Tell Your Own Story, or Someone Else Will — Scott Yoffe Communications (DH 016)

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If you don’t tell your own story, someone else will.

On this episode of Digital Hospitality, learn how public relations veteran Scott Yoffe approaches the art of communications in 2020, hear interesting stories from his two decades with the San Diego Chargers, and get tips on telling your brand’s story with both new media and old media.

It’s an exciting time to work in communications, Scott Yoffe said.

“You never had this landscape before; you can share your own message. You always had to rely on other people.”

If you have the right tools and knowledge, you can publish your own story right now for the world to see, hear, and read. That’s a lot of power to have.

Scott Yoffe Communications helps their clients with public and media relations, as well as many other essential communication services like social media, design, publishing, strategy, and crisis management.

Before operating his own full-service public relations and communications firm, Scott Yoffe spent 21 years with the San Diego Chargers in the National Football League.

When you are proactive about communications, you have a chance to control your message which is very valuable for any business.

First you have to understand what is your own story. That can be harder than it seems. If you haven’t worked to StoryBrand your company and fine-tune your messaging, how can you expect anyone else to understand where you’ve been and where you’re headed?

Building Relations:

Much of Public Relations is about creating and fostering opportunities to tell your brand’s story with those who can help reverberate the information. This comes down to building relationships.

Relationships are constantly being formed in business and solid connections become mutually beneficial. At Cali BBQ Media we know that, “A Rising Tide Lifts All Ships.”

When he ended his long run with the Chargers, Scott Yoffe had to work to re-establish relationships with the media in a new capacity.

“I value every word of coverage, every line…,” Scott Yoffe said about getting media for his clients. “I understand how hard it is to get that kind of coverage. And how lucky we were because we had it built in when I was in the NFL.”

For a lot of small- and medium-sized businesses, public relationships is sometimes just not Top of Mind for them. It should be, however, because maintaining a flow of communication about your company is essential to keeping it alive and thriving.

Some businesses will hire a marketing manager to handle all of their content, publishing, social media, and PR work. That’s just too big a job for one person, Scott Yoffe told Shawn Walchef on Digital Hospitality.

You have to get out of your own way as a business owner and realize you can’t do everything yourself. Sometimes it takes a team to tell a brand’s story. If you don’t have that on staff and can’t do it yourself, then that’s where people like Scott Yoffe can help save the day.

Scott Yoffe helps his clients with sometimes-elusive earned media, the kind of press that you just can’t buy.

Getting press coverage and other “earned media” is a specialized skill that takes being proactive, engaged, and vigilant. You’ve got to steer the messaging and keep in touch with those who broadcast it.

Scott Yoffe advises his clients to be accessible and available to communicate at any time.

“You never know when you’re going to get a story opportunity,” he said.

You might see those stories as “good” or “bad,” but it doesn’t mean you should only tell the good ones. With the proper messaging, you can find a happy ending for most tales.

Sometimes you might not want to comment to the media, or talk about your business, but it’s always good practice to do it anyway.

“No comment” is just not good storytelling and gives too much power to others.

If your story is going to be told, in whatever form, make sure you have a say. Who else knows your narrative better than you?

“There’s no such thing as bad press,” Scott Yoffe said. “When you’re getting a story written about you, that means your competition is not getting written about.”

You may not be able to control the questions, but you can control the answer.

“They can ask the question, but you can answer however you want,” Scott Yoffe said.

Balance Old and New Media:

In the digital age, a lot of businesses have become too reliant on simply posting to social media as the only way they promote themselves, when instead they could do much more to grow their reach.

“At some point people become tone deaf to those things,” Scott Yoffe said about social media promotion. “A lot of people have kind of gotten used to thinking that’s the new way of doing business now. But it’s not.”

You’ve got to have a balance of different types of communications, which still includes “earned media” in the traditional radio, TV and print.

The reason you can’t just expect to get earned media coverage is the same reason it’s called “earned” — you have to work to earn it.

It’s one thing to promote yourself to the media, it’s another to build a relationship with its members.

For example: When Cali BBQ hit its five year anniversary, it was hard to get media coverage for the achievement. But when we hit our 10 year anniversary in 2018, the milestone was shared by San Diego press and media members on social media thanks to the real relationships we formed with them.

There’s an exponential value in establishing bonds with those who can help share your story. You can help tell theirs, too. Everyone is the media in 2020.

“A lot of it come down to relationship building,” Scott Yoffe said. That means emails, phone calls, coffee meetings, whatever it takes to keep the communication flowing.

“You’re relying on those relationships to get these stories done.”

You can’t just sit behind a keyboard and do the job, he said. You still have to get out and shake hands every now and then.

“You’ve got to have those relationships, because when you’re in a pinch and you need a favor, you got a client that you need to get a story for, it’s a lot easier to do that when you know the person on the other end of the phone,” Scott Yoffe said.