TJ WALKER - THE HABIT INFLUENCER - Personal Development | LIVE STREAM

Welcome to PR Spotlight, the show that profiles the leading public relations practitioners in the world.

Our guest today eats, breathes, sleeps, thinks PR all the time, 24 hours a day. In fact, he has put many people in the Guinness Book of World Records for accomplishments they've done, which is a great PR hook. And full disclosure, he got me into the Guinness Book of Records for most talk show appearances ever in a 24 hour period. Our guest is Ryan McCormick, a partner with Goldman McCormick. It is a New York City based PR firm. They work with a lot of top law firms around the country, but they work in the medical, entertainment, finance industries as well. Ryan, thanks for joining us today.

TJ Walker, it is a great honor to be here. Thank you so much for having me.

You've been in the PR business for a long time, but you come from the media background. Your partner does too. Specifically a lot of talk radio focus and TV talk show producing. How has that affected the typical service you give for your clients?

Well, it has allowed us to have a very unique relationship with the media because we're not just former TV and radio producers, we're active radio producers. So we have a mindset of a producer. We know what we'd like to create and what kind of show that we feel would be exceptional. And we were able to relate to a producer. And when we're conferring with them, communicating with them, we can kind of be on the same page and be on that same frequency. If you just do PR and you don't understand how the media works, I feel you're missing a great part of the puzzle. And when you're working in both fields, that has given us a tremendous advantage. It's allowed us to service our clients exceptionally well.

You are known for constantly monitoring the news media and focusing on their needs, which ultimately benefits to your clients needs as well. But I know, I mean, I've gotten a call from you before when I wasn't a paying client and you still booked me on shows. Because you're constantly building relationships with top bookers at Fox News, cnn, cnbc and elsewhere.

It is very crucial. There's a gentleman named Robert Kurosaki, rich dad, poor dad. And he had this one quote, he said that you want to provide as much service as you can. Always think about others, put the others ahead. And that's what we do in the industry. If we see a person could be a fantastic individual or guest for a show, we'll reach out to that show and put them in contact because they're the producers. When they know that you're not just putting your clients and your needs ahead. It comes back. So our goal is to again, service as many people as possible. We want to always service our clients, obviously, and we also want to always service the media. So anything we can do to help another person along the way is just wonderful. And it's a crucial part of the business too. I think you need to come off and really be seen as selfless.

Now. You're what I think of as a hybrid firm. You're not just getting traditional placements on Headline News and CNN and Fox News, but you're also helping facilitating and producing Internet talk radio shows, podcasts for your clients. So they're not just being interviewed, they are doing interviews too, getting their message out. How has that evolved over time?

It has evolved over time where we have been able to apply everything that we've learned over 10 to 15 years of producing radio and TV and brought that directly to the podcast. And some of the podcasts we've started originally on BL Blog talk radio have become nationally syndicated radio shows. So we've been able to build shows for clients, start at the tip top that have a hard huge audience. So they've evolved to the point where the quality improves. Clients are having high quality guests on, they're having newsmakers on their show and they're creating memorable programs. And when you are a person that is putting yourself out there to the media, if you're able to create a platform and become an excellent show host yourself, you can provide so much value to others and it is incredibly exciting venture. When you are a host of your own show and you are the one who's hosting the gathering, it could be a tremendously fun and beneficial experience.

And we can't all be Oprah or Bill O'Reilly, but the best PR in the world is when you do host your own prominent show. Especially if it's daily. Because every, Every book Bill O'Reilly writes straight to the top of the bestseller list. Same as Oprah, Rachel Maddoff for that matter. It's all across the spectrum. If you host your own show, it gives you a certain prominence. It also makes it a lot easier to get bookings because people want to be on your show and they want to build relationships. Ryan, you and your partner Mark Goldman work with a lot of different industries. You are known for deep expertise in the legal arena. What's different about doing PR for lawyers and how do you help them?

