In the round-the-clock battle for media attention, reporters, marketers, and PR pros cannot afford to waste words. We’ve all come across executive quotes in press releases or news articles that sound like they were written by a novice PR person, or, worse, a committee. A poor spokesperson quote is a lost opportunity at best. How do you make something as ordinary as quotes from executives a real asset? Show Add to the storyThe executive quote is a chance to add information — substance, details, color — to the story, not to repeat information found elsewhere in a press release or article. If a release announces a $30M Series B funding, the executive quote should not be about how “pleased we are with the investment,” even if that is true. Instead, it should describe plans to use the cash infusion, brag about milestones already hit, or articulate specific reasons why the company merited it. Use visual languageOne thing that will make a quote stand out is visual imagery. If you plant an image in the reader’s mind, they are much more likely to remember it, and a journalist is more likely to use it. In an article where many industry figures are quoted, a visual one is also more likely to be used as the “pull-quote” — a key excerpt pulled from the piece as a highlight. A congressional hearing is a “political strip search.” VC pressure for startups to scale prematurely is like “driving a car that’s leaking gasoline.” A loss of transparency is a “black box.” Using such evocative language also adds dimension and color to an executive’s persona. Be boldStrong language works for those corporate leaders who are keen to embrace a higher public profile or be seen as a thought leader — and who can weather the attention that may follow if the comment is controversial. Quotes that convey bold predictions, unexpected opinions, or blunt honesty will often attract attention. When objecting to Indiana’s law to allow businesses to refuse service to gay or transgender people, Salesforce CEO Marc Benioff objected with public comments. But he didn’t just say, “We don’t agree with this legislation” or “It doesn’t reflect our values.” He called it “brutal,” “unfair” and “unjust” while pledging to reduce the Salesforce presence in the state. The strong words put Benioff at the top of the list of business leaders who opposed the move in the media coverage that resulted. Banish robo-quotesEven if an executive isn’t trying to be a Benioff or Bezos, his comments don’t have to be boring or robotic. Press release quotes are often written in stilted, jargon-stuffed, or boilerplate language, the better to earn internal and legal department approval. Yet they’re far more effective and usable if they read as comments that a human being might actually utter. The ideal way to craft a natural-sounding quote is to discuss it with the executive on the phone and listen to or record his response. Unfortunately, PR staff don’t always have the opportunity to do that, so we rely on our skills and familiarity with the situation and the spokesperson in question. Don’t go overboardIn press releases, it’s not necessary to quote business leaders more than twice at most, and one well-written quote is better. Sometimes we must include quotes from multiple people, as in the case of partnership releases involving two or more businesses, but too many executive quotes can be tedious and unwieldy. If remarks by executives multiple organizations must be included, consider a quote sheet and a press release addendum.
 It’s no big secret that public relations professionals often do all the leg work on press releases, including writing and suggesting quotes for executives’ approval. Here are a few pointers to keep in mind while crafting or communicating these scripted soundbites. Keep the explanations out of the quotes. Journalists sometimes get bogged down by technical, scientific, educational or other explanatory information. Save that for its own paragraph in the release instead of using it in a quote. Instead, have the quote amplify and expand on the information. Think brevity. Journalists and other readers often scan stories or releases. If they see an extremely long quote coming, they tend to pass over it. Keep it short, or break it up into two quotes. Use powerful keywords. “We made these moves to avoid further financial difficulties to our company.” Sounds bland, right? “We made these moves because the future of our business was in jeopardy.” Whoa, that’s a pretty powerful word, jeopardy. And it grabs the attention of a journalist—who might even turn it around in a story. Avoid clichés. “We’re delighted to announce ….” Ho-hum. Be human and conversational. See above. Avoid clichéd, robotic quotes. Humanize the subject. Reading quotes aloud always helps. Giving