How Can Startups Get Media Coverage w/ Divya Talwar | BBC News

Divya Talwar: 0:00You know, what I'm about to say may come across controversial, but getting media coverage could be a complete waste of time and money unless you do it right.

‍Amardeep Parmar: 0:16

How can startups get media coverage we look at? Is there any point in the world of social media today? How do you frame your story in a way that's attractive to journalists? How do you get in touch with journalists and make them pay attention to you? Should you use PR agencies or are they just a scam? And so much more. We have our expert with us today, Divya Talwar, who's a BBC investigative journalist. She's done work for incredible amounts of programmes, including Panorama.

Amardeep Parmar: 0:43

I hope you enjoy today's episode. I'm Amar from BAE HQ, and this podcast is powered by HSBC Innovation Banking, so thank you so much for coming on the interview today, and I think this is a topic that's going to be really interesting for so many founders out there, because so many of them don't really think it's even possible, maybe, to get media coverage, or maybe think that's not relevant anymore. So if somebody's looking right now and who know about media coverage in the mainstream media, why should they bother with it? Why should they not just do tiktok or do instagram?

Divya Talwar: 1:14

You know what I'm about to say may come across controversial, but getting media coverage could be a complete waste of time and money unless you do it right. So I think that anyone, any founder, entrepreneur, anyone thinking of you know I really want to get media coverage, I really want to get my story out there. I think you just need to basically peel it back and ask the question why? First, what is it that you you want to get out of this media coverage? Do you want to get eyes from investors? Are you looking for new clients? Are you trying to build credibility? And then that way you figure out your kind of your media strategy. And, like you said, you know you may realize that actually I'm not really going to fulfill my why by getting featured in a newspaper because my target audience isn't there or you know what. It's just not really helpful.

Divya Talwar: 2:23

Me going on this coaching business and she was basically getting quoted in newspapers and publications, which is great and it helped her build her credibility. But ultimately, what she wanted out of that was to get paid speaking gigs because she was pivoting her whole business towards speaking basically pivoting her whole business towards speaking basically and it just wasn't moving the needle on that front. So we had a chat and said well, people want to see that you can talk. Well, people want to see you under pressure, people want to see you dealing with kind of life situations, so you need to be on the telly. So she kind of pivoted and now she followed these journalists on social media and eventually she got asked to come on.

Divya Talwar: 3:11

I think it was Sky News or something and literally the moment that interview finished she got an email from someone can you come and speak at this event? And it just shows you to be really, really intentional about what your why is. Why is it that you want media coverage? Because actually it might be a total waste of time if you know it's not the right fit or it's, you're not going to reach that right target audience and, like you said, social media may be a much better platform than the, the traditional media outlets so it's interesting to mention there about how your friend followed a bunch of people on social media or journalists and eventually she got asked on the news right, and I'm guessing that's one path you can take.

Amardeep Parmar: 3:53

But if somebody's listening right now and they really want to get covered in the mainstream media, what are the first steps maybe take in order to reach somebody in that stage? And then afterwards we can go into what they should actually do once they get there. If we start off at the initial bit like how do you even get the opportunity to do that kind of thing?

Divya Talwar: 4:11

Take a step back first and figure out what your story is. What is it that you're actually going to? What value are you delivering? And then, once you figure that out, figure out what are the journalists that are writing about that particular industry you're in. Like, let's say, you're a wellness specialist, for example, you're not really gonna be, you're not gonna really get much luck if you contact a financial journalist. So do your research first, figure out what it is, what's your story, what's your message, and then figure out which media outlet, which journalist do I need journalist do I need to contact? Look at what they're writing about. Look at stuff they've written about in the past. Have they written something about your competitors? Have they featured your competitors? So it just shows you that that sort of topic is on their radar.

Divya Talwar: 5:02

And then I think the next step is, once you've identified potential journalists, is to contact them. So social media, for example also. Just drop them an email. But when you drop them an email, make it personal. You know, address them by their first name.

