Cheryl Broom (00:00.078)
Hi, I'm Cheryl Broom, CEO of Graduate Communications. How do you get the news media to notice your story or your college in today's super crowded media market? How do you make sure the right message gets out even when you're facing a crisis?

And how do you become better at telling your college's unique story in a way that your audience can pay attention to? Well, these are some of the questions that I had for today's guest, Nancy Marshall, who is the CEO of Marshall Communications. Marshall Communications is a boutique marketing and public relations agency that's been working with clients and the media since its founding in 1991. It's based in Maine, but Nancy and her amazing team have worked

on stories and PR and marketing programs all over the United States. Their disciplined strategic approach to marketing and PR has built brands through relationships and innovative storytelling for more than 30 years. I had such a great time talking to Nancy. She is so much fun and has such a wealth of knowledge and I know you're really going to enjoy the conversation as well.

So Nancy, thank you so much for joining me today. It's a pleasure to be here with you, Cheryl. We're all the way across country. You're in California and I'm in Maine. We're on two different coasts and this is what we call now in San Diego the locals summer because all of the tourists have left and the water is warm and the weather is beautiful. yeah, nice. Well, we call it Indian summer.

We have a of fall foliage visitors. We call them leaf peepers. well, you're on my list to visit. I can't wait to get out and see that. Good. Well, you're welcome any time. I have a guest room at my condo. You're welcome to stay with me. And you have a guest room that.

Cheryl Broom (02:17.95)
you actually use to house sometimes reporters because you're in a really interesting line of work. So tell me about that. Yeah. So I've been doing public relations. I'm almost embarrassed to say how long because it gives my age away but since 1982. It's like, my gosh, will tell you how old I was in 1982.

I feel like I have discovered a profession that I was like, I was born to do this. I have no doubt that, you know, when I came out of the womb as a baby, I was born for public relations, because it pretty much entails kind of all the skills that come naturally to me, whether it's, you know, networking or presenting or presenting story ideas to journalists, or just paying attention to kind of what's going on in the world and trying to

figure out a way to get my clients connected with that. And I'll talk more about that. There's a technique I can talk about called news jacking. That's a really good PR technique. It was Jackie. I like the sound of that. did it you now? Tell me one of the big struggles that, my clients have is, you know, back in the eighties and the nineties and the two thousands, you would write a press release or call your local reporter and you would get coverage. You would.

You know, they would show up for anything or print anything. And now it's really hard to get noticed. Yeah. Although we have more options now too, cause we can be the media ourselves. We as PR people can now produce our own content. Back then we didn't have social media. So we had to totally depend on the media, but now with all of the different social media platforms and websites, we can just put our own content out there. However, I will say that.

news and stories that are shared on websites or in the media that's controlled by journalists that has more credibility. And actually, Google will give that a little bit more authority, like the Wall Street Journal, for example, if you get a story in the Wall Street Journal, that has a lot of domain authority. So Google is more likely to show that to someone searching than the local radio station. Well, definitely that makes sense. So

Cheryl Broom (04:43.736)
How do you do news jacking? So news jacking, part of it is any good PR person should be following what's happening in the news every day, all the time. And how does your story fit in with what's happening nationally or internationally? And then how can you localize that story? So an example is I have a client here in Maine that actually is the only manufacturer of COVID test swabs.

in the whole country and one of only two in the whole world. So obviously that company is extremely relevant to the news media right now. So the idea is that you figure out what you do and how does it connect with a story that's happening in the news anyway. So that client of mine can get in the news any day at this point because COVID testing is so relevant. I had another client that was a novelist.

wrote thriller novels, and he wrote about women from Saudi Arabia, actually. And these were fiction books. So my strategy with him was sort of to identify journalists who were writing about authoritarianism and everything that's happening right now in the Middle East with the Taliban and women. So I was trying to tag my story of my client into what's happening.

in the world stage. a journalist will oftentimes be open to a story pitch if it gives a human face to a current story. the fact that I could offer an author who had done a lot of research about authoritarianism and its impact on women, I was able to get quite a bit of coverage for him because of that. And something interesting that you said there wasn't just like you

you know, write up a press release like this author, you know, is an expert on authoritarianism you found reporters who were covering that story. So this is something they're already interested in and dedicated to and you pitch it to them. Yeah, I sometimes will say press releases are so last century, you know, because I mean, we still do press releases, it's fine to do press releases, but I think almost anybody can do a press release, but the real

Cheryl Broom (07:08.162)
What I always say is where the rubber hits the road in public relations is either having a relationship with a journalist or finding a journalist. And I will give you a secret. And this is worth a lot of money. Twitter is the best place to find journalists because most journalists use Twitter. And you can actually figure out.

what they write about and you can use the search function in Twitter and then figure out the hashtags related to your client. And you can start following journalists that are writing about whatever you are promoting. And then you can start liking that. You can start commenting back and kind of have sort of a conversation with these people. Then you could go in and do a direct message on Twitter.

