Are You An Expert To The Media?

What should an expert be able to offer the media?

·                     Something new or newsy

·                     Insight into trends

·                     Interesting answers to their questions

·                     New ideas or a different way to see things

·                     Something controversial

·                     Behind-the-scenes perspective

·                     Help on a story that’s not about you

Many authors can present themselves as an expert and often they can make a case as to why he or she should be considered an expert.  Are you such a person?

Who qualifies as an expert?

·                     Someone with a major degree, such as a Masters or Ph.D.

·                     Someone with many years of experience in a targeted or related area

·                     Someone who works or worked for a major corporation, non-profit, or government agency  

            or authoritative group/person

·                     Someone close to the rich, famous and powerful

·                     Witnesses to events

·                     The subject of a news story

·                     An author, especially an award-winning or best-selling one

·                     Someone the media has established as an expert in a related area

There’s no singular authoritative body to designate anyone an “expert” of anything but people can sense when someone is qualified to be taken seriously.  However, there is a lot of wiggle room there.  If you speak like an expert with conviction, energy and well expressed views/ideas, that’s half the battle.  Credentials are in the eyes of the beholder.

Become the expert you want to be by speaking like one, by declaring yourself an expert, and by doing things or acting like one who is an expert.  The media often quotes or interviews people that are barely qualified or in the know, but due to any number of factors – availability, timing, lack of resources to find out how qualified an expert is – the media may just interview those who are not even amongst the top 1,000 people on a given subject.  You can be that person.

Start being an expert by being an expert.  Build up your interview totals and guest blog posts and start to proclaim you’re an expert to bigger media outlets.  As one media outlet accepts and validates your expertise, it gets easier to impress other media outlets.

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Brian Feinblum’s views, opinions, and ideas expressed in this blog are his alone and not that of his employer, Media Connect, the nation’s largest book promoter. You can follow him on Twitter @theprexpert and email him at brianfeinblum@gmail.com. He feels more important when discussed in the third-person. This is copyrighted by BookMarketingBuzzBlog © 2014.