Don't Watch Local TV Programming: Major network affiliates offer local news programming to feature both local and national stories to inform and educate their viewers. Ignore your local stations and don't take the time to find out if they offer a morning, midday, or early evening local news magazine show that features local experts.
Don't Contact Your Local Stations: Most major affiliate network stations have local offices and studios that are staffed by receptionists. Don't waste your time, trying to find their contact phone numbers to ask for the names and email addresses of the news magazine show producers.
Don't Bother Introducing Yourself: Because you're far too busy and have so much to get done, don't reach out to the local producers with an introductory email explaining briefly who you are and what information you can provide them with, to help them beef up their segments.
Don't Send them Leads: As an industry expert, you're probably constantly watching for the latest trends and producing content such as books, eBooks, articles, blog posts, and more. Don't bother to help a producer out by sending an email containing a 3 - 5 bulleted story lead each week that you can comment on. You have way more important things to do.
Take Your Sweet Time Replying: If by chance a TV news program producer does respond to one of your leads, wait a few days or even weeks to reply. Better yet, have your assistant reply instead or ignore the email all together. You can't possibly be expected to fit in one more thing into your day.
Make Your Existing Appointments More Important: When a producer needs an on-air contributor, they may ask an expert to come in at a moment's notice or very early in the morning or even very late at night. Decline the producer's request by being too busy or unwilling to move existing appointments. This way they are sure not to contact you in the future.
Let Them Know How You Were Inconvenienced: If by chance you get invited into the studio for an on-camera interview and it is cancelled or postponed, place a call or send an email to the producer letting them know how inconvenient that unexpected change was. I'm sure they will apologize and make it up to you.
Demand to Speak with Their Boss: If you had gotten all the way into the studio and your segment is suddenly preempted for breaking news and you're dismissed, let the producer know how angry you are and demand to speak to her boss about being inconvenienced.
Call and Voice Your Disappointment: If the segment in which you were interviewed did not air on the date and at the time you were told, call or write the producer to let him know how unfair it was for you to have invested your time and effort for no reason. I'm sure they'll make sure it never happens again.
Do Not Send a Thank You Note: Save your money and don't buy a box of thank you cards. Forget about sending off a short note of thanks to the news program producer, you can use that valuable five minutes for other more important matters.
Let Them Find Their Own Expert: Once you establish a relationship with a TV show producer, they may contact you out of the blue, when they are seeking commentary on a topic that is close to, but not exactly within your area of expertise. Let them know that you can't help them or just ignore their request all together. Do not recommend to them, any other experts in your network that may be more skilled at providing what they're seeking. Why bother helping them if you're not going to benefit from the opportunity.
Send a "Nasty Gram" Letter to the Studio: Without notice, your emails to the producer are coming back undeliverable, stating that the producer is no longer working there. TV producers experience lots of stress and are under great pressure, which means the person in that position may change frequently. But that's not your problem. Send an email or letter to the studio describing your inconvenience of having to start the process of finding the contact information for the new producer, all over again. As ridiculous as some or all of these points might sound to you, I've seen or heard of unconscious professionals making these exact mistakes. I coach experts in growing their speaking business. I help my clients understand how busy producers are and what it takes to grow yourself as an industry expert that producers call first. I welcome comments on how you've seen others make these mistakes or new ones that I did not include in this piece.
