I was on Entertainment Tonight recently, sharing my PR and media training expertise.

This was my fourth segment with ET, and the show producers had called me two other times when I wasn’t able to tape the segments due to scheduling conflicts. However, I believe that one of the reasons the producers have called me so much is that I’m easy to work with.

As a media trainer, I offer you these tips to prepare for TV interviews:

1. If you are positioning yourself as an expert, stay up on research, trends and news related to your field and think about how to articulate various aspects of your work so that you can easily answer questions about it. If you have not had media training yet, do not wait until the day before you have an interview. Get it as soon as you begin to think about putting yourself into the public eye so that you have time to work with your media trainer on creating clear responses to questions and on polishing your delivery.

2. Have your preparation ritual down, so that you can center yourself and get your energy up with very little notice. Quite often, you will receive requests for interviews that must take place within hours, or sometimes minutes. Having a good preparation ritual that you use to get in performance mode can give you the confidence to say “yes” to great opportunities, even when you are very busy.

Preparation rituals are included in all of our programs. When we have provided media training for actors or music artists, we have observed that they love our techniques, because they are based in acting training and movement training.

When we provide media training for athletes, they too appreciate the use of a quick preparation ritual, as most of them use them in their professional work.

3. Knowing that many media interviews come up very quickly (sometimes with less than 24 hours’ notice), have your wardrobe ready to go, have your hair cut and colored the way you want it, nails manicured, etc., at all times. This is the life of a public figure, which is what you become if you put yourself out into the public eye as an expert.

4. Try to accommodate last-minute media requests, if you can. If you say “no”, someone else will say “yes”.

Suze Orman skyrocketed into the public spotlight because she told the producers of The Oprah Winfrey Show that she could be an emergency guest. They asked her to fly in and sit in the front row so they could ask her a question: she answered it so much to Oprah’s liking that Oprah asked her back, and rest is history.

You can watch my interviews on Entertainment Tonight and learn more about the media interviews that have arisen for me as a media trainer and PR expert at https://expertmediatraining.com/press-room/.

To further prepare for TV interviews, use the quick list of items to have ready to go, which you can find on this blog post:

https://expertmediatraining.com/media-interview-checklist-from-a-media-trainer/

Here are some other links you may find useful in preparing for media interviews:

Media Training Resources

https://expertmediatraining.com/media-training-resources/

Top 10 Media Relations Tips – Media Training Tips

https://expertmediatraining.com/media-training-tips-for-good-media-relations/

Frequently Asked Questions about Media Training

https://expertmediatraining.com/faqs-about-media-training/