11 a.m. February 10 was supposed to be Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner’s finest hour. The markets were eagerly awaiting what he had to say about how the administration plans to rescue the banking industry. The President urged the nation to tune in.

And what did we get? A lot of goo.

As a result, the news coverage barely mentioned the financial rescue plan. Instead it focused on Geithner’s disappointing performance.

While Geithner offers an extreme example, the same thing happens to marketers and CEOs every day. They get in front of the media or jump on their blogs and say things that aren’t newsworthy, or say them so badly that the message they mean to deliver isn’t heard.

It means audiences don’t get important information that can persuade them to buy, invest or change opinions. It can also kill a company’s chances to get attention down the road since the last “announcement” turned out to be a waste of time.

No matter how effective a spokesperson you think you may be, opportunities to tell your story to the media are too rare and too valuable to waste, especially with today’s tight marketing budgets. That’s why the most successful companies require their spokespeople to be trained on how to work with the media and to assure the stories they intend to deliver are the stories that get told.

If you’d like to learn more, give me a call.