6 Ways to Help Your Clients Secure More Email-Based Interviews AND Get Included in the Published Piece
Wondering why some email submissions don't get used? Learn how to give writers the most usable responses (which will help your client become a writer's go-to source!)
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On to this week’s topic…
We’ve received a few questions recently from publicists about why their clients’ email-based interview questions didn’t make the cut in the final story (reminder: you can always email your newsletter topic ideas/burning questions to us at info@toptierconsulting.NET).
We realize it is incredibly frustrating on a publicist's end if you have your client answer email questions and then they don’t end up getting used in a story. There are reasons why this happens. The good news? There are definitely ways to avoid this from happening and to better a client’s chances of getting used.
When it comes to answering email interview questions, there are some tricks to know that would help out a writer tremendously, and even help make your source a go-to for that writer, and the other many publications that they write for, in the future.
There are also some mistakes we see people making with email questions time and time again (some of which could get you blacklisted from working with a writer ever again, eek!). Your clients may be doing some of the things unknowingly and some of these things may be happening that you, as the publicist, are also unaware of.
Here is everything you need to know about helping your sources navigate the world of email interviews: Why writers request them, when and how to push back, tips for answering to ensure that your client’s quotes make it into the story and things to avoid that could get your client left out of a story they submitted answers for.
Here we go!
EVERYTHING to Know About Navigating the World of Email Interviews
First off, why are writers asking for email interviews?
Lead times are getting shorter: In a perfect world, writers would love to hop on the phone with all of our sources and have lovely conversations. And we still do make that happen whenever we can (think: a big feature with a nice and lengthy deadline, which gives us time to hop on lengthy phone calls). But being assigned stories with long lead times is happening less and less frequently. Editors are notorious for giving writers quick turnaround stories these days, especially as they try to keep content around trending news and culturally relevant situations. And when things move fast, email tends to work the best.
Writers are juggling A LOT: A newbie writer may have a handful of stories a month, but the seasoned writers you are pitching that write for top-tier publications are bussssssy — sometimes with 15-20 assignments a month. That means they constantly have a big slate of stories going at the same time. They are trying to stay on top of multiple email inboxes. They are networking with new editors and pitching story ideas to other editors. They are tracking down payments and doing edits that pop up on stories they have already turned in. In the middle of all of that, they are trying to source and write. And they are juggling multiple stories at the same time. Having email questions out to sources can make it easier to be able to keep up with this pace, as a writer can shoot off questions and then be working on other things while waiting for the answers to come in. Then when they come in, they write that story and can move onto the next.
Sometimes a writer just needs a few quotes from a source: Sometimes you just need one quote from a doctor to supplement a story or a few thoughts from a real estate expert, etc. It’s hard to do this on the phone though. What could happen in a quick email exchange could easily turn into a 40-minute phone call. What happens then is your source gets frustrated that they only had a few quotes in the article after all the time they committed to being on the phone. Nobody has time for all that.
It can be easier, trust us: Having a source see our questions in print and being able to sit down and think the answers through, then read over their responses in the end, can definitely result in better quotes than having sources being asked questions on the fly. Sometimes sources are unsure of what they want to say on the phone when a topic arises and end up asking to send email responses anyway. Or they fumble through the topic the best that they can while chatting with you, feeling unsatisfied with their answers at the end of the call (sources are quick to tell writers “Ugh sorry I didn’t do a good interview” or “I probably didn’t give you good stuff.” We hear this a lot). Many clients do better when they have time to sit down and really put some thought into an answer, plus see what their responses will look like in print.
Scheduling can run smoother: Finding a time to coordinate everyone’s different schedules, in a sea of time zones, can be difficult. It’s also hard on a writer when sources constantly have to reschedule phoners, as writers are trying to schedule a bunch of things into their days as well. Email interviews allow a source to answer questions on their own time.
Also, being able to have a source put together some email responses can make them appealing to a writer who is looking for a quick same-day quote request and is racing to get a story done and simply doesn’t have time to factor in a phone call + typing up a transcript of a conversation and then sifting through it.
Answering email questions can often make a source more comfortable: Having someone write out their own quotes gives them a chance to review their responses. This avoids situations where your clients come to you asking if you can approach our editors to have us change their quotes (editors never want to do this and writers DREAD these emails because it makes us look bad) that they see in print that they didn’t like after telling us on the phone.
Many sources also do phoners with writers and ask to see the article before it publishes. This is not a practice that writers or editors engage in. Once you do a phone interview, that’s that. The writer does their thing and then the story goes to print. This can help avoid concern over how something was captured.
So how do we make this process run more smoothly?
Here are 6 ways to have your sources rock an email interview:
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