hello everyone marco montemagno here
digital donation some in 2013 and with
me a friend a person that i really
appreciate his work in this moment
Gareth’s Tomas founder of capella PR I
Garth are you going okay thank you great
to be so Garza um I was talking with so
many speakers during this digital
emission summit and one topic that I
think we we miss is the pr so okay cool
a lot of people Seth glory he was
talking about marketing and everyone
listening but in the end you also need
to do PR you need to talk with
journalists you need to have a strategy
of what kind of promotion communication
you going to do so I would like to go
deep in this topic by the way capella
fear is one of the smartest PR company
in UK my opinion young but is growing
very fast so take care first point let’s
start from companies that don’t have a
big budget because I think when you have
a big budget everything is easier but
it’s always good to think with the mind
of you know a start-up in a way that you
probably can be more creative so the
first point that I would like to you to
elaborate a little bit is about a
startup so if you start up and you want
to launch your idea your project or your
product or service where you start from
I mean you start to write to journalists
and say hi I’m here you start to write a
story an idea where do you start from I
think there’s three things you need to
think about when you’re a startup and
you think about you PR ok first thing is
what is it you want to say your message
absolutely you get that right secondly
is who you want to say that to all right
both your end audience and then the
journalists you want to then try and
influence ok and thirdly you have to
think about what you want people to do
with what you tell ok call to action
and I think too often PR campaigns not
don’t have that simple thinking behind
them they simply go in trying to create
lots of noise create a story without
really thinking about that last thing
which is what is it you’re trying to get
people to do right because in the end I
mean is is the final result that you
need to have in mind I mean I think if
you want to get sign up for your website
or there has to be something that other
users when read the news okay are going
to do that I think that’s absolutely
right you can divide the kind of output
viewer into both outputs and outcomes so
an output for me would be regenerated
loads of nice coverage in a national
newspaper but an outcome to the business
would be as you say people have signed
up people have actually bought the
product or people’s opinion about
something has been changed right and
it’s very important to design programs
thinking about those two things yeah
also because maybe you could have a
great coverage and no results from a
business point of view or maybe not so
much coverage but the right coverage and
then you get big guy I know you sell
more products or or this kind of stuff
and you you say the second point is
thinking about who you talk with and do
you think is different the way you talk
with the the message that you give to
the journalist and the message that you
want the journalist to deliver on the
media are two different messages or you
only want one master i think i think
it’s probably one message but what what
PR is about is if you think over here
you’ve got what journalists want to
write about which is the story what’s
going on in there okay and their
national agenda or whatever and over
here is what you is a business what to
talk about and what PR tries to do is
marry those two things up trying to find
a common middle ground and the best
campaigns do that you know they tap into
what people are interested and excited
about which is what journalists there
and will be writing about okay and then
they marry that to a really strong brand
message tell me one thing Gareth in your
experience um if I have to start from
scratch you know and obviously I have my
or my company or my product or my
service and I want to get a box around
it where do I start from I mean okay
there is all the pay Ward advertising
okay forget for a second
what what way will they start from I
start from journalists I start from
websites I start what what’s in your
mind I think that once they do this you
know message and and you have clear your
strategy I think the first thing is to
get the message right okay I think one
of the traps that lots of people are
starting early stage businesses or new
products whatever fall into is they have
invented something they’re very quite
rightly very proud about and they often
think it’s absolutely unique no one’s
ever done it before this is something
that no one’s ever seen before in the
world and which is fine but when you’re
talking to a journalist that doesn’t
always help so what you need is a frame
of reference you need to compare what
you’re doing is something that people
already understand a good example of
that would be when the film alien was
originally pitched in Hollywood what
they talked about the pitch for that
film was this is jaws on a spaceship
okay and that sold the film because they
already knew that George has been a
massive phenomenal seller and they could
understand where this just going to go
so I’d say that’s the first thing get
the message right and make sure you
don’t just invent something completely
new and then where do you start from in
terms of talking to so and yes you can
go directly into journalists and using
an agency like capella okay and but the
the thing that we tend say with
early-stage startups is to think about
social media so there’s a lot of things
that you can do yourself without having
to spend enormous amounts of money so
they start a twitter feed and get
yourself on facebook if you’re a
business-to-business company start
thinking about a linkedin profile and
start connecting with people that way
because PR is all about trying to get
other people to recommend you your
product your service your message okay
and that doesn’t necessarily have to be