Divya Talwar: 5:19

Say something like you know what I saw you write about X. I really liked a piece you did about that because it just shows the piece you did about that, because it just shows the journalist you've done your research, you're not wasting their time, you're not wasting your time. I don't think, also, you need to do this massive pitch like, hi, I want to tell you about this story and I'm great because of this. And here's evidence. Just literally two lines Hi, I see that you write about this, I've got a great story, would love to have a call with you and that's like the intro. You've kind of peaked the journalist's interest and hopefully they'll say, yep, fine, let's schedule something in. They might ask you for a little bit more information. I would just keep it vague and get that journalist on the phone, and that's where you can really have a conversation and and sell what it is that you.

Divya Talwar: 6:07

You basically your story or what it is that you want.

Amardeep Parmar: 6:10

Obviously you must get content with so many people who are trying to get covered in the media, and many of these pictures probably aren't very good or aren't very relevant to you. What's the kind of hit ratio that you see and that people can maybe have as a benchmark and heads? Okay, if I'm going to get covered, then maybe I have to reach out to at least this many people to have a decent chance, and it's even if they have a good pitch. Obviously, every good pitch doesn't get taken, for whatever reason as well.

Divya Talwar: 6:35

Honestly, I would say don't just play the numbers game, because you know, if you're thinking right, my strategy is I'm going to contact 100 journalists and hopefully one of them will bite.

Divya Talwar: 6:46

I don't think that that's the right plan of action. I think it just goes back to doing your research, because you'd rather tailor a pitch to a particular journalist or a particular publication than just basically playing this big numbers game. In terms of me, like, I get contacted by PR agencies or people probably every single day, and the ones where you know the ones I read and actually take notice are the ones that have taken time to figure out why they're contacting me. What is it that's made me special, you know? Is it because I have covered a particular issue that they've connected with and think that they think that I can do a follow up on that? You know, they make me feel like, ok, I've come to you for a reason, because I believe you can help me.

Divya Talwar: 7:35

So don't play the numbers game, don't just contact any journalist. Figure out, comes back to your why. Why is it that you want media coverage? And that should determine your strategy. And don't be afraid to just ask. You know, don't be afraid to just contact journalists. I'll tell you a secret. I mean, we want, you know, we need stories, so we need people to contact us. We rely on people telling us their story. We rely on people talking to us. So it's very much a a two-way street. So don't don't be scared of journalists. I know a lot of people are. Don't be, you know, we, we can work together really, really well.

Divya Talwar: 8:14

Um, I think, just just be mindful of who you're contacting and why you're contacting.

Amardeep Parmar: 8:22

And looking at that as well, I said a key thing is about the story, right, and it's obviously something I've seen in my own past as well how often people think that their business as usual is a story, which often isn't the case, right? So when you're pitching to a journalist and obviously it's different journalists who cover different things, but how does somebody need to frame their story in a way which makes it attractive to be covered?

Divya Talwar: 8:46

I think there's two ways on that. One, you could be telling them your own story, for example, and what's interesting there is almost like talk to a friend about it, because ultimately you want people to be interested. Right, what is going to make me cover something or my colleagues cover something is essentially, you know, are people going to care about this story? So what's interesting about your story? Is it a tale you know, a really inspirational tale? Is it a tale of kind of you know, winning something against all odds? Think about, think about you. Would you be interested in reading about this or hearing about this? What value would you get out of that? So there's one way sort of crafting a story and going to a journalist or media outlet and saying, look, I've got this great story. It's very much focused on me. This is why I think that you should, you should cover it. Um, I mean, I'll give you some examples.

Divya Talwar: 9:47

Like around the pandemic, there were some really great businesses that really thrived and in the kind of the you know the, the outlook was a lot of businesses were going under and there were some incredible founders and companies that just found a real opportunity and they basically approached us in like various outlets and said look, this is our story. We have taken this awful situation. The pandemic found a niche and you know we have, you know we're flying, and that was really interesting at that time where people are just seeing, you know, negative press and things going wrong and death and destruction, you know there was a real appetite for kind of success stories, happiness, you know a silver lining. So just be careful about it. Think about what's going on right now. You know, in the world, how does your story fit? How is your story or why is your story important right now? So that's one way.

Divya Talwar: 10:48

Another way of trying to get media coverage is to kind of position yourself as some expert in a particular area. You know, are you the go-to on men's health, for example? Are you the go-to when we're talking about, um, children's health, you know. And so there's two ways for a founder or an entrepreneur to try and get that coverage one as an expert in a particular area or field, or two as kind of themselves putting themselves out there as the story essentially.

