In this episode, award winning Publicist, Candice Nicole shares expert tips on pitching to media outlets. She dives into the importance of knowing your why and doing your research with actionable tips on how to find media contacts. As a soon to be mommy, she also shares how she's preparing herself and her business for this new intersection and what she's most looking forward to in motherhood.

About Candice

Candice Nicole is an Award-Winning Publicist of 16 years and a proud graduate of an HBCU, Morgan State University. She is the Founder & CEO of Candice Nicole Public Relations, a boutique PR Agency where purpose and intention meet.

She has been recognized by the U.S. Black Chambers, INC as an Emerging Leader in Black Business, named one of the Top 25 African American PR Millennials in The Huff Post, and has appeared in several lists within the PR industry. In addition, she inducted into Who’s Who in Black Charlotte 2023 and made the QCity Metro’s Power List: Black PR Professionals to Know in Charlotte.

In addition, she is the Creator of Respect The Publicist, which is a network for Publicists that also welcomes those who are Journalists, Branding/Marketing/Social Media professionals, and has over 2.5K+ members on Facebook. Candice is also a Podcaster, Author, PR Instructor, and an "outside of the box" thinker and game-changer who is on a mission to inspire & educate.

LINKS & MENTIONS

Email: hello@candicenicolepr.com

Website: http://www.candicenicolepr.com

Instagram: http://www.instagram.com/candicenicolepr

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/candicenicolepr/

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You are now tuned in to the mom CEO suite podcast.

I'm your host, Felicia, wife, mom and

entrepreneur. In this podcast, I'll be sharing my mompreneur

journey along with strategies that will help you build your online

business operations in a sustainable way. The goal is

to help you build a business that fits into your lifestyle as a mom who

values putting family first. We will also hear the

experiences and expertise of other moms with service

based businesses. You'll get a peek into our journeys, so you'll

know that you aren't alone. Motherhood gets hard.

Entrepreneurship gets hard. But together, we can

do hard things. Welcome to The Suite.

Hey friends, welcome to another episode. Thank you so much for being here. And

we have a guest today, Miss Candace Nicole. She is an

award winning publicist of 16 years and a proud

graduate of an HBCU, Morgan State

University. She is the founder and CEO of Candace

Nicole Public Relations, which is a boutique PR

agency where purpose and intention

Meet. She has been recognized by the U. S. Black Chambers Inc

as an emerging leader in black business named one of The top

25 African American P. R. Millennials in the HuffPost,

and she has appeared in several lists within the P. R. Industry.

In addition, she is the creator of respect the publicist, which is a

network for publicists. That also welcomes those who are

journalists, branding, marketing, social media professionals, and it

has over 2. 5 thousand members on Facebook.

Candace is also a podcaster, author, PR

instructor, and an outside of the box thinker and game

changer who is on a mission to inspire. and

educate. Love it. Hi, Candice. How are you? Welcome to the suite.

Hello. Thank you so much for having me. I was like, I need to update

that. It's been 17 years now since being in

PR. I feel like I'm dating myself. Um, but I'm happy to

be here. Yes, we're so excited. So we've heard a little bit about

your professional bio, but just tell us a little bit more about you as a

person and just more about the work that you do through your business.

Yeah. So me as a person, there's so much going on

with me as a Candace. Um, I'm a new

wife, got married. So June

18th to be specific. and I have a baby on the way, so I'm a

mommy to be. it's a boy. His name is Grayson Oliver.

So super excited about that. also with me, about my personal

life. Absolutely love my family, you know, and my

friends of will. Of course. Um, however, a lot of people always

see me. you know, talk about my family. I just don't on my family.

They are, you know, my, my everything.

Know, Candace as a person I love lately, I will say this.

I love my quiet time. Um, especially getting ready

to. You know, have this little boy the house,

a whole human that I'm like, Oh, I, you

need to get dressed too. Okay. Oh, and you need to eat. Okay.

because I'm just so used to just being solo dolo. Right. you

know, and I'm 40 and so it's definitely, uh, a

change. Of course I've had responsibilities in my life, but

nothing compared to, you know, A whole human, right? Like, you

know, about that, like you are responsible for this human. Now, what are you going

to, what are you going to do? Um, so that's about me, you know, just,

you know, my, my personal side outside of the

business, and I don't like that you asked me that because. A lot

of the times, um, because my conversations are solely about business,

which is totally fine. You sometimes will kind of

lose yourself. You forget who you are. Like as a person, I won't say

like lose yourself, but you're just so used to like,

this is what I do. This is how we execute. I'm very resourceful. Guess I'm

resourceful in my personalized life, but that really comes from the

business. Right. So I appreciate that question.

Yeah, absolutely. I do agree. We sometimes get. Lost or wrapped

up in our identity as business owners. And it's like, okay,

well, what if the business closes? Who, who are you as a person? I

love just hearing about people anyway. Um, but

congratulations on all the newness that is happening in your

life. I still consider myself a newlywed. Uh, our

anniversary is August 6th and it'll be two

years. Congratulations. So thank you. Yes,

Lord. We made it two years. It's a job, even just being

very new for myself. I'm like, Oh, you really

need to ask the other person. Like, Hey, I have this

idea. do you think about this? Where I'm

very much. I want it. I'm going to make it happen. This is what it

is. Right. yeah, definitely was,. It was a

interesting transition going from singleness

to, you know, wife and mom kind of at the same time. So.

I kind of get where you're at, but since we're talking about that, how are

you preparing yourself? You touched on that a little bit, you know, getting your quiet

time, but how are you preparing yourself and your business too

for motherhood? Yeah, I feel like every

day I'm still trying to figure that out because here's the thing.

Um, there is no blueprint. Everyone's

business is different, it's structured different, all the moving

parts. So it's not like you can buy this book that says, you know,

if you're a business, and you're going to be gi

you know, this is what yo

Um, I do think of

course with

potential clients.

U You know, I am expecting.

Um, I've already started having conversations with contractors that I've

worked before where I may have to bring them on for maybe like, you

know, 60 days. Um, in a perfect world, it would be great

that I take all of Q4 off. Um,

that's just not what it is right now. And also, I just

think that will miss the work, right?

And like, yeah, but once, and I'm like, no, I get it. Like once he's

here, I'm going to be like obsessed with him pretty much.

Um, but I still, I don't want to lose that side of me if that

makes sense. Right. And that work does make

me happy. And I think even like showing up is

like, like my son is now here earth

side and girl like you're a really a mompreneur

now. So just. You know,

seeing that that's actually very exciting for me. Certain conversations

I can now, you know, have, with individuals, which I've

always, you know, longed for, right? Of just that

balance of being a wife and a mom. I won't say it's a

challenge. It's just, it's just, it's interesting, right? Of

just, how does this all work of doing something that I

completely love and I know I'm going to have to, you know,

step away. And. Have this time

and also just the healing process, right. Of, giving

birth and, it's just, it's just something new. So

day by day, I'm taking it and just trying to figure out,

uh, like, you know, onboarding clients and okay, I'll bring this contractor

in, I'll introduce them because at this time I'll be stepping away. Cause honestly,

by like, these are my last kind of like two months of me,

just. able to like really peddle to the metal work.

Um, because October,

October one, like I could, give birth, right?

So I'm like, Oh girl, you literally have like 60

days, right? You really need to like head down and everything. So

y'all pray for me. Y'all pray for me and any other

woman that you know that whether they're a business owner or not, because even

if you're not, that's still something that you have to mentally prepare yourself to

please pray for us. Um, in this transition that we're about to

go through. definitely will be praying.

Um, but I love that you said that there's no blueprint because there isn't.

And it's like, do what works best for you, how

you like to live, what makes sense for you and your family. Like, that's what

I always stress when I'm talking, even when I give my advice

or my thoughts based on my experience, it's like, okay, this was my experience.

this is what I did, but you have to see if that makes sense for

you because everything doesn't make sense for everybody. Right. And I don't.

I just don't like in this space, this like motherhood and entrepreneurship

space where people say, you need to do this this way, or how

people have said to you, Oh, when you get that baby, you want to, you're

not going to want to work. You don't know that everybody is different.

So, you know, I love that you're taking it day by day. You already know

there's no blueprint. So I'm super excited for you and definitely

will be praying. For like a speedy complication, free

delivery and all those things. And you'll have to definitely update us when

baby boy is born. Um, what are you most looking forward

to though? What am I excited? Most excited about pretending to like

giving birth to him. Motherhood. Yes. Um, it is

seeing his personality just

evolve. I feel like, he is going to be

a mover and shaker. I. I look forward to

seeing family and friends just be able to love on him because he is

just so wildly loved

already. Um, especially just, excuse me. And

as a, and as I'm going through this, I'm still actively grieving

from the passing of my Nana and so

finding out 10 days after she transitioned that I was expecting.

It was. Very heavy, but very

exciting. felt like it gave my family just.

Another reason to smile as we were literally still

like actively, you know, grieving so that has been just very interesting

So I look forward to being able to hold

him and look at him and just you know Pour into him because

he really has been like this beacon of light since

late February of Finding out that you know, he was

there at you know at six weeks But Yeah, seeing his

personality and also Again, looking forward

to how I will navigate

motherhood um, being a wife

and a business owner. And here's the thing, I know it can exist. I

feel like I know a lot of amazing women who navigate it

pretty well, even if they're like hanging on by a thread. I'm

like, but you're doing it. Just know you're motivating me. Like, so I know

it's possible, especially those who are in Comms like me.

It's always great to see. So that's what I'm looking forward to.

Yeah, it's definitely a beautiful season and

journey. And I know you already are, but like soak it all in. I'm so

excited for you. Um, Um, so

let's get into the P. R. Talk. because I know people want to

know all about P. R. It's a hot topic. so can you

explain to us actually what is P. R. And how does

that differ from marketing?

Yes. Okay. Um, I love that you asked that So

in simple, you know, terms of where someone will remember

PR equals visibility and marketing equals sales.

So when people come to, um, come to

us, you're having an event, right? And, or let's say you're

going on a podcast tour, right? Mom's CEO podcast tour. And

you're like, Hey, Candace, you know, I need to hire you. Um, I need

to like sell my tickets. My question is going to be, okay, it

sounds great. Who are you working with as far as like your marketing efforts?

that is dedicated to, to marketing. Like what are the,

the, the different initiatives that you're going to be creating that will

result in ticket sales? Right? So are

you familiar with Mia Ray? Uh, what is it? Glamaholic

lifestyle. So she does

amazing marketing, right? All of the,

the visuals that she has that is part of

marketing, like, and at the same time, she is telling a story,

but why she is doing, putting this visual together. It's to

push you to this sale, right? So when she has these great

visuals, she has her, her new purse or the

new, you know, wristlet or whatever it is, or you'll see a beach

town. You're like, is, is that coming up for sale? See, it's

driving you to get excited about making that sale. Right. And

so with PR, it's more of the, the

storytelling and getting the visibility out. So let's just keep it on her

now. Um, I know recently, maybe like two months ago, I think she did

like Two interviews, and I've never really seen Mia

do interviews before. So I was like, wow, this is great. So

obviously she felt that, you know, telling her story would, would

be great. that's her talking to a podcast

or so journalists online for something digital or even print

and speaking about her journey. You know, speaking about how

she wrote down years ago, what her goals were of how she lost

X amount of dollars. Um, so she had to start from zero to build it

back up again. So now she has her own rent house and making

eight figures or whatever, you know, she's, she's making and having her

drops and just kind of like the, the method to her madness

of how she does her drops. Like That's the storytelling part. So that is going

to help with the visibility. Now, the unique value you

guys is that with her being on this podcast, I'd say,

and she's telling her story, I guarantee nine times out of

10, it's going to resonate with someone and they're going to say, Oh, I need

to check her out. Let me check out these bags. Let me check out all

the other things that you know, that she sells. And so that may result

in a sale. That's the unique value of PR.

that's not exactly what it's for. It's the storytelling and

it's for the visibility. The marketing is going to put this

campaign together and we're going to drive people so we can make these sales.

That's a really great, simple breakdown, you know, PR for

storytelling and visibility marketing sales. Easy