the quote an actual voice will answer the question, “Is this something that would be said in normal conversation?” Be authentic. Write it the way it was said if you’re speaking with/interviewing your CEO, if you aren't writing it yourself. Don’t be afraid to use writing devices such as ellipses or dashes to denote pauses in speech or to emphasize a point. For third parties, be opinionated. Let’s say you have a client who is an expert on mergers, and you want to get him publicity by reacting to the news of two companies joining forces. Make sure the quote is a definitive opinion. Journalists can’t, and shouldn’t, be biased in stories and offer up their opinion. They are looking for quotes from someone to explain those positions. So saying “Only time will tell if this works,” isn’t a quote that’s going to be used by journalists. “This will be the biggest boondoggle since New Coke,” will certainly resonate with journalists. Think about placement. Quotes should never be used in the first two or three paragraph of a release. Quotes are supportive and should provide context to the explanatory first few paragraphs of a release. He said, she said. Quotes should be attributed by "he said" or "she said." Don't use synonyms. People don’t exclaim things, for example—they say it. Help clients put in a good word for you Thumbs up: “What others say about you and your product, service, or business is at least 1,000 times more convincing than what you say, even if you are 2,000 times more eloquent.” — Dan Kennedy, author of No B.S. Sales Success. What’s the least important element in a release — less important even than the dateline or the boilerplate? Quotes, say one in four reporters surveyed in a study by Greentarget. According to Greentarget’s research:
What’s their beef?
“Please don’t make me wade through a bunch of boilerplate, taglines and patting-ourselves-on-the-back quotes to find out if the news release is relevant,” begs one journalist surveyed by Greentarget. Another writes: “I dislike press releases that have ‘spin.’ I just want the facts. Not a sales pitch, not canned quotes about how fantastic the person/company/event is.” ‘Don’t sound natural’“Most quotes in press releases sound like the teacher in Charlie Brown cartoons: ‘Wah wah wah wah.’”— A frustrated PR proThese aren’t unreasonable complaints, considering the wah wah that passes for quotes in releases these days. Here are three quotes from releases posted on PRNewswire recently. (I could show only one in my PR Tactics column, because these suckers weigh in at more than 100 words each — 20% of my word count. Think about that for a minute.) Wah wah, indeed. Transform the wah wah.How do you get the wah wah out of your release quotes? Make quotes: 1. Short.While PR quotes measure in the triple digits, journalists use much shorter quotes. In fact, the average length of a quote in a recent issue of The New York Times, not including attribution, was between 19 and 20 words, according to a 2015 Wylie Communications analysis. The most common length: seven words. So “peel the quote back to one great sentence,” counsels Jacqui Banaszynski, a chaired editing professor at the University of Missouri. How about: “Hot rodders, racers and other street performance enthusiasts will now be able to do something better [we can’t figure out what from the release], thanks to our merger,” Callahan says.2. Rare.Don’t use quotes to convey basic information, as in this release on the Hip Hop Hall of Fame: “The program curriculums are currently being designed and prepared to launch first class this fall with all classes online in 2016,” stated Pierre Voltaire, the Educational Program Coordinator Consultant.Instead, paraphrase. 3. Personable.Clearly, no human ever uttered the words, “MSDP provides the ideal partner for Holley, a Lincolnshire portfolio company that is the leading manufacturer and marketer of performance fuel and exhaust systems.” Just as no human has ever sought “customizable, comprehensive literacy solutions.” Write quotes that sound human, not like a computer spit them out. Here’s one to model, from a Pulitzer Prize-winning series in the New York Daily News about the declining health of 9/11 rescue workers: “I’m begging for someone to help me,” Valenti said. “I do not want to die.”4. Creative.Quotes should sound like more than just the most basic parts of human speech. Make your executive seem eloquent — even interesting. Here’s a New York Times quote by former New York mayor Ed Koch on political consultant David Garth: “I said, ‘Listen David,’” Mr. Koch recalled, “‘You want me to kill my mother? Tell me what time and where?’”Now, that’s a quote that reporters won’t shoot down.
|
How to write a ceo quote
Pos Terkait
Copyright © 2024 membukakan Inc.