Amardeep Parmar: 11:23

And looking at that as well. So, obviously, when somebody is trying to frame their own story as something which is covered by the media, right and when they're trying to do that, obviously we know that many people aren't necessarily the best storytellers. So you mentioned there about would this story be interesting to somebody else to read. Is there anything else that maybe people can do in terms of the way they pitch it? Because you mentioned there about emailing and messaging and things like that. How brief should those messages be? Should they be trying to get really concise or should they go into a lot of detail?

Amardeep Parmar: 11:57

Because I'm sure you realize this is what I had this on myself is PR agencies will often send me a massive, massive essay on somebody which I'm never going to read and I advise against it myself. But then I'm not somebody who's in the traditional media, so I don't know exactly how that works, and for people who are sending me this kind of emails, it must work, I assume. Or the PR agencies are really inefficient, so that kind of comes back into that question too. The PR agencies is that one way you can go to get this done? If people are worried about how they frame themselves, or what advice, what steps can people take there?

Divya Talwar: 12:29

This is really interesting and I could talk all day about PR agencies. I mean, I am contacted by PR agencies every single day, um, and I don't know if the founders that they are approaching me about know how they will just cold email me. For example, I got an email just a couple of days ago. Hi, Divya, I know that you're really interested in luxury travel, so I was wondering if you want to interview X Y,Z, and it just made me laugh, because it doesn't take long for you to Google and realize that's not my niche. I don't cover luxury travel. I've never done a story around that, ever. So obviously I'm just going to press delete, but you know, the founder may have had a really compelling story to tell. Oh, he could have been a really interesting voice on a particular story or something else that I was covering. So I think, for founders, be really careful about the PR that you get and the PR that you're paying for, because you could be spending a lot of money. I've heard people spending thousands and thousands and thousands of pounds, but I'm not sure you know, I think there's a huge variation in skill when it comes to PR, because, really, if that PR agency, if the you know the PR companies that contact me every single day. What separates them from the ones that are successful is they've done their research. For a start, right, they've Googled me, they know what I'm about, they know what my interests are and they tailor their email to me. You know, because I know that that company has sent that same email to every single journalist that they've been able to find. You know, on social media, or they've just kind of. You know, there's a formula for certain media outlets. It's like first name dot, surname, slash, whatever the media outlet is, and that's what I think they've done, just a scattergun approach.

Divya Talwar: 14:29

So any founder out there, before you invest in PR, ask them how is it that you, you're going to get media coverage? How do you contact the journalist? Because I think that will tell you a lot about their, their strategy. Um, because it can be damaging to your own personal brand, right, the great ones that do a really good job. I mean, I've got this PR person who's now on my WhatsApps and she will contact me really regularly. I've got so-and-so are you interested? And I get. You know she gets a response really quickly, just because I know that she's reliable, she does her research, she knows. You know what it is that I cover.

Divya Talwar: 15:11

So any founders out there, I would just say, be mindful of who's looking after your PR and think, do you need a PR person or can you do it yourself? Because, in a nutshell, you know contact a journalist, put a few lines, and a good journalist should be able to have a conversation with you and figure out what is interesting for them, what the story is. So you don't have to go with everything on a gold plate. You could just say look, this is this is what I do. Have a chat with you and, like I said, get on the phone, have a conversation and you know good journalists will be able to spot an angle, be able to spot what's unique in your story.

Amardeep Parmar: 16:00

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Amardeep Parmar: 16:34

Looking at that as well, about the unique side of the story, so say how important is the relevant side of things. So let's say, for example, my own story. Right, I've got lots of different parts to it and it could be something that's not really relevant to what I'm doing today, what the Bae HQ is, but something else from my past might be able to get me news coverage. What do you think founders should do in that sense? Should they use kind of other elements from their story in order to maybe get their foot in the door? And then, once they've got their foot in the door, I guess it's easier. Once you've been on BBC once, for example, it's probably easier to get on again. Or should they be careful about that and maybe not get media coverage unless it is really relevant to what their startup does or what their company does?