a journalist to begin with that can be
other peers within the industry and also
can probably help if you have a social
media platform let’s say social media
presence when a journalist see your your
message or door you’re pure message then
come to check and probably see how wow
this guy has got thousands followers and
so probably each helps too but yeah I
think that’s why it starts to build
credibility okay what you need is a
early-stage business when you don’t show
that other people are interested and
therefore mr. journalist your readers
may be interested
okay you’ve been talking with tons of
journalists during the years and my
question about journalists is always
what’s the right way to to be in touch
with them if is you know a long term
relationship that you build with
journalists if is that you really try to
provide value to them or the big scoop
or what’s the right way do you think to
deal with journalists and I think the
first thing is you got to understand
you’ve got to put yourself in the shoes
of a journalist to understand what their
life is like I’m most generous today are
ridiculously busy their editorial
budgets have been slashed their film you
baby so that means brevity is really
really important okay and we as an
agency we think about a thing called a
story in a sentence so a bit like the
jaws on the spaceship we try and think
how how can we get a message for a
company across very very quickly to
capture Leah take the interest of the
journalists now that’s really important
these days because not just because
journeys have less time but it’s also
because some journalists will only take
pictures on Twitter for example okay
you’ve only got a few characters to
picture story sony has to be short and
so I think that’s the important thing is
to think about yourselves in their shoes
understand who they are writing for a
broadcasting for so you understand what
their audience are going to be
interested in and then get it as short
and brief as possible don’t worry about
all the puffs around the side just go
right to what story is it is any great
kz story that you had dealing with
journalists that that you thought gosh i
mean this not trick because trick is
there to say but this way of doing was
giving me a great great result and
because i give an example iris lee tons
of press release songs for press release
from PR agencies or companies and they
just send me you know a PDF or an email
and say hey this is our press release
and joy and I think I don’t want to
enjoy you know I don’t know exactly who
you are I don’t have a relationship with
you so what’s the right way to
this guy novel how to be a lady can it
depends on your product I’ll give you
some examples yeah I think if you can
get the journalist to engage and get
involved in whatever it is that you do
then that can help so for example
working for one of the online dating
companies we wanted to get the founder
of that business profile in the business
media and so rather than just say let’s
meet up for coffee and do a briefing we
said well that particular guy was really
into various forms of yoga okay in took
the journalists along and she
interviewed him whilst doing yoga which
made it a bit more interesting in a bit
more fun okay and another example would
be we work for lots of sports brands
doing a grassroots sports with young
people and what we try to do there is
bring journalists to actually get
involved in the games that going on so
actually get them to experience what
it’s like playing some of the the
tradition they’re shorter formats of
traditional sports games that those guys
do so I think if you can offer something
you have to be able get the journalist
out the office in the first place al
khaleej you can get them to experience
and engage with the product rather than
just tell them and ask them to believe
what you’re saying ok that’s quite a
good way to get them more engaged great
so test the product and give some
context that the journalists can relate
and find his story yeah come and get
them to have a go at it get them to play
with it and so they actually understand
what it’s all about and do you work a
lot with what sort in the news so like
there is i don’t know the election of
the prime minister and you say ok i try
to find an angle on these for a client
how does it work absolutely so news
jumping as we would call it absolutely
absolutely key to what we do so you
watch everything that’s going on ok we
as an agency we get lots of information
about what’s coming up in the news
tomorrow or next week and then we pitch
we try and marry our client stories to
what’s going on there some big things
that you can always guarantee is going
to be creating lots lots of waves in the
media is anything to do with Google or
Facebook if they announced new products
on the right grades actually that
creates enormous amount of interest it’s
almost like stories about the weather
because Facebook effects most of the
people in the world so those if you can
jump on the back of stories that bigger
companies like Facebook and Google are
doing and give your own
then that’s a really good chance for you
to get major coverage how do you balance
what’s the right mix between traditional
PR and PR digital PR let’s say and also
I would like to understand from you
what’s the difference how different is
for you to deal with I don’t know a
blogger or a online influencer and the
traditional journalist what was the
difference there well it’s a good point
because they are always used to be about
traditional media so newspapers
magazines radio TV and so on and of
course social medias change that because
there are some very influential voices
out there that don’t belong to an
established media organization so we
deal with both what I would say is that
don’t I don’t think you necessarily have
to think about the two things in
isolation if you have a good idea or a
good story then it will translate across
both and it’s I think quite after people
