A 2011 story by Barrington Patch about CareerPlace

At a time of record unemployment in Illinois and the country, organizations that can help people find employment and build their skills are more important then ever. Yet, CareerPlace, located in Barrington, found that more than 40% of people in their area didn’t know about their services and classes for unemployed individuals.

“We struggled with finding the time to reach out to the local media,” said Monica Keane, executive director of CareerPlace. “I thought Professional Media Relations would be a good way to learn how to get information to the public.”

After attending the Community Media Workshop’s Professional Media Relations course in early 2011, Keane said she realized that when working with the media, everything is about a story.

“I learned to stop telling the business of the agency and to tell the story of the people who are touched by what we do,” said Keane.

Since the Workshop course, CareerPlace has received more media coverage in community press (check out the Patch story here) and started developing relationships with local reporters. Keane says she can now pick up the phone and call certain reporters with possible story ideas. She’s also used the Workshop’s online press release generator and Chicago area media guide to aid in her media outreach work.

“I’m just really impressed with the Workshop,” said Keane. “The willingness of staff to roll up their sleeves and get involved with the nonprofits they serve is so important.”

Keane enjoyed her time at the Workshop so much that she decided to hire Workshop staff for a custom consulting project—development of a train-the-trainer curriculum “Using Social Media to Search, Network and Find Your Next Job” to give CareerPlace trainers tools to help job seekers use social media in their employment searches. The project was supported with a grant from the Barrington Area Community Foundation.

The Workshop team continues to work with CareerPlace to ensure successful social media trainings for its participants in the coming year.

The Workshop’s 2012 Professional Media Relations course starts Jan. 20. There are still spots available. Register today and start making your own local media connections!

RoiAnn Phillips of HealthConnect One

RoiAnn Phillips decided to attend Professional Media Relations because she wanted a better grasp of media strategy and outreach as she took on more communications work at HealthConnect One.

Her “ah-ha moment” came when instructors told the class how to tailor a pitch to pique reporters’ interest, but her big breakthrough came a couple of weeks later. During the five-part workshop, she was able to pitch her organization’s upcoming report analyzing breastfeeding rates in Illinois to WBEZ Reporter Chip Mitchell. That opportunity resulted in three stories (below) in the coming months about the report and HealthConnect One. One hospital even decided to step up its breastfeeding efforts after hearing one of Mitchell’s stories on WBEZ.

“The WBEZ stories wouldn’t have happened if I hadn’t taken Professional Media Relations,” said Phillips. “Without the class, I wouldn’t have understood how to frame a pitch and I wouldn’t have had the opportunity to be in the room with reporters.”

REGISTER FOR PROFESSIONAL MEDIA RELATIONS TODAY.

Check out the WBEZ stories that resulted from RoiAnn’s time at Professional Media Relations and follow-up work with reporter Chip Mitchell.

Report: Breastfeeding in Illinois hinges partly on race, income – April 26, 2011

Hospital regulators let formula vie with breast milk – May 5, 2011

After WBEZ report, hospital steps up breastfeeding efforts – August 2, 2011

Professional Media Relations
$395 for the five-part media workshop
Starts Jan. 20, 2012
Includes numerous handouts, worksheets & a copy of the 2012 Getting On Air, Online & Into Print media guide ($125 annual subscription value).
Reserve your spot today.

Visit our website or call 312-369-6400.

Workshop President Thom Clark leads a communictions training.

The 2011 session of Professional Media Relations (PMR) is shaping up, and participants will have the chance to learn from reporters and experts in the field. In addition to regular trainers, Workshop President Thom Clark and Vice President Nora Ferrell, confirmed guest speakers include:

- Dave Hoekstra, Chicago Sun-Times reporter

- Ingrid Goncalves, director of communications for the Center for Labor and Community Research, as well as a former PMR grad (Read Ingrid’s success story here.)

- Alejo Torres, senior outreach program manager, Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago

- Wanda Wells, long-time Chicago broadcaster and Workshop trainer

Professional Media Relations–a cornerstone course at Community Media Workshop–kicks off in January, but there’s still time to sign up. You will learn how to craft a communications strategy, draft media materials, serve as a spokesperson, pitch a reporter and use social media tools. Sign up for Professional Media Relations today.

The path that Ingrid Gonçalves followed to her position as director of communications at the Center for Labor and Community Research will sound familiar to many nonprofit communicators: “I was hired out of college as an administrator for a program, and I was then promoted to director of communications almost by accident, because we needed someone to do that kind of work,” she recalls. “They liked a newsletter I had done.”

On her boss’s recommendation, she looked up the Community Media Workshop and signed up for a five-week course called Professional Media Relations in January. “It was a really great sort of general course,” she says. “It was good to have someone walk me through the technical aspects of working with media, and to provide strategies for making those interactions effective—even something as basic as asking them if this is a good time for them to talk. It’s not something I would have thought to do, but they’re often on deadline, and they’re not going to be paying attention if they’re trying to finish an article.”

They also got to practice on real, live reporters, who came to the workshop to hear pitches-in-progress. Chicago Sun-Times Reporter Dave Hoekstra liked what he heard when Gonçalves told him about a student-run coffee business—and called for an interview the following week.

“We got a really nice story on the front of the food section, and our students were photographed by a Pulitzer-prize winning photographer,” says Gonçalves. “I never would have thought to pitch a food reporter about a student-run business. I was more focused on education reporters.”

Gonçalves has since gone on to mount major media campaigns on her own, and the Sun-Times story continues to pay dividends. “We use reprints of articles in our fundraising materials,” she says, “and it does grant us legitimacy.”

“Before I took the course at the Workshop, it would be daunting when someone would ask me to write a press release or send something to the media,” she says. “I wouldn’t know what to do. Now I can think strategically: What do I want to say, based on who I’m sending this to? It makes you much more effective.”

For 20 years, Professional Media Relations has been the Workshop’s cornerstone training. This intensive training session is designed specifically for nonprofit communicators to plan media campaigns around one of their own stories, while learning basic public relations skills. Sign up for the 2011 session of Professional Media Relations today. Pitch reporters in person, take a free media guide back to the office, learn tricks of the communications trade. It’s a win-win-win.