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Public Relations and Marching
Band
The focus of this edition is to introduce public relations and publicity techniques to you, the music educator. It will advise you in your dealings with today’s media outlets by knowing who to contact and how to contact them and to establish a foundation in writing for them. Further, it will enable you to take advantage of media opportunities to promote concerts, festivals, award ceremonies and the like. Sample media releases follow. What is Public Relations? It encompasses external relationships with the media, the community, and the public at large. Public relations can help increase the visibility of a music program, generate a higher awareness of the activities of a music program, assist with recruitment and retention and can be tied in with other advertising campaigns district-wide. For example: Publicize your event in your local newsletters. As you know these come in all forms: Union newsletters, faculty newsletters, school calendars mailed to the public, the school newspaper. What a wonderful PR tool to have your students write an article to their peers about your season. What is Media Relations? It is a key component of public relations in that the effective use of the media will gain coverage for your music program on local district-wide levels. Media relations is a cost-effective way to reach large numbers of people with the message of your program. In our profession, time is precious. We prepare in the summer for a lengthy fall competitive season with our marching bands. Before you know it, the Holiday Season is among us. Along comes Spring and we’re into concert preparations. It may seem impossible to suggest, but call members of your local media. If you are unable to take them to lunch, at least contact them by phone – e-mail is too impersonal and may not get answered – and invited them to a performance. That’s your best advertisement! Unlike advertising, which must be paid for, public relations and media relations deals with the editorial side of the press. Rather than spend money and time at the printer developing an ad, use a media release to get your story to the public. I offer pre-made releases in my binder that will save time and energy. Information is reported as
news, based upon what the media feels is of importance to its audience.
For example, a teacher new to the district takes his or her band to state
championships for the first time. After competing for only one year, this
is a story. The local news media looks for hooks in covering an event.
Another example, your school is celebrating 40 years in the community.
Call your local television station to see if the weatherman travels to
various locations to do his segment. Call him, invite him to do the weather
forecast from your school. Most importantly, have your marching band in
the background ready to perform. You might also want to measure the weatherman
for a uniform that morning! It will be a VERY early day, but think of the
coverage your students will get for THEIR efforts.
Following is a sample news
release. In today’s time, the term ``Press Release’’ is old fashioned.
It refers to the days of the printing press. Terms such as news release
or media release are common place. By placing it on school letterhead and
using your name as the contact (who knows the situation and story better
than the band director), you control the information flow.
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
(When do you want the story published?)
Smallville High School Marching
Band
NYS Champion Band will march in televised parade (Summarize the story) Smallville, USA Mar. 1, 2001
– Trumpets will wail and drums will roll as the Smallville High School
Marching Band again represents its community to the world by marching in
the 2001 Rose Bowl parade in Honolulu, HI. This year’s parade – to be televised
on NBC-TV at 10:00 a.m. Eastern Time – will be viewed by an estimated 3
million people.
To order this manual that includes a 3 ½’’ floppy disk with pre-made news releases for all events pertaining to music education, contact John Gallagher at JGBandDirector@netscape.net. For $40.00 that includes shipping and handling, the music educator will receive the guidelines above as well as sample press releases that are ready-to-use. Just fill in the required information and mail! John Gallagher is a former publicist-turned music educator. He holds a BS in Communication Arts from St. John’s University and an MS in Music Education from Long Island University’s C.W. Post College. Currently, he is a high school band director on Long Island where he lives with his wife, Danielle and daughter, Amanda."
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