Almost anyone with any media experience will know the basic questions to ask before agreeing to do...
The Dragons' Den is back later this year with its 11th series, so why after all this time do contestants go into the Den and still seem to miss the basics? The Dragons expect their potential business partners to be prepared and passionate; if they are not, it leads to some very awkward questioning. As we all know, these are also the basics when facing the media and ‘Dragon’ Peter Jones is a great example of this.
Last week, with the announcement that Peter Jones, that well known ‘Dragons Den’ entrepreneur has bought Jessops, the camera shop. Thirty new stores will re open across the country with an all new singing and dancing online shopping website. Now, Peter is a seasoned businessman and has no doubt handled many a TV interview, so appearing on BBC Breakfast to tell the bleary eyed general public why they should head straight to a Jessops probably didn’t register to highly on his stressometer. In a 1 minute and 16 seconds interview he got all his key message across and bridged nicely away from the reporter’s question on “isn’t this a big risk for you?”, to which he answered – I always love a challenge! However what makes him a really good interviewee is that he has that extra factor which all TV and radio journalists love – ENTHUSIASM. Your spokespeople may have all the right key messages down to a fine art and have a vast amount of knowledge about what the company is doing and where it is heading. However, for the viewing public, if you don’t come across as passionate and genuinely excited about your new product or service, then all that hard work by the comms team is simply lost. It’s not enough to calmly manage the interview with all the right information, you have to come across as if you really mean it.
It’s not normally in the British psyche to want to be outgoing and brash about a new announcement – we normally leave that to the Americans – However, if you really want to connect with your audience through the media then you do need to put on a bit of a show. I’m not saying that you need to bring on the dancing girls and let off fireworks, but demonstrating your personal commitment and belief goes a long way in terms of getting customer buy in. It’s all about using the broadcast media as a facilitator to talk directly to your audience. That’s why it is important to make sure that your spokespeople understand about body language and voice control to portray these points, there is no need for them to crave the smell of the greasepaint and the roar of the crowd, but confident, passionate spokespeople will all go far in the entertainment business that is 24 hour news.
