In this rapid‑fire interview, host Professor Pete Alexander asks six concise questions of Tracey Lamourie, founder and managing director of Lamourie Media and author of Get Rep’d. Tracey introduces herself and shares her award as a Women of Inspiration 2020. She humorously notes the glamorous perception of publicists versus the reality of desk work. The core of the conversation focuses on the importance of positioning for media coverage, emphasizing that many entrepreneurs overlook editorial opportunities and leave up to 80% of media potential on the table. She stresses the critical distinction between editorial and advertorial content before pitching to newsrooms. Tracey provides actionable resources—HARO (Help a Reporter Out), SourceBottle, PodMatch, and Matchmaker—as tools for securing quotes and thought‑leadership placements, even for those without a publicist. She encourages business leaders to view themselves as experts in any field and to share that expertise to become thought leaders. Tracey recommends fellow business leader Sir Sanju Ganglani, a knighted marketing and SEO expert, as a potential podcast guest. She recounts her first job as a teenage telemarketer for a carpet‑cleaning company, a story that led to meeting her future husband. Finally, she shares how listeners can find her online via lamourie‑media.com, Facebook, and Instagram, offering free consultations to educate entrepreneurs on PR tactics.
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This is Professor Pete Alexander with the Winning at Business and Life podcast, where business leaders share their insights. It is 6 questions in 7 minutes because successful business leaders are busy and rarely have more time to spare. So let's get to it. Question number 1: In a few sentences, please tell me who you are and what you do.
My name is Tracey Lamoree. I'm the founder and managing director of Lamoree Media, a publicity and media company. I'm the author of Get Rep'd: Build Your Brand with Effective Public and Media Relations and the winner of Women of Inspiration 2020 for media.
Tracey, it's so great to have you on the show and congratulations on that award. That's awesome.
Thank you.
Question number 2, what is something that makes you smile and/or laugh about working in your industry?
I think it's really funny that whenever they want to make somebody have a glamorous job on television and it's a woman, they call them, they make them a publicist. We get the big parties, but 80% of the job is plugging away at your computer.
Mm-hmm. Not as glamorous as it sounds. I love it. Question number 3. I have a fictitious book with all the answers for business. What chapter would you think most companies should read?
Absolutely, how to position yourself to get into media.
Mm, yes, I would think that, that you want to elaborate a little bit on that because that's obviously an important one.
Yeah, absolutely. We all think as entrepreneurs about advertising, but we don't think about media opportunities, and that's more than just press releases. Every entrepreneur across industry is literally leaving 80% of their opportunities on the table, just passing them by to get themselves into existing articles that somebody is going to be be quoted into. And there are all kinds of secrets on how to do that.
Awesome. I love it. Question number 4. Other than the generic work harder, have a great attitude, and care for customers, what advice or insight would you give to other business leaders?
I have some hard advice and insight. So what I was just saying about how to get yourself into media, um, 2 things. Before you even look at which media to do, how to get into it, remember the difference between editorial and advertorial. And I'll say that again, editorial and advertorial. Because before you reach out to the newsroom, you want to make sure that it's really something of substance and not something that literally belongs in their ad department or that's where they'll direct you. And secondly, um, understanding that you're an expert in your field and no matter what you do, whether you clean toilets, whether you mow lawns, whether you're a lawyer or a doctor, you have insight and expertise that most of us don't have. You can become a thought leader, um, by sharing that expertise within your industry and outside of your industry. And there are tons of media opportunities. I'm going to give you two words to Google right now and look that up. Which is Sourcebottle and HARO, Help a Reporter Out and Sourcebottle, and also things like PodMatch and Matchmaker. If you have time, if you can't afford a publicist to do this stuff for you, if you have hours to invest in research and time, there are absolutely opportunities right now that if you write something compelling about yourself and present yourself as the leader in your field that you are, there's opportunities today that you can begin to get quoted on. Easy. It's not some other people that get quoted and you that doesn't. It's literally a matter of turning the key that opens those doors.
—Oh, I love it. And thank you for sharing those resources. Those are wonderful. And I'm sure that some of our listeners will take you up on that. —Write them down.
I'm not joking. I'm not selling those. Those are secrets I rarely give out. That's what I'm telling you here. —Thank you for that.
Question number 5, what other business leader like yourself would you like to acknowledge and invite to be on my podcast?
—So I have so many I could. So I just want to acknowledge first of all that I'm not wanting to leave anybody out. And later I'll be introducing others to you. But the first one that comes to mind at this moment is Sir Sanju Ganglani, who is actually a knight, literally a knight, not something you buy. He was awarded a knight with only one of 300 or so people of this particular thing for good works that he does in the industry. Or sorry, outside, you know, good works he does in the world. But he's a marketing expert, SEO expert, a life expert, and he is just a great client. He's a great boss. I see the way he treats people. He's a great family man. So I think I think that he is killing it. I think he's winning at life and at business. So I want to suggest him. Perfect. He sounds wonderful.
And he would be the first sir that I would have on the show.
There you go.
And our final question, question number 6, please tell me about your first job.
So my first job, I was a telemarketer. I was 15 years old and it was telemarketing for a carpet cleaning company. A carpet cleaning company in 1986, we were Literally cold call. Cold call. Like, it's like the— but, you know, I look back on it, I guess I was brave. I would never do that now. Nothing could keep me— nothing keeps me, you know, I'm not shy of anything but that. Calling strangers, "Hello, would you like to have your car— I'm telling you, we have a $49 deal." And I remember it so clearly. And they— and funnily enough, they didn't like it. We were 15 and they didn't want people to know that we were 15, so they made us say, This is Mrs.— we had to make up a name, and I said Parkinson. And 10 years later, I met a Parkinson and I married him.
So what a great story, and I could appreciate it too. It wasn't my first job, but I had a telemarketing job for the full 3 weeks, and that's all I could do.
And then you walked.
I mean, there's only so many times you can get the phone slammed on your ear before you say, this is enough. It was a great story though. Tracy, thank you so much for being on the show. How can people find you?
On the web is Lamori Media. If you spell my last name right, they can find me at lamori-media.com. I live on Facebook at Tracy Lamori and Instagram, where you can see all my adventures and all my client adventures, which is Tracy Lamori PR Media. And I do work internationally, so, you know, if anybody has any questions, I'm also a talker. Anybody wants a free consult just to kind of understand because I'm all about educating entrepreneurs about what this PR thing is. So you don't have to hire me, hire another publicist, or just figure out what we do and do some of it yourself and get in the media, get in the news, elevate yourself. You deserve it. Get out there, do it.
I love it. That's very inspirational. This is Professor Pete Alexander with the Winning at Business and Life podcast. Thanks for listening.