think that story that the traditional
media takes its stories from social
media actually it works both ways and so
I wouldn’t try and do one or the other I
would try and think about a brilliant
idea that’s going to get people excited
get people talking and then you can hit
both both medium social right in
tradition we both have kids and we both
are probably black belt of Pixar movies
and you know just different and I’m
always really intrigued by the fact that
there are stories I don’t know
Cinderella or you know stories that are
leaving for eight years nine years
hundred years but the stories are simple
but still people get passionate about
and they have emotions and so on and I
was starting really the store how Pixar
is building their stories and in the end
the stories are more or less the same
always is anything changing in the PR
ward like from when you start to now
the stories that are pitched by
journalists or by bloggers or by
influencers are different or you know is
always the same and you just have to
find the right I think it’s a really
good point you make about storytelling
and I think actually is somebody who’s
trying to promote a product or service
or whatever you can learn a lot from
traditional storytelling like Pixar and
Disney or anything else because the
fundamentals are what makes a good story
I don’t think we’re ever going to change
I think what has changed is the medium
so whereas we used to pitch a story to a
journalist to go in tomorrow’s newspaper
or next week magazine with a press
release and some written comment now
actually stories that we packaged up
have to include all sorts of different
stuff so it might need a video it
certainly needs much more kind of
multimedia that’s shareable right
because most journalists today are not
just waiting for a newspaper or
broadcasting on television they were
working across multiple different
mediums and they need content to use on
those different mediums okay I’m asking
to all the digital domination summit
speakers um the their favorite three
apps two apps whatever that they really
think you know are they use every day
and they think gosh for a business this
works like a charm do you have any
particular app not for the kids you know
I some speakers say gosh yes I’m told
some angry birds and subway surfer no i
said no for business that’s a good way i
mean you probably right not the first
one because when my favorite axises TED
talks okay because for me starting and
running a business myself it’s really
good way to get kind of inspirational
working for some of the leading thinkers
much like the digital domination summit
and whatsapp is usually useful for me
because quite often I’m overseas
traveling around so actually keeping in
touch with people that’s that’s
brilliant in terms of keeping a costume
so there’s two good ones yeah excellent
Gareth thank you very much Gareth Thomas
Capelo PR go to check their website and good luck for everything thank you chase
digital donation some in 2013 and with
me a friend a person that i really
appreciate his work in this moment
Gareth’s Tomas founder of capella PR I
Garth are you going okay thank you great
to be so Garza um I was talking with so
many speakers during this digital
emission summit and one topic that I
think we we miss is the pr so okay cool
a lot of people Seth glory he was
talking about marketing and everyone
listening but in the end you also need
to do PR you need to talk with
journalists you need to have a strategy
of what kind of promotion communication
you going to do so I would like to go
deep in this topic by the way capella
fear is one of the smartest PR company
in UK my opinion young but is growing
very fast so take care first point let’s
start from companies that don’t have a
big budget because I think when you have
a big budget everything is easier but
it’s always good to think with the mind
of you know a start-up in a way that you
probably can be more creative so the
first point that I would like to you to
elaborate a little bit is about a
startup so if you start up and you want
to launch your idea your project or your
product or service where you start from
I mean you start to write to journalists
and say hi I’m here you start to write a
story an idea where do you start from I
think there’s three things you need to
think about when you’re a startup and
you think about you PR ok first thing is
what is it you want to say your message
absolutely you get that right secondly
is who you want to say that to all right
both your end audience and then the
journalists you want to then try and
influence ok and thirdly you have to
think about what you want people to do
with what you tell ok call to action
and I think too often PR campaigns not
don’t have that simple thinking behind
them they simply go in trying to create
lots of noise create a story without
really thinking about that last thing
which is what is it you’re trying to get
people to do right because in the end I
mean is is the final result that you
need to have in mind I mean I think if
you want to get sign up for your website
or there has to be something that other
users when read the news okay are going
to do that I think that’s absolutely
right you can divide the kind of output
viewer into both outputs and outcomes so
an output for me would be regenerated
loads of nice coverage in a national
newspaper but an outcome to the business
would be as you say people have signed
up people have actually bought the
product or people’s opinion about
something has been changed right and
it’s very important to design programs
thinking about those two things yeah
also because maybe you could have a
great coverage and no results from a
business point of view or maybe not so
much coverage but the right coverage and
then you get big guy I know you sell
more products or or this kind of stuff
and you you say the second point is
thinking about who you talk with and do
you think is different the way you talk
