pumped and the boxes assembled and secured in my bike basket and balanced on my handlebars, I took off.

What could have been a successful adventure turned into a minidisaster because within three seconds, the bags on my handlebars hit my front wheel and jammed into it, which kept it from moving forward. As physics was now the star of the show, I flew directly over my bike handlebars and landed in a heap on the street.

Thank goodness that I’d learned the ole tuck-and-roll move back in elementary school. I popped up as fast as I could (c’mon, I was an athlete too), brushed myself off, sheepishly collected all of my boxes that had flown everywhere, turned around, and immediately headed back home.

I tended to my bleeding palms (and bruised ego) and decided that all was not lost—I just needed to reduce my load, slow down, and change my strategy a bit. I decided to make my first stop at Daily Candy. It was the only press house where I had a connection—I had a friend in common with the editor. I figured I’d start there to warm myself up (especially needed while nursing that bruised ego), then be better prepared to walk in cold to all of the other places.

Daily Candy was located downtown Manhattan. I got back on my bike, and a short while later, bandaged palms and all, I walked in as confidently as I could and approached the front desk.

“Hi, I am here to meet with Pavia.” Pavia was at that time the editor in chief of Daily Candy.

“Do you have an appointment?”

“No, but we have a friend, Anne, in common.”

The secretary looked at me and my beaming smile and said, “Ah, OK, let me check.”

She picked up her phone. I held my breath. My face started turning red, I could feel it. (Blushing is the worst. It’s like a big old sign to everyone saying, “I’m nervous!” Ugh.)

“She’s busy but she said she’ll come out to say a quick hi.”

I clutched the brown box tightly and waited. I started sweating. What if she thought this IV bag idea was terrible? What if she was annoyed that someone without an appointment was bothering her? I brushed those thoughts aside and concentrated really hard on what I was going to say.

Pavia walked out a few minutes later and quizzically looked at me. “Hi,” she said.

I greeted her with my warmest smile. I said, “Hi, Pavia! My name is Miki and my friend Anne has been telling me forever that you and I need to meet.”

She smiled, so I continued.

“Anyway, I wanted to actually invite you to our grand opening of my new healthy, farm-to-table pizza place on the Upper East Side! We have gluten-free and vegan options as well! Here is the invitation for it.”

I handed her the box.

She took it but didn’t open it (thank goodness), smiled, and said, “Aw, well that’s nice of you to stop by. I’ll certainly look on my calendar to see if I have an opening that night. Thanks so much for the invitation.” I decided not to ask her outright if she would write about us and hoped that the package would give her the nudge she needed.

I thanked her, gave her a hug, and watched her take the box back to her desk. I hurried out before she could open it.

With my confidence boosted that one person at least took the box, I decided to go big. Next stop: Florence Fabricant (affectionately known as Flo Fab) at the New York Times.

She was one of their most seasoned restaurant critics and if she wrote about the restaurant, it would be a massive boost for my business. I hoped that since she was a woman who had obviously taken her career very seriously, she might empathize with me and my dream. I told myself that it would be a victory if I could just get the box to her, even if I didn’t get a chance to meet her (and become her best friend. OK, getting ahead of myself).

Before walking into the New York Times Building, I stood outside and pretended to be on my cell phone, while looking in through the glass. I wanted to study the movements of the people walking in and out of the security area.

After feeling like I got the rhythm down of how the guard would let one visitor in and call the next person in line waiting, while no longer paying attention to the door, I took a deep breath and started walking toward the turnstiles. As the little doorway was closing, I caught it in time and slipped right in.

I was still pretending to be on the phone when I heard the guard yell at me to stop. I kept my phone to my ear, kept walking as fast as I could, and ducked into an elevator that was just closing.

After a few long, deep breaths to soothe what felt like a heart attack, I pretended to look frustrated like I couldn’t find an address and asked the other people in the elevator if they knew where the food editorial department was. I got the answer I needed and hit the button to that floor.