I have found that journalists are much more likely to respond to a message through Twitter than just an email, because their emails are just flooded with irrelevant stuff from random people that are just looking for publicity, whereas Twitter tends to be more conversational and more niche oriented, like you can really drill down. So that example of journalists writing about authoritarianism, that's how I was able to identify.

A lot of journalists who wrote about that or COVID test swabs. My agency's largest client is actually the state of Maine office of tourism. So I'm able to connect with travel writers from around the world through Twitter. And I think that is amazing advice because like everything relationships matter how you form relationship with reporter, if they have a trust in you as a credible source.

is super important. Exactly. just if you also get back to them, like if they email you and they want something, like say they want a photograph and you don't have it, just get back to them and say, well, I don't have that photo, but I'll get it for you. And what's your deadline? I mean, one time we had a reporter from the Washington Post who wanted a photo from an island off the coast of Maine. And we actually had an employee

Cheryl Broom (09:29.218)
Go, she had her camera at work. And this was before cell phone cameras, but we had her take a ferry out to this island to get a photo because then it appeared in the Washington Post. And it was like a half page photo. So like that amount of exposure for main tourism was invaluable. Anyway, if you receive a request from a media person, you need to respond quickly. Because usually these people are on deadline.

TV news, they've got to put their stories together before the six o'clock news at night. And typically newspaper journalists have to get a story in by like eight at night. So I've always been very aware of the news cycle. Even broadcast journalism now is just more minute by minute, because even if they're not putting something on the six o'clock news, they're probably going to publish a story on their social media platform immediately. And it's very competitive.

my contacts know that Nancy Marshall will respond, you know, and I make sure that they'll take a ferry to an island off the coast. I'll do whatever it takes to help you because the journalists will then remember you and they'll remember, yeah, Nancy, help me. And then if I have a story that might not be such breaking news, like a little bit soft, the journalists that I helped

when they needed something, they'll remember and they're more likely to want to like help you out the next time you have a pitch. So speaking of helping out, I've been asked before by clients, whether or not the platform help or reporter out is, something good for them to subscribe to or be a part of. Is that something you use or recommend? Yeah. Yeah. We, I mean, I have people on my team who follow that every day. Yeah. It's really a good tool. It's free.

So it's at Harrow, help a reporter out. And you just need to be able to respond to exactly what they're looking for. And don't use that as an opportunity to pitch something else. If they have a query on there and they're looking for something really specific, like I'm looking for a bed and breakfast in that has bathtubs with cloth feed or that has a wraparound porch or whatever it is, you identify exactly what they want.

Cheryl Broom (11:53.41)
Don't say, you know, I have a client that has mountaintop views from the rooms or whatever. No, when they put a query into Harrow, they want that very specific thing. a client comes to you, what are they usually looking for? What do they want your help in accomplishing? Clients want to either protect their reputation. A lot of the work we do would fall under the category of reputation management.

but also publicity to help them achieve their marketing goals. And getting good publicity out on the internet is really good for search engine optimization. So again, your clients are colleges, and I know that's a competitive business. colleges want to have good publicity online, whether it's if they're trying to attract professors to come and teach their students or

they want to be well thought of by other influential people. So it behooves you to have good publicity. Again, not only in the like the daily newspaper, because sometimes people will say, oh, nobody reads the newspaper anymore. Well, actually they do. And if you get a really good article in the Washington Post or the Wall Street Journal, or even the San Diego, is it the Tribune you have the San Diego Tribune? Yeah. So having

good publicity in your local paper is important too. Another thing we do a lot of is write opinion columns for our clients. And that's a way for someone to be positioned as a thought leader. And again, college professors all want to be considered as thought leaders. Yeah. What are some tips on opinion columns? I know that a lot of college presidents.

