For many Papua New Guineans, getting media coverage, especially for television (TV) is a difficult task often when they are organising events.
It is understood, not all people in authorities and outside of electronic media are fully aware of how the newsroom operates hence engaging TV media organisations for coverage of events usually is a struggle or does not occur at all.
Lack of knowledge concerning procedures involved in getting TV personnel for coverage of events is a barrier that needs to be brought down so important events are covered in a multicultural country like Papua New Guinea.
According to “How to Get Local TV to Cover Your Event” by Marsha Friedman, from the two important things covered on how to get a local TV, ‘Writing Media Alerts’ covers Five important things.
When writing media alerts, Who, What, When, Where and Visuals are five important things that should be considered.
- Who: Name your organisation and any key executives or dignitaries who might be in attendance. Include only those who will be available to speak on camera.
- What: What is the announcement or the reason for the event? Include all material you consider news.
- When: Make certain to include the date and time of the event, and how long it will run. Also include the schedules of any on-camera spokespeople, and if they will be available before the event.
- Where: This is key. You need to include an address, directions or name of the place. Getting a reporter or a crew to an event can be won or lost in how well you direct them there. If security personnel will be at the event or venue, make sure they know the media might be coming.
- Visuals: TV is a visual medium, so make sure you have something for the cameras to shoot. Talking heads does not a press event make. Have demos, graphs, lots of people around, so they’ll have something other than an executive in a suit to shoot.
Timing the delivery of media alerts is also vital for the message about an event to reach the media in a consistent manner without causing any annoyance. Further information on timing the delivery of media alerts can be obtained on this link here.