When I got off the elevator, I saw a secretary sitting at the front desk. She was older and she looked fierce. There was no way I could avoid her. I walked up and told her that I had a package for Florence Fabricant. I asked if I could speak with her.

In a monotone, yet sharp and direct voice, she said, “She’s not here and packages should go through the mail room. I’ll take it this one time.”

“Are you sure she’ll get it?” I asked.

She looked up at me with annoyed eyes and bitingly said, “Yes, she’ll get it, but you’ll be more certain that she’ll get it if you go through the mail room at the service entrance like everyone else.”

She took the box and dismissed me.

Although happy that my box was on its way, my mind started to race. Wait, service entrance? Mail room? All I had to do was put the name of the writer or editor who would be receiving the package and it would 100 percent get to their desks? Well, that made my life much easier! At least if I got reneged at the door, I’d have a backup plan that would work.

Immediately following this experience, I went to all of the other newspapers, magazines, and press houses with a lot less fear, and if I got turned away at the door, or failed in my attempts to get to the intended recipient, I just went to their mail rooms to drop off the rest of my weird boxes. At every stop, I made sure to chat up the mail clerks—after all, I never knew when I’d have to come back! In the end, I hit up fifty places in five days, going back and forth from my apartment with four to five boxes at a time, and although I saw mostly mail rooms, I also got to physically talk with four writers, which was unexpected.

Once the packages were dropped off, all I could do was wait and see what happened. While I waited, I printed out five thousand copies of my menu and wrote a note to my neighbors (similar to what I received in my mail slot), and photocopied the note on a special card stock paper to make it look like I wrote each one by hand.

Rather than sending them through the mail and having them sit there among the Banana Republic catalogs and utility bills, I spent the next week going from building to building (starting from my restaurant and moving north, south, east, and west systematically), waiting for someone to come out of the buildings, then sneaking in and leaving a flyer on the door of every apartment. I knew I could have hired a flyer service to do it, but I wanted to do it myself to make sure that it got done properly and that the letters were sitting on top of the doorknobs and not slid under the door. It was important to separate my note from the rest of the mail noise. I was excited to see if this effort would translate into actual sales.

It was Wednesday, November 9, when I opened up the New York Times dining section and I. Freaked. Out.

There I was, holding one of my signature rectangular pizzas with my consulting chef, Tomas, and an article written by Flo Fab herself! I had no idea that she had gone to my place to actually try the food. The New York Times had asked to come in and take a few shots without promising that there would actually be a piece in the paper. But there it was, in print, for all to read. PIZZAS FOR ALL, BE THEY DUNCES OR GENIUSES (We used to call our plain cheese pizza the Dunce and our build-your-own pizzas the Genius.)

I ran straight to the corner store and bought ten copies. You better believe it that my grandparents in India were getting a copy.

In addition to that review, Daily Candy wrote a dedicated article about us, Time Out New York called us the “Upper Crust of NY,” and a segment aired on Taxi TV via NBC (the little screens in the back of taxis in New York City). All told, my little pizza place was written up by more than fifteen different media outlets in the first year of opening.

I will also mention that 95 percent of my delivery sales that first week came from the note I hand delivered to every apartment in the neighborhood. My tiny, little 450-square-foot healthy pizza shop was officially on the map!

HOW TO GET PRESS WITHOUT KNOWING ANYONE

Here are some straightforward suggestions to help you attract media attention for your new passion project.

STEP 1: Print out a map and pinpoint every media outlet in your city and neighborhood that you are targeting.

Collect as much information as you can on each place—company, address, general phone number, hotline phone number (where you call in for story ideas), e-mail addresses, names of editors and writers, etc.

STEP 2: Call as many media outlets (or press houses, same thing) as you can.

There is generally a phone number to call to pitch story ideas. If you can, always call instead of e-mail, especially in this day and age. People can hide behind e-mails and not respond, but they will have to talk with you if they pick up the phone.

