Tips for Hosting a Good Press Event
Having press attend and report on an event will greatly expand the audience that hears the
message of “Imagine A Day Without Water.” If you are planning an event with the intent of
inviting press, it is important to give press the best material possible to create an engaging
story. Help them help you.
Media needs a few things to make a story work. In addition to the “who, what, when, where”
that you typically put in an advisory to the press, you need to be sure to develop a message or
narrative for your event that is very simple for the media to understand and report on.
Here are some guidelines and principles to help you develop a good story:
1) Content
What facts, stats, quotes, etc. are you providing? Reporters need interesting nuggets for
their stories. Don’t overwhelm them with data, but give them a pithy quote and a few
bullets – no more than a page – to help punch up their stories.
If television or still photographers are in attendance, the content they need is great
“shots.” Let them film or take pictures of your facility, the workers, and the system at
work. Offer something impressive that the public doesn’t usually see.
2) Context
Explain how the situation in your area fits into a greater story about water infrastructure
across the country. For example, the Value of Water Coalition’s website has a number of
resources and fact sheets about the state of our nation’s water systems:



There are more miles of water pipe than miles in our national highway system.
A water main breaks every two minutes somewhere in America.
Some major cities are sitting on top of wooden water pipes and have water
systems that date back to the Civil War.
Use that information to put your system into context: How old is your water
infrastructure? How big is it? How many customers do you serve?
3) Conflict
News coverage hinges on conflict. Reporters want to know, what is at stake? What is at
risk? What are you doing about it? The “Imagine A Day Without Water” theme sets up
the opportunity to talk about conflict without resorting to scare tactics. It is important
to explain the challenges and the solutions you are pursuing. What are the greatest
challenges the water systems in your area face? What are you doing to address those
challenges? What would happen if those challenges are not addressed?
4) Concise
Keep it brief. Stories on news radio are no more than two minutes, on public radio no
more than four. Local television stories are also about two minutes and a local
newspaper will only be able to write a few hundred words. So you need to keep the
story that you’re providing to the media equally tight.
A tour of a facility should be limited to less than a half an hour. If you have a line-up of
speakers, limit them to 3-5 minutes each for delivering remarks. Host your event in the
late morning or early afternoon to give people time to file their stories for the evening
news or tomorrow’s paper.