Hearts & Minds: Winning with the media at Christmas

As we rush headlong into Christmas, spare a thought for the journalists this holiday season. The ones on duty, tasked with filling space with no news. Better still, send them your stories. For this is the time when desk editors are at their most receptive. 

Print and online editions don’t stop because much of the rest of the world does. News does happen, of course it does. Natural disasters sadly don’t pay heed to the festivities nor do some folks who choose this very moment to launch some startling offensive. Generally, though, the business end slows. Journalists have been asking us for Christmas story ideas since mid-November. There has been the occasional takeover move down the years but they are seldom. No, this really is an opportunity to put the brand centre stage. 

More so, with digital and social media. In the past, few people bothered to buy a paper over Christmas. A cutting was nice to have, but that was about it – the piece wouldn’t reach a wide audience. Not so today – now, once it’s online, it’s out there, to be read and reposted and linked over and over. 

 There is, though, an art to this. In a nutshell, too heavy stuff won’t do. What the press is looking for is lightness. Readers are in a relaxed mood, so are the hacks. They want something interesting but not especially taxing – they’re after entertainment rather than solid information. 

It’s the moment for that slightly quirky, offbeat tale. That is a surer route to success than sharing your thoughts about the year just gone and the one ahead - a very competitive field unless you’re a captain of industry or the Governor of the Bank of England. 

Also, while it remains Christmas, the papers have an unwritten rule: the C-word is banned once the 25th is past. They drop it immediately, so a Christmas-related gem will have to wait another year. They’re quickly moving on. The focus switches. In the build-up, it was all about shopping and eating and drinking and winding down; the hangover kicks in, so it’s health and diets; and families and friends are together, so it’s plans for summer holidays and splashing out on large ticket items, like replacing that car or adding a conservatory. 

Tune your offering and you may receive a pleasant surprise. Hurry, because you haven’t got long – they are filling up their schedules already. Sodali is here to help. We know how it works. 

Chris Blackhurst is one of the UK’s foremost business journalists. He was previously Editor of The Independent and City Editor of the Evening Standard.