would love, you know, they have opinions, strong opinions, that's why they lead big institutions and they would love to get their opinions published. How do you even start going about doing that? Well, again, it is something that we do. But if a college president wants to do it, they would either reach out to the opinion editor themselves or have their communications director do it. But you could just send an email to the opinion

Cheryl Broom (14:13.678)
editor at whatever paper and say, you know, I would like to write a column about my stance on whatever it is. And then the editor will get back and say, okay, submit it. I probably could use that by such and such a date. And they'll tell you it's probably going to be 1000 to 1500 words and make sure you write to the length that is prescribed. Don't write more because then

the onus will be on the editor to like edit it down and you want to just provide the number of words they asked for. And are they looking for like anything in particular, like are you supposed to be controversial or opinionated? Yeah, opinion columns should be an opinion. And in an ideal world, they would take a position on something that is newsworthy. Like right now, masking and

COVID testing are very much in the news. And that's something that I know all colleges are dealing with is, we mandate masks? And do they have to wear masks when they're in their dormitories and classes? And how about athletics? mean, it's huge right now, like sporting events, football games. And again, right now, to have a college president take a stance on those topics would be very interesting to the opinion editor also.

Actually, you just sparked an idea in me. like, oh my gosh, when I get off this call, I need to call my client because her college president wrote a opinion piece on LinkedIn, just on his own profile on why he didn't support requiring vaccinations on his campus, which is completely opposite than the way most colleges are going. And his opinion, he's a doctor and it was very eye-opening to hear a different side of the story. So I was like, that would get sure get picked up.

That could get picked up locally, nationally, and actually I could see that person going on Meet the Press or on a national news program because that's a unique stance. And that is a point I kind of wanted to discuss with you because I think a lot of people think whatever they're doing at their institution is newsworthy.

Cheryl Broom (16:26.542)
But if a whole bunch of other people are doing it, it's not unique, it's not exciting. So you have to find what makes it interesting or different. Yeah, positioning yourself as an authority involves having something that's fairly unique. I like to talk about public relations from the perspective of an individual who is the leader or someone like me who's an expert on a certain topic and putting yourself out there.

because you have a unique point of view to express. So if your point of view is just the same as everybody else, you're not going to be that memorable. I know. And that's how, I used to work at a college campus, I'd have faculty come by and be like, you should get Channel 10 out to cover this. It's so amazing. And it'd be so hard to be like, yeah, it's special. It's great.

No one's going to drive an hour and 15 minutes for this. It's not that exciting. But in our own worlds it is, but to the news media it needs to be excited or angry or upset or emotional or you know. Exactly. And also if it has something to do with money or taxes or public policy again.

Those are things that you would call news hooks that will attract the attention of the media. So you've been in this business since 1982. Did you start as a reporter? Or did you start in PR? started in PR, although I did then become a reporter for a period of time. So I wrote for a weekly newspaper in the mid 80s. But then I went back to PR. I just found that

I really love PR and I love getting enthusiastic about whoever I'm representing. And I think that that enthusiasm is contagious. And again, the media people enjoy talking to me because I'm passionate about the clients I'm representing. And I think the clients feel a great deal of confidence in what I can do for them because of that enthusiasm. And I have a whole team of people in my agency and

Cheryl Broom (18:43.33)
They share my same enthusiasm also for our clients and our work. Well, yeah, if you get a great article published in a good magazine or an amazing blog online, I mean, that's a win. Actually, I have it over on my table here. I have a magazine called Edible Maine that just came out. And our client restaurant has the cover story. And there's a beautiful photo of this scallop dish that

is served at this restaurant in Waterville, Maine. And they were through the roof with excitement to get the cover story. And that all came about because I identified the editor of that magazine. And I actually went and picked her up and brought her to this restaurant in my own vehicle, because it was an hour away from where she lives. So we had an hour drive to the restaurant. I sat with her and ate with her. had a

couple of glasses of wine. Then I brought her back, delivered her back home. And she was just so impressed with the restaurant. And she also just had a really nice time. And, you know, again, reporters are human beings. And if you can make them feel like they're valued and respected. And, you know, I took time in the car with this editor to really get to know her story.

And then I sent her a thank you note in the mail. And that's one of my other secret weapons is I always have note cards by my desk and stamps. And I write a lot of handwritten thank you notes. So I really think that that's sort of a lost art and people will remember you if you do that. Actually, it's so funny, because I have one right here that my son just wrote to thank me. He just turned 29.

