With practice and coaching, she believes we can all improve our Media Darling potential. 
Media trainer, publicist, industry insider and former broadcaster Joanne McCall coaches high profile authors, professors, business leaders and speakers, and now readers, through her new book, “Media Darling: Shine Through Every Interview.”
She defines a Media Darling as someone who makes interviews seem effortless, creates great content for their own media channels, and delivers a great interview while also making the interviewee look good, among other key characteristics.
With practice and coaching, she believes we can all improve our Media Darling potential. “The first key element of the Media Darling would be: Attitude. Attitude really is everything,” she says. “It’s how you approach an interview; it’s how you approach a producer or whoever you might be working with and it’s also the attitude you take when surprises happen and things go wrong. Everyone wants to work with people who are easy to work with. And when you have a great attitude, handle difficulties with grace and with ease, it’s just going to go better. People will like you more, you’ll like them more.”
Some of what a Media Darling is not, she says, includes: acting like a prima donna, being late to interviews or caving under pressure. However, to master the ability to shine through an interview, presentation and the process, McCall says no one is born with these skills.
“If you are watching an interview and you see someone who makes it look really easy, you can bet they’ve been trained or they have a lot of experience – and often, it’s both. It’s similar to watching a fantastic dancer up on stage and thinking, ‘I could do that,’ because they make it look easy. And then you try, and it would not be so good. It takes some practice. All too often, I see people go out and say, ‘Oh yeah, I can do an interview,’ and they just wing it. And, it’s this disaster.”
In her book, she talks about knowing and practicing key messages and how to create “hooks and sound bites” that grab attention. “It’s a busy, noisy world out there. How are you going to break through all that noise? How are you going to stand out? How will you be unique? You must be able to answer that as well as the question on every media person’s mind: ‘Why you? Why now?’”
For challenging questions, nervousness and training out distracting quirks and habits, McCall recommends practicing mock interviews alone or with others.
She offers tips for podcasters and other program hosts as well. One, she says, “Get to the point of the interview right away, don’t waste the audience’s time.” Another is, “Don’t compete with your guests. Sometimes there’s competition as to who has the best answers. When you’re going to have guests on, you really want to shine the spotlight on them.”
The book, “Media Darling,” also addresses “the inner game of media.” McCall says the outer game involves coming up with ideas for interviews, pitching the media and the actual interview itself. The “inner game” she says is what you are doing before you even go out there. “It’s what you are telling yourself.”
As a coach, McCall uses her skills as a licensed Business Master Practitioner of Neuro-Linguistic Programming (NLP) and as a licensed Advanced Hypnotic Practitioner to address clients’ inner game.
“Are you saying things to yourself like, ‘I’m not good enough, I’m not smart enough, I’m not educated enough, I’m not young enough, I’m not old enough, I’m not experienced enough?’ People have all kinds of things going on inside. If you say you want to do something such as, ‘I want to get out there and do a podcast,’ and you’re not doing anything to actively do it, that tells you there’s something going on in the inner game. There’s something in the way. It could be you’re scared. If you go in and can figure that out, then moving into the outer game is so much easier.” QCBN
By Bonnie Stevens, QCBN
McCall can be reached through her website, JoanneMcCall.com. Her book, “Media Darling: How to Shine Through Every Interview,” is a step-by-step guide and is available on Amazon.
For more, watch McCall’s interview on Zonie Living, “Gain Visibility, Become a Media Darling, Hear Tips from Publicist Joanne McCall, at StarWorldWideNetworks.com/shows/bonnie-stevens.