Divya Talwar: 17:11

I think it just has to come back to your why. What is your ultimate goal of getting media coverage? And if it means that, let's say, for example, for you, let's say you get some coverage, not necessarily talking about the BAE HQ, but about something else, necessarily talking about, um, the BAE HQ, but about something else. But your kind of strategy is ultimately what I want is to build relationships with the aim that eventually they will, you know, they'll talk to talk about the Bae HQ in some shape or form. It's not a bad strategy, but I think you just need to be intentional of what your, what your end game is. And would that coverage help you to get that? Because I've I've seen some people go, you know, get media coverage for them but not, you know, their company isn't mentioned. They've almost become a case study in a wider story. For example, there's something about I'm just trying to think of a good example this woman actually runs a really successful business, but there was journalists from newspapers looking for women talking about how they you know how they they discipline their children and she signed up for that. I mean, it wasn't written up very well and she wasn't very happy with it and that ultimately hurt her and hurt her brand, and so it wasn't really very beneficial for her. So I think it just really goes back to your why, and that needs to determine which outlets you want to talk to and what you want to talk about. But what you did hit the nail there is, like you know, you build that relationship with the journalist and hopefully next time they'll come back to you.

Divya Talwar: 18:47

It does come down to building these relationships. You know, contact a journalist and hopefully next time they'll come back to you. It does come down to building these relationships. You know, contact a journalist and say, look, I like what you're doing, I would love to be featured in some shape or form. Let's go for a coffee and then maybe you know, a few months down the line, they are looking at something and remember you. You know that's what separates you from the kind of the email that they've got or the, the message on social media. They've either had a phone conversation with you or they've seen you face to face and they will then remember you.

Divya Talwar: 19:16

Um, so do build relationships, look at, look at journalists and outlets that are doing a good job, that align with you, and and build those relationships.

Amardeep Parmar: 19:28

And just coming back to as well with the, so say once, you've been covered in Bbc once, for example, right so, even if it's a different journalist. So let's say you can see that somebody's messaged you and they can say I've been featured in Forbes, Sky news and those kind of stuff before. Does that make an impact on you or not so much, because I guess if you know somebody's been covered before, it might maybe make your due diligence a bit easier, or is this not a factor at all?

Divya Talwar: 19:52

Um, I think if, speaking personally, I mean, yeah, sure, okay, they've been featured in other media outlets, okay, so it kind of you assume that they would be good, a good talker, for example, or they have a clear message, but that wouldn't make me, that wouldn't compel me, to say, right, yeah, you're booked. I'll tell you what I do, though. With every single person that approaches me and I'm thinking of working with, the first thing I would do is check their social media, so I would go and see are they on Twitter, are they on Instagram, are they on TikTok, are they on Facebook? And I will go through as many posts as I can, because what I want to do is make sure that they are not controversial in any way. I mean, it's fine to be controversial, but is that, is that controversy bordering on, you know, quite harmful content in any shape or form? We were always there, and the number of people. We've then looked on social media and realised, oh gosh, they have said this about this particular issue, nothing to do with the story that we were thinking of. But you know that would damage my credibility as a journalist if I then gave this person a platform to speak on and to kind of convey a message. I mean, they may be talking about a really niche topic and they may be an expert in that particular issue, but you know, if they have said something in a public you know in a public way that could harm me, then no public. You know in a public way that could harm me, then no. So I would tell any founder that's thinking of you know, trying to navigate the media, wants to get featured in the media. Look at what you've already put out there, because a good journalist will look you up. A good journalist will do their research and you don't want something you said or written not thought about too much to come and bite you. So it comes back to your.

Divya Talwar: 21:54

We talk about personal brand a lot. It's sort of become a buzz term, but that is important. If someone's contacting me saying I'm an expert in so-and-so, I'm going to look them up, I'm going to see are they really an expert in this? Do they have a particular following of a particular demographic that illustrates that yes, they are an expert. What qualifications have they got?

