Getting on the News: What Broadcasters Actually Want From a Spokesperson

Most brands are sitting on a wealth of expertise that would be a gift to broadcasters who need context, insight and fresh perspectives on the biggest stories of the day. But expertise alone doesn’t translate into airtime. 

The tricky bit for PRs is doing three things: turning this expertise into something broadcasters can actually use, media training spokespeople and becoming confident enough to let them speak live and unedited, and actually getting them in front of the right audience at the right moment. 

It’s one thing to pop your CEO on the radio when the circumstances arise, and quite another to have sharpened your wealth of knowledge, developed an entire bench of inhouse spokespeople and defined the strategy for creating your own opportunities for broadcast impact on a regular basis.

So what’s the secret to a successful spokesperson strategy, in which your contributors become the go-to commentators for journalists and are seen across the news agenda and beyond? In the spirit of landing a great interview, we sat down with former BBC news presenter, reporter, and senior producer (and current Head of News at Broadcast Revolution), Mike Young, to draw on his experience. 

First things first: what are producers actually looking for?

When a big story breaks, producers and journalists can find themselves working within an information vacuum. A plane disappears over the ocean, and all anyone knows is the aircraft type; the Queen’s death brings the entire news agenda to a standstill with one story and no scheduled contributors to speak to it; an election night can mean hours of airtime to fill before a single result comes in.

The gap between a story breaking and there being any real detail to report is where producers feel most uncomfortable, and are most grateful for a spokesperson who can fill it. And it isn’t only the urgent, agenda-transforming moments that matter either. Moments like a band reunion, a royal jubilee or a World Cup final – cultural events with big public interest – create the same appetite for someone who can add context the newsroom doesn’t already have.

Mike calls this being a “presenter’s friend” – a person who can be pulled in at short notice not because they have a highly-tuned marketing message to deliver, but because they can put meat on the bones of a story that’s still unfolding. “A presenter will feel very exposed if there is a massive breaking story and they’ve got no experts with them,” he says. It’s this precise moment that a prepared organisation can make their mark. 

It all starts with trust

Being a presenter’s friend goes beyond being available. Spokespeople also need to be credible and authoritative. Reflecting on his BBC career, Mike was clear that he’d “want someone from a reputable organisation, a reputable source, someone you could trust. One of the big concerns at the moment is who’s saying what, is there a political spin to it, how much is it linked to some sponsorship or commercial enterprise.” 

And lands with substance 

It’s a producer’s job to create compelling discussions, so it’s vital to communicate what a contributor will be adding to the conversation. “Very often you’re contributing experience, opinion, and context to what’s happening in the here and now… the worst thing as a producer is a guest who is entirely beige and has very little to add on the issue of the day”. 

You can also gain an advantage by leaning into the fact that there is nuance to every story. After what has become colloquially known as Liz Truss’s disastrous mini-budget, people with mortgages were negatively impacted on a huge scale. A contributor who is sensitive to this fact (resisting a flattened, one-sided view) but who can also provide the counter perspective on the advantages to savers, backed by their own data and experience, has something genuinely useful to offer journalists. 

As Mike puts it: “It’s all about talking about different perspectives. If you can capture that, you’ll carry everybody with you.”

Finally, this needs to be communicated naturally. “Don’t make it too polished, because then it becomes artificial. Authenticity is the order of the day. Be true to yourself.” The most engaging contributors are those who can avoid sounding rehearsed, even when they’re saying something they’ve said before.

The quick ways to never get invited back 

Want your spokesperson’s role as a broadcast media contributor to be one and done? Treat your interview as if it’s an advert. Mike is firm that one or two brand mentions – one of which can even be baked into your introduction by the presenter – is enough. “Anything more starts to feel like an advert. It does you a disservice, and the listener is quite wise to it now. If they think, ‘oh, they’re just plugging their product’, suddenly they’re not listening to what you have to say.”

There’s some nuance here. Attributing commissioned research to your organisation can be acceptable, since it reads as data with context rather than self-promotion. “That has almost journalistic credentials,” Mike notes. Academia sometimes gets a similar pass, since referencing a university affiliation alongside years of research feels earned rather than opportunistic. Charities, too, tend to get more leeway. But the underlying principle holds across the board, and it’s better to be safe than sorry.

Be adaptable, be flexible, be ready for the unexpected

For Mike, rigid planning is the enemy of good broadcast opportunities, because when it comes to the news agenda, no one knows what’s around the corner.

He points to a recent example when a group of climate experts, primed to speak about the 50th anniversary of the 1976 heatwave, found themselves overtaken by events. The Met Office had announced a rare red weather warning in soaring temperatures just two days before the climate experts were expecting to take to the airwaves. “Suddenly the NEW mega-heatwave became the story, about 24 to 48 hours before the group expected to be interviewed.” 

“Do you hold on, or go with it, since everyone’s suddenly talking about what you want to talk about, just ahead of schedule? Can you break your own embargo? Can you make sure your spokespeople are available, that the data is ready? If you can, you can seriously pivot and capture a moment where demand is far greater than you anticipated.”

That willingness to move fast, knowing you have built the right processes and developed the right people to make the best call under time pressure, is what unlocks the kind of ongoing impact that really moves the dial for a brand. 

In part two, Mike turns to the practical side of getting there: building a spokesperson bench, getting job titles right, and the sector gaps broadcasters are actively trying to fill.