And I got the nicest thank you note from him to thank him for the money I gave for his birthday. And it's like, boy, I've taught that boy right. He's 29 years old. within a few days of him receiving some money for his birthday, he sent me a beautifully handwritten note. I'm like,

Cheryl Broom (20:54.52)
Thank you, So first of all, your son's going to get more money from you now. Yeah. Next time he asks, the answer is yes. But reporters get complaints all the time. They probably don't get a lot of thank yous. Exactly. So thank yous definitely stand out. Yeah. And the fact that you've taken the time to write it and acknowledge them and thank them for, you know, for what they've done for you and your clients, that does make you stand out.

and it goes back to relationships. Exactly. When I was in my 20s, one of my favorite jobs ever was doing the PR for a ski resort called Sugarloaf in Maine. And I had a condo right on the slopes. And my job pretty much was to entertain writers and broadcasters like all the time. So I would invite meteorologists or sportscasters or sports writers.

And then I would greet them and I would go out and ski with them. I would give them a complimentary lift ticket, take them to lunch, then go to apres ski and have a few drinks and have some fun and have dinner. And then they'd stay overnight in a condo or the hotel and then do it the next day. And then I would also go to New York City to have what we call desk side visits, which is where you meet up with journalists like in their offices. I don't think that's happening during COVID, but

It used to be a thing. So my whole job was about just building these relationships with the media. Yeah, that's what a fun job. It was made for me. It's like a dream job. It was. in their 20s. And I had a nice expense account too. Oh yeah. You get to like ski every day. It's great. It's awesome. Oh, how fantastic. You mentioned too that you do a lot of like crisis management.

What are some simple tips, like if you find yourself, your institution in the midst of a crisis, like what do do? Yeah, okay. Say you've had a fatality or a fire or say the president of the college has done something they shouldn't have done, like driven drunk or had a relationship with somebody they shouldn't have had. First thing you have to do is when the media calls, you need to have

Cheryl Broom (23:16.408)
what I call a by time statement, which is a short statement to give you some time while you really get your messaging together. So if NBC television calls, it's like, yes, thank you for your call. What is your deadline? We will get back to you or we will be holding a press conference tomorrow at 12 noon. And this is where it will be or it's going to be on Zoom or whatever. Don't ever say no comment like.

That's the biggest rule in crisis is if you say no comment, you might as well just say I'm guilty. So the first thing you need is this by time statement, then you need to gather all of the key players in a room. And that would be, you know, whatever the leadership team is, or the people who are involved, might be a sports coach might be a professor. And you create what we call a message map. And a message map would have a key message at the center.

something about your institution, you know, like our institution is devoted to educating students in the right way to work and live in our society or something to that extent. But then if this bad thing actually did happen, you should not deny it. You know, there was an incident that happened and we are investigating it further and we'll get back to you with the details. So.

If you've got any kind of a police investigation going on, you can say, we're working closely with local officials to determine the cause of this incident. And we'll get back to you as soon as we have more information. And then you can have what we call supporting messages, which would be sort of background. The media is going to want to talk about whatever the thing was, the crisis. But then they'll say, yes, Saint

whatever college was founded in 1829 and the campus is 300 acres of wooded forest land and they have 3000 students from around the world. And you could have other talking points, give the media something to talk about because they have to tell the story. So why not feed them with information? So the media is saying, yes, there was this bad thing, whatever it was.

Cheryl Broom (25:36.066)
However, this is an institution that's been in business for 300 years. They've got 3,000 students. They've got a beautiful campus. Whereas if you just say no comment, they're going to dig around. They'll be Google searching or they'll be asking the janitor to give you a comment. So if you're the PR person, you want to cooperate with them and help them. And then as soon as you have more information, you need to reveal it.

There's an expression that if you mess up, you need to dress up and fess up. you know, if you've done something bad, don't try to cover it. The sooner you address it head on, the sooner it will go away. I love that. If you mess up, you have to dress up and fess up. Exactly.

That's the rule in crisis communications. That is the on my wall. I think that what I've seen and what I've struggled with when I worked at a college is there's these crises of confidence. Like you gave the example of a college president drunk driving or doing something inappropriate. So I call that a crisis of confidence. Somebody's done something bad or that they should have done.