Divya Talwar: 22:16

So I will do my research and you as a, as a founder or an entrepreneur, just needs to make sure that your digital brand is not going to harm you in any way at all. Everything needs to align with the story that you want to tell, align with the messaging that you want to convey, because you'll be surprised, you know. Some people think, oh well, yeah, the last month everything is really clean. But as a good journalist, you should dig a bit, a bit, you know. You dig a bit further and maybe, like a year in, and you see something that they've posted. You think, oh gosh, no, I, I definitely couldn't put this person on. So be careful, clean up your social media. I would say so as somebody posts every single day.

Amardeep Parmar: 23:01

That's a bit of a scary thought. That's why I'm smiling there, but there's probably something I've done dodgy at some point. You know it's almost like you sometimes. You said like you might post something about thinking too deeply about it and not realizing how different people perceive different things. And you mentioned there about personal brand too, and you mentioned about like, for example, in trying to cover looking up your story and there's this sort of battle between personal brand and business brand. How much so, say some people are listening right now, our founders maybe don't really want the personal coverage, but want their company to be covered more. How would you advise them that kind of route if they wanted to maybe stay away from the spotlight themselves but put their brand in the spotlight?

Divya Talwar: 23:44

I think it's often easier to because companies are are faceless, right, you know, and it's it's quite hard to get coverage for a company because people connect with stories, people connect with real people.

Divya Talwar: 24:00

And if you are a founder and you're really shy and you just don't think that the media outlet is okay, you know, know, you just don't feel comfortable with that, that's okay. But trying to get coverage just for your company, without a a kind of human story, is far more difficult and often the, the founder, builds this personal brand, which makes it a lot easier for the, the company, to then get coverage. So often works the other way around, where the founder builds the brand and that reaps rewards for the company, rather than the other way around. But obviously I understand that some people are just not comfortable with that. Some people are just not comfortable with being in the spotlight in any shape or form. But it's just harder, right, when you may have a great company, but if it's faceless and human-less, it's just harder. It's just harder for journalists to tell stories, it's harder for audiences to connect with it.

Amardeep Parmar: 25:00

It obviously just feels more like an ad as well, right, when it's a company being featured as opposed to a person.

Divya Talwar: 25:05

Yeah, yeah, it comes back to people don't want to be sold to. Even on social media, we are flooded with people trying to sell stuff to us. And what do we do? We just scroll past right. So again, in the, the media, it's far more intentional, like we can't be shown to be promoting products. You know, we can't be shown to kind of backing certain things, but we can be shown to be telling stories and compelling stories. Exactly, and it comes down to people don't want to be sold to people. People are just bored of that because they're getting too much of that. They're bombarded with people selling to them. You know, you see, whether you go on social media or you turn on the telly, there's a lot of that and it's just not going to.

Divya Talwar: 25:53

It's just not going to reap any kind of rewards.

Amardeep Parmar: 25:56

I think it's a really important point as well, because I know from experience where some people will be saying oh, my product does this, so it's revolutionary like, can you feature it? And it's like it's not like you said exactly it comes across as an ad, which is not what a journalist would do. Right? And just before we go into quite quick five questions as well, I'd love to get your opinion on advertorials, which is the new thing that I get a lot of emails about, where it's like you've been selected to be featured in this list. Here's the fee of five thousand pounds to featured, and what do you think founders should be thinking about that? When it's this paid media coverage where you're essentially paying to be part of a list or to get an award, and it's often in magazines, and sometimes a lot of people will say it's national newspapers where they've somehow got a slot in there. Is that something which is worth the money for people or should people avoid it?

Divya Talwar: 26:48

See, I don't sell advertorials, um, so I don't think I'm best placed to say whether it's beneficial. But I would just say, be careful. If you're being asked to pay for something, think what's what's going on here, because journalists you know good journalists they rarely pay for stories. So be careful, you know, maybe speak to someone that's that maybe has got something out of it. Ask, you know, ask the journalist or whoever's contacting them. Can you put me in touch with people who have done this so I can, you know, hear what their experience has been like before? And especially when you're forking out big sums of money, I would say you do your research, speak to people who've done it and if it's helped them in some huge material way, then then maybe it's worth a gamble.

Divya Talwar: 27:41

But it feels, it feels like a risky strategy to be spending that much money on you know something with no guarantees of anything other than right. You're going to have this little, you know this little page and we'll talk about your, your company. Again, it comes down to as well. Let's say, you're the audiences, those you've got those adverts there. Often you just flip the pages. How many times do you? Let me ask you a question how many times do you do you actually read the adverts when you're scrolling through a newspaper or a magazine? Do you? Do you even remember a single advert?