with the the message that you give to
the journalist and the message that you
want the journalist to deliver on the
media are two different messages or you
only want one master i think i think
it’s probably one message but what what
PR is about is if you think over here
you’ve got what journalists want to
write about which is the story what’s
going on in there okay and their
national agenda or whatever and over
here is what you is a business what to
talk about and what PR tries to do is
marry those two things up trying to find
a common middle ground and the best
campaigns do that you know they tap into
what people are interested and excited
about which is what journalists there
and will be writing about okay and then
they marry that to a really strong brand
message tell me one thing Gareth in your
experience um if I have to start from
scratch you know and obviously I have my
or my company or my product or my
service and I want to get a box around
it where do I start from I mean okay
there is all the pay Ward advertising
okay forget for a second
what what way will they start from I
start from journalists I start from
websites I start what what’s in your
mind I think that once they do this you
know message and and you have clear your
strategy I think the first thing is to
get the message right okay I think one
of the traps that lots of people are
starting early stage businesses or new
products whatever fall into is they have
invented something they’re very quite
rightly very proud about and they often
think it’s absolutely unique no one’s
ever done it before this is something
that no one’s ever seen before in the
world and which is fine but when you’re
talking to a journalist that doesn’t
always help so what you need is a frame
of reference you need to compare what
you’re doing is something that people
already understand a good example of
that would be when the film alien was
originally pitched in Hollywood what
they talked about the pitch for that
film was this is jaws on a spaceship
okay and that sold the film because they
already knew that George has been a
massive phenomenal seller and they could
understand where this just going to go
so I’d say that’s the first thing get
the message right and make sure you
don’t just invent something completely
new and then where do you start from in
terms of talking to so and yes you can
go directly into journalists and using
an agency like capella okay and but the
the thing that we tend say with
early-stage startups is to think about
social media so there’s a lot of things
that you can do yourself without having
to spend enormous amounts of money so
they start a twitter feed and get
yourself on facebook if you’re a
business-to-business company start
thinking about a linkedin profile and
start connecting with people that way
because PR is all about trying to get
other people to recommend you your
product your service your message okay
and that doesn’t necessarily have to be
a journalist to begin with that can be
other peers within the industry and also
can probably help if you have a social
media platform let’s say social media
presence when a journalist see your your
message or door you’re pure message then
come to check and probably see how wow
this guy has got thousands followers and
so probably each helps too but yeah I
think that’s why it starts to build
credibility okay what you need is a
early-stage business when you don’t show
that other people are interested and
therefore mr. journalist your readers
may be interested
okay you’ve been talking with tons of
journalists during the years and my
question about journalists is always
what’s the right way to to be in touch
with them if is you know a long term
relationship that you build with
journalists if is that you really try to
provide value to them or the big scoop
or what’s the right way do you think to
deal with journalists and I think the
first thing is you got to understand
you’ve got to put yourself in the shoes
of a journalist to understand what their
life is like I’m most generous today are
ridiculously busy their editorial
budgets have been slashed their film you
baby so that means brevity is really
really important okay and we as an
agency we think about a thing called a
story in a sentence so a bit like the
jaws on the spaceship we try and think
how how can we get a message for a
company across very very quickly to
capture Leah take the interest of the
journalists now that’s really important
these days because not just because
journeys have less time but it’s also
because some journalists will only take
pictures on Twitter for example okay
you’ve only got a few characters to
picture story sony has to be short and
so I think that’s the important thing is
to think about yourselves in their shoes
understand who they are writing for a
broadcasting for so you understand what
their audience are going to be
interested in and then get it as short
and brief as possible don’t worry about
all the puffs around the side just go
right to what story is it is any great
kz story that you had dealing with
journalists that that you thought gosh i
mean this not trick because trick is
there to say but this way of doing was
giving me a great great result and
because i give an example iris lee tons
of press release songs for press release
from PR agencies or companies and they
just send me you know a PDF or an email
and say hey this is our press release
and joy and I think I don’t want to
enjoy you know I don’t know exactly who
you are I don’t have a relationship with
you so what’s the right way to
this guy novel how to be a lady can it
depends on your product I’ll give you
some examples yeah I think if you can
get the journalist to engage and get
involved in whatever it is that you do
then that can help so for example
working for one of the online dating
companies we wanted to get the founder
of that business profile in the business
media and so rather than just say let’s
meet up for coffee and do a briefing we