What you say when you do get someone on the phone is crucial, as you usually only get one shot at it. Try this:

Hi! I’m calling in from [name of your company]. I wanted to ask you a couple of quick questions, as I have a really exciting new story to share.

    Since I want to make sure this story is relevant to you and not to waste your time, what kind of stories are you looking to publish right now? A personal piece, goodwill piece, entrepreneurship piece, political piece?

This way, you are starting by engaging them in a question and not pitching them right away. Also, since everyone likes to feel like an expert, generally they will offer advice if you ask for it. In this case, the advice may help you make your pitch back to them even better!

Sometimes, they may not be open to sharing what they’re looking for, but many times they are. The whole point of having a hotline in the first place is for them to get good ideas! The warmer and more confident you sound, the more likely they will answer. If they spell out what they are looking for, all you need to do is create a story that ties into your project.

Then the next question you can ask:

What are some of your most successful stories from this past year and why? What was it about them that made them successful?

This is an important question because (a) you’re still engaging them by asking them questions, and (b) if they answer it, you can tailor your story to be even more appealing to them.

Thank the person and get off the phone. Now you’ve got the information you need. You don’t need to reinvent the wheel, you simply have to find out what worked in the past and how you can be what they are looking for.

STEP 3: Create something original and/or weird and/or funny for writers to want to write about, using the knowledge you gained.

Stay away from writing a long press release, because chances are, nobody is going to read more than the first sentence or two (if you’re lucky). Remember, people think in short sound bites now (just think about Twitter’s 140-character limit or how often you read a Facebook status all the way to the end when it’s longer than a few sentences).

Know your audience. If you know that one editor is more serious than another, try to tailor the package and your delivery to match his or her personality. Otherwise, make it weird enough for everyone to like it. They’ll “get it” in the way they choose to, right?

STEP 4: Personally hand deliver your own press packages.

It will save you money (every parcel delivered in Manhattan by a bike messenger costs about twenty-four dollars), and it is a way to meet the writers and editors when you are dropping the packages off. Great opportunities always arise when you put yourself in the position to have these opportunities.

STEP 5: If you do meet one of the writers or editors, after you hand them the package, give them a hug!

It will completely throw them off guard and sometimes disarm them into actually being friendly and open to what you have to share. (Obviously, use your own judgment here. If the person looks really grumpy or angry, maybe stick with the firm handshake and a big smile! But choose to go in for a hug if you can!)

STEP 6: Try to get an e-mail address to follow up.

Following up is critical in closing the deal. Sometimes writers and editors get really busy and even if they liked you, they may be bogged down by their own deadlines and very distracted, so a gentle nudge the day after you meet them or deliver the goods can be really helpful. And if you don’t hear from them still, follow up a week later. And then every two weeks until you finally hear back. Unless they tell you otherwise, continue to follow up with them. Persistence pays off!

A great way to remember to follow up is to use the free Gmail plug-in called Boomerang. Its function is to bring your sent message back to the top of your in-box so you don’t forget to follow up.

Gmail has another great plug-in called Canned Responses (go to your Gmail settings and you will find the plug-in). If you are pitching the same thing over and over again to many different people, rather than having to copy and paste the same message continuously, you can simply click on CANNED RESPONSES and it will automatically put in the text you want in the body of the e-mail. It will make follow-up and sales calls so much easier!

STEP 7: Write a cute note (sign it yourself!) and flyer all apartments in your neighborhood.

Explain your business idea sincerely and why it’s an MB product for the customer. Do everything it takes for people to get to know you and want to root for you. It worked for that cute café a long time ago and it will work for you too!

The most important thing to remember is to keep going! Don’t stop pushing when you raise the money, and definitely don’t stop pushing when your doors open or when you launch your product—that’s when so many people quit, but that’s only the beginning!

Getting people to learn about your concept and fall in love with it is a challenge, especially if you can’t afford to hire a PR company. But you can do it yourself, you just have to be tenacious and wake up every morning with the plan to get people to know about what you’re doing.