What's different about working with lawyers is lawyers are not only commenting on the news, they're also commenting on their own cases. So there's a lot of elements as far as what is being perceived by the public. So it's very, can be very complex, very complicated at some times, but it's very exciting and with attorneys. Some of the cases that we've worked on, we've actually worked on two particular cases where the PR efforts have directly resulted. We feel in the trial changing. There's a gentleman named Nick Hillary, a father of five who was accused of murder back about a half a year ago, maybe a year ago. The entire public thought he did it and he had all this evidence that was stacked up against him. And his team came to us and they said, can you bring this to the public's attention? Can you help us out? Can you get his, the truth out about it? And we did, we worked really hard and we wound up getting a five page cover story of the New York Times. And he wound up doing a lot of other national media, a lot of radio, a lot of tv. And as a direct result, or at least a part of the result is that people started looking at the case with a greater scrutiny and a lot of the evidence that they had against this gentleman, it turned out to be dismissed. And I think that we're on the verge of this case being completely dismissed and he's going to be exonerated. And I can't tell you what an incredible feeling it is to know, to see a person who had all this against him, knowing that our efforts have helped him to become free or helped him to become restored with his family. So sometimes when you do PR and it does goes really well, it can really help people a lot especially. And if you're also working in philanthropies and you're working with charities, PR efforts can be seen directly in the fundraising efforts and you can also help organizations. So there's a lot of great things that can be done well when PR is implemented correctly.

Now, when I think of your full disclosure, I work with a lot of PR firms all over the world. They hire me to train their people. And so I have, I think, a good sense of the relative strengths and weaknesses of a lot of PR firms based on size. What's always struck me different about Goldman McCormick is, is the two principals who have a tremendous amount of experience and depth in the industry are still out there pitching every day. Most people who've been in the industry and are say over the age of 30, they want to sit back and do strategy and big concepts and creative ideas and certainly all of that is important.

Yes.

But at the end of the day, someone has got to pick up the phone or send an email or a tweet and generate a booking. How do you maintain. Here's my real question. How do you maintain an enthusiasm for that? Because most PR practitioners burn out and they want to farm it out to the 22 year old intern who just started on Monday.

That mentality has never settled in with us. We love talking to the producers, we love having those relationships. Because when a person hires a PR firm, what they're really doing is they are purchasing, they're renting that firm's relationships with the media so they can facilitate information about themselves to the media, knowing that that firm has great relationships. So it is crucial, absolutely crucial, we feel, to always reach out and speak on the phone with people all the time. As far as strategy goes, you could spend a lot of time coming up with ideas, but those ideas will never see the light of day unless you have good relationships, unless you can confer with the media on a regular basis. And we, we talk to the media, we just don't talk to them because we're offering them something. We just don't talk to them because we're asking how they're doing. We're seeing how else we can help them as well. So we're always doing things to continue and build those relationships. But I think that I don't care what era or how far along you are, I think everyone should be picking up the phone because you never want to lose that skill set. You never want to lose the ability or your passion for speaking with people on the phone.

And do you find the phone is still how most producers want to be pitched? Because I am hearing more and more, especially from people who are pitching Millennials, that it's got to be through text, it's got to be through email. How are you figuring out the right mix as far as approaching reporters, producers, editors?

Even if a producer asks us to email, we'll always try to make a phone call. We'll always try to meet them in person. Because when you see someone in person and you have them on the phone and there's just an extra element of human interaction, and I think that people are trying to get rid of that and we don't agree with it at all. Matter of fact, some of our best relationships have come when you meet with someone in person. We've gotten them on the phone because you could have a quick conversation with someone and then offer that producer three or four other guests that you're currently working with or experts that you're currently working with. So we don't agree with email only. We agree with being we feel that you should be on the phone as often as you can and it's even better to have face to face meetings with the producers and your clients as well. Always, always be out there, always show yourself and always improve your communications with these people.

The firm is Goldman McCormick. You can find out more information about them by going to their website, Goldman McCormick dot com. It's linked in the show notes Ryan McCormick. Thanks for being our guest.

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