Why Media Training for Senior Leaders is Crucial for Your Brand

We often get asked about media training, whether a brand should run training sessions and who within a company should receive it.

Put simply, media training is a must, especially if you’re a consumer facing business, and it’s important from the outset to decide who will front the brand when talking to the media.

As a rule of thumb, it’s the senior team that will need to be the face of the brand and will require training.

This group will represent the brand to celebrate good news, in a crisis situation or simply to be the designated person for the press to speak to when they want a comment or an opinion on something.

Some people will be natural at talking to the press and take it all in their stride, for others it can be a more daunting experience.

But regardless, media training is essential to help ensure messaging is correct, build confidence and give interviewees the tools they need in a media interview situation.

Here are the benefits to having a media trained senior team:

Builds confidence

Talking to the media can be daunting so having training to help these brand representatives overcome nerves is important. The key is to practice, practice and practice some more with different scenarios. A good trainer will have this covered off.

Understanding how the media works

It’s down to a good PR team to brief a spokesperson on the media outlet they’re talking to. This will help identify some of the questions they may ask and the direction the interview may go. For example a trade publication will have a different angle to a major UK national. They’re targeting different audiences and will write the story to appeal to that target group.

Messaging

It is easy to go off topic so keeping replies concise with no waffle and being in message is a key skill for any media spokesperson. Be clear on the messages the brand wants to get across in the interview and keep referring back to them.

Shaping the narrative

Knowing how to frame the story, bring questions around to what the brand wants to say allows a spokesperson to shape the narrative and convey exactly what they want.

Tackling difficult questions

Journalists can ask tricky questions which means a spokesperson will have to think on their feet to give an answer. However, preparing beforehand and running through any potentially difficult questions will certainly help.

To find out about media training for your business, please get in touch.