Whether you’re getting your ducks in a row, laying down the foundations of your business, or trying to establish yourself as an expert in your chosen space, there’s some boxes you’ll need to tick.

Firstly, have the credentials. You’ll have much more kudos as an expert if you’ve spent a generous length of time working in that sector, have a relevant degree and have been contributing to the thought leadership or improvement of your industry for a period of time. It also helps if you’re passionate about it and love what you do.

Having a solid background and some runs on the board is important to establish you as an expert in your area. The next step is to let others know who you are. Some of the best experts are still unknown because they’re good at what they do, but not so good at promoting what they do. If you want to create a profile in the media you need to put your hand up to let everyone know that you’re available and willing to comment.

Creating a relationship with the media is a process. It starts with you being introduced as an expert in a particular field to make comment on that industry. Media Stable facilitates this process and is therefore the perfect place for experts to register who want to engage with reactive and proactive commentary in their field of expertise.

The next part of the process is about the organisational elements of being an expert and preparing you to make commentary. You need to be available, you need to be flexible with times and most importantly you need to want to do this. You’d be amazed by the amount of experts the media requests a comment from who miss out because they’re “not ready” or “not available”. If you can’t commit your chances of making it as a known expert are very slim indeed.

If you’ve made it through those hurdles, the next step and the key to getting asked back or providing regular commentary is the execution of your interview or appearance. You never get a second chance to make a first impression. The difference between making yourself a ‘media asset’ or someone the media won’t use again is in the execution of your media engagement. Be lively, be fresh, be unique, be different and most importantly be yourself. The media doesn’t need another ‘Barefoot Investor’ or ‘Bernard Salt’, so don’t be afraid to walk your own path. Be authentic, be true to yourself and make sure you understand the audience you’re delivering to.

I believe that the post media engagement period might be the most important of all. You’ve done the hard work of making your content media relevant, faced the pressure of a media engagement to fail at the last hurdle. Now you need to share this piece of media with your audience, your followers, your business so it extends its reach and your opinion is heard. Share it through every channel you have at your disposal; social media platforms, newsletters, EDMs, your website and any other way your industry communicates.

These are the basics to get you started, but there’s one more key to making it in media. Attend the event that the media attend.. #MeetTheMedia is the perfect place to learn, understand and connect with the media that you are looking to engage with.

There’s no replacement for meeting someone in the media face-to-face and there’s no better place to hear from those that make daily media decisions, and gain valuable insight into why they choose certain stories and overlook others.

A seat at this table is priceless. See you at our next #MeettheMedia event.

By Nic Hayes, Managing Director, Expert Registry

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