And they're protected legally by HR laws or by tenure. And so then the institution gets the lawyers involved who are like, you can't say anything because this person's protected. But you're saying like, there's always something that you can say about your institution or that, yes, you know, we are investigating an incident. There's always something. There is always something that is a step above no comment. Yeah.

And I think that lawyers today, who are enlightened, they get that. I think the lawyers that will tell you to say absolutely nothing, I hope those lawyers are retiring. That's just not the world we live in. And the other thing that happens now is that everybody's got their cell phone that has cameras. So you could be getting taped by people no matter what.

Cheryl Broom (27:58.466)
where you are or what you're doing. it's kind of like we're always on stage. Yeah, it's true. Yeah. We're always dressing up. Yeah. Well, you have your own like training, don't you, for people who are interested in learning more, can they download things on your website? Is there resources that you offer? Yeah, I have a course on message mapping actually, which is really a very important tool.

in any kind of messaging, whether it's just general institutional messaging or in a crisis situation. So yeah, you can find that course on my PR Maven website, is prmaven.com. P-R-M-A-V-E-N. And I think if I can give a word of advice to people listening is, if you haven't done that work before, don't wait until the crisis happens to start.

You got to have things in place, these statements, these holding statements, or what you call the buy time statements, having some pre-written, having them thought out, talking through your leadership with this beforehand so that you're prepared is essential. And also identifying who would be in that key team also, and having all of their cell phone numbers and their email addresses. I mean, if something happens in the middle of the night, you might have to.

call and wake those people up or get them to a meeting like at the crack of dawn. So having all the contact information is just one of the most basic tools that you need. And I learned the hard way to have it printed because my campus once like.

had a major power outage and a flood at the same time. And I could get on anything. And so luckily I had a binder with everything in it. It's like, you don't think you're ever gonna need a binder with a bunch of people's phone numbers in it. But wow, it came in handy. Yeah, that was smart. I've been around the block a couple of times. Yeah. than, I don't envy you that part of your job. It's difficult. It's hard. It is hard.

Cheryl Broom (30:16.034)
actually have a crisis team that consists of the former spokesman for the main state police, and he did that for 40 years and now he's retired, but he works with me on a special crisis team that I have. And I also have a gentleman who used to work with governmental officials and municipalities so if there's a

Like say there's a corporation or a college that has a crisis, the governmental officials are gonna be involved with this gentleman would communicate with those people. And then I also have a copywriter who can write press releases or opinion pieces or letters to the editor. So we have this four person crisis team that we can descend on any situation and advise on most any situation as needed.

Wonderful. Well, you've got an excellent team and an amazing record. And my last question for you today is you're hitting a milestone in 2022, right? It's going to be 40 years. So guess it will. are at your sleeve. Oh, gosh. Well, I did just have the 30th anniversary of my agency in 2021. April 1st.

was the 30th anniversary of my agency. Yeah. And we normally would have had a big party, but it was COVID, so we didn't have a big party. But yeah, I mean, I guess as much as you can sit around and think about the good old days, I try to think forward. You know, I'm going to the content marketing world conference next week, because I always am trying to stay on top of all of the newest methods of communicating.

you again, when I was in my twenties, I had a very wise boss who said, you've got to stay on top of the technology or else you're going to be outdated really quickly. So I try to really stay on top of it. And that's why I enjoy doing podcasts like this one and why I have my own podcast as well. Excellent. Well, it's always so much fun to talk to you and your podcast is great. And I'm a listener.

Cheryl Broom (32:26.006)
So for those people interested, PR Maven podcast, and I just learned from you and you technology podcast technology that I'm going to check out. So you're now streaming your podcast. So people like to watch it. can find, find Nancy now on what was it? Stream yard. Yeah. Stream yard. Yeah. And then all the different podcasts, platforms. So yeah.

Well, always so fun to talk to you. you so much. enjoyed it. I love your saying I'm going to put it on my I'm also going to share it with my children because I think it's awesome. All right, Nancy, take care. Thanks, Cheryl. Bye bye. Thank you for listening to Higher Education Coffee and Conversation.

If you like the podcast, please leave me a five-star rating. And to discover more great higher education-related content, make sure to visit us at graduatecommunications.com. And with that, I'm going to say thank you for listening. Thank you for the hard work you do for students each and every day. you