Amardeep Parmar: 28:16

Nope, and that I think the challenge is that a lot of people use these paid for lists as credibility. But the challenge for somebody like me and for somebody like you we'll see straight through that right. We'll know that they're paid for it and it might get you credibility with people who aren't aware, but it will damage your credibility with the people who are aware.

Amardeep Parmar: 28:35

So as soon as you tell me your top 10 yahoo finance, whoever it is, I know okay, so you pay to be put into lists, which means that you probably don't have the actual underlying credibility, otherwise you wouldn't need to do that.

Divya Talwar: 28:46

Yeah, exactly, it just comes back to the I think I said at the start, and it might be controversial, but getting media coverage can be a complete waste of time and money if it's not done right and you have to just go back and take a step back and say, right, okay, why am I doing this? Okay, to get publicity, but but why? Why do I want publicity? And figure out why. And then the rest should fall into place, because all media is not equal. Right, you could be featured in a particular platform and, if anything, it damages your brand and the negative pressure you get, you know, will damage your brand. So just just be intentional and do your research,

Amardeep Parmar: 29:31

Yeah, so so gonna move into quick fire questions now okay, go for it ready. So first one is who are three British Asians you think are doing incredible work that you'd love to shout out?

Divya Talwar: 29:45

Oh, you've put me on the spot here, um, can I say you, Amar, I think that what you are doing with the BAE HQ is is brilliant, um, really championing uh people from our community, which I think is great um. I speak to a lot of people entrepreneurs and just in my line of work and I feel like they've got great stories and be great to have a platform, uh for that, and so I think I think what you're doing is great. Um. I would say my sister, uh Ruchira. She's uh with the founders club, um, and I think she's doing great things. And the third person I would say, someone you've had on the podcast, uh Vishal Amin. Um, he's building this incredible company called Until, which is essentially disrupting the health and wellness space, um, and I think that that's going to go. That's going to go places.

Divya Talwar: 30:53

So those would be my my three off the top of my head.

Amardeep Parmar: 30:58

V ery kind of you for shouting me out there, and if people want to get in touch with you or learn more about what you're up to, follow your stories, all of the stories that you're saying, where should they go to?

Divya Talwar: 31:09

You can. You can email me directly. Um, you can find me on social media and my dms are always open. I'm always looking to hear from from people interesting people that you know either may need some help or want me to look into an issue or story. I'm always open to people contacting me.

Amardeep Parmar: 31:31

And is there anything that you need help with right now that maybe the audience could reach out and help you with?

Divya Talwar: 31:36

I suppose it's just you know anything I do, every story I've done has come from someone having a conversation with someone, or someone getting in touch with me saying you know I've been impacted by this, can you look into it? So you know, if you've, if you've got an issue or story that you want me to look into, contact me and and I'd love to, if I can help, I will. If not, I can try and put you in touch with someone that might be able to help.

Amardeep Parmar: 32:06

And just as you were mentioning this as well, what are the areas that you're most interested in covering? What stories are you most looking for?

Divya Talwar: 32:12

So I cover investigative journalism and I mean just a fancy word for saying I tell stories but I tend to do kind of longer-term investigations, documentaries, platforms like, say, panorama or radio for essentially stories that kind of expose some kind of wrongdoing or scandal. Um, if you you know, you may feel like, oh gosh, I haven't got anything that fits that. But, like I said, you know, journalism is a small industry, I know other journalists. Um, and if you've got an important message or story and I said, you know journalism is a small industry, I know other journalists and if you've got an important message or story and you think you know can I, can I potentially get some coverage on this, just get in contact and if not me, I can point you in the right direction.

Amardeep Parmar: 33:00

So thank you so much for coming on today. Have you got any final words for the audience?

Divya Talwar: 33:03

No, thank you for for having me and hopefully you. You know you found some nuggets of information and, yeah, feel free to get in touch if you have any questions.

Amardeep Parmar: 33:16

Thank you for watching. Don't forget to subscribe. See you next time.

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