said well that particular guy was really
into various forms of yoga okay in took
the journalists along and she
interviewed him whilst doing yoga which
made it a bit more interesting in a bit
more fun okay and another example would
be we work for lots of sports brands
doing a grassroots sports with young
people and what we try to do there is
bring journalists to actually get
involved in the games that going on so
actually get them to experience what
it’s like playing some of the the
tradition they’re shorter formats of
traditional sports games that those guys
do so I think if you can offer something
you have to be able get the journalist
out the office in the first place al
khaleej you can get them to experience
and engage with the product rather than
just tell them and ask them to believe
what you’re saying ok that’s quite a
good way to get them more engaged great
so test the product and give some
context that the journalists can relate
and find his story yeah come and get
them to have a go at it get them to play
with it and so they actually understand
what it’s all about and do you work a
lot with what sort in the news so like
there is i don’t know the election of
the prime minister and you say ok i try
to find an angle on these for a client
how does it work absolutely so news
jumping as we would call it absolutely
absolutely key to what we do so you
watch everything that’s going on ok we
as an agency we get lots of information
about what’s coming up in the news
tomorrow or next week and then we pitch
we try and marry our client stories to
what’s going on there some big things
that you can always guarantee is going
to be creating lots lots of waves in the
media is anything to do with Google or
Facebook if they announced new products
on the right grades actually that
creates enormous amount of interest it’s
almost like stories about the weather
because Facebook effects most of the
people in the world so those if you can
jump on the back of stories that bigger
companies like Facebook and Google are
doing and give your own
then that’s a really good chance for you
to get major coverage how do you balance
what’s the right mix between traditional
PR and PR digital PR let’s say and also
I would like to understand from you
what’s the difference how different is
for you to deal with I don’t know a
blogger or a online influencer and the
traditional journalist what was the
difference there well it’s a good point
because they are always used to be about
traditional media so newspapers
magazines radio TV and so on and of
course social medias change that because
there are some very influential voices
out there that don’t belong to an
established media organization so we
deal with both what I would say is that
don’t I don’t think you necessarily have
to think about the two things in
isolation if you have a good idea or a
good story then it will translate across
both and it’s I think quite after people
think that story that the traditional
media takes its stories from social
media actually it works both ways and so
I wouldn’t try and do one or the other I
would try and think about a brilliant
idea that’s going to get people excited
get people talking and then you can hit
both both medium social right in
tradition we both have kids and we both
are probably black belt of Pixar movies
and you know just different and I’m
always really intrigued by the fact that
there are stories I don’t know
Cinderella or you know stories that are
leaving for eight years nine years
hundred years but the stories are simple
but still people get passionate about
and they have emotions and so on and I
was starting really the store how Pixar
is building their stories and in the end
the stories are more or less the same
always is anything changing in the PR
ward like from when you start to now
the stories that are pitched by
journalists or by bloggers or by
influencers are different or you know is
always the same and you just have to
find the right I think it’s a really
good point you make about storytelling
and I think actually is somebody who’s
trying to promote a product or service
or whatever you can learn a lot from
traditional storytelling like Pixar and
Disney or anything else because the
fundamentals are what makes a good story
I don’t think we’re ever going to change
I think what has changed is the medium
so whereas we used to pitch a story to a
journalist to go in tomorrow’s newspaper
or next week magazine with a press
release and some written comment now
actually stories that we packaged up
have to include all sorts of different
stuff so it might need a video it
certainly needs much more kind of
multimedia that’s shareable right
because most journalists today are not
just waiting for a newspaper or
broadcasting on television they were
working across multiple different
mediums and they need content to use on
those different mediums okay I’m asking
to all the digital domination summit
speakers um the their favorite three
apps two apps whatever that they really
think you know are they use every day
and they think gosh for a business this
works like a charm do you have any
particular app not for the kids you know
I some speakers say gosh yes I’m told
some angry birds and subway surfer no i
said no for business that’s a good way i
mean you probably right not the first
one because when my favorite axises TED
talks okay because for me starting and
running a business myself it’s really
good way to get kind of inspirational
working for some of the leading thinkers
much like the digital domination summit
and whatsapp is usually useful for me
because quite often I’m overseas
traveling around so actually keeping in
touch with people that’s that’s
brilliant in terms of keeping a costume
so there’s two good ones yeah excellent
Gareth thank you very much Gareth Thomas
Capelo PR go to check their website and good luck for everything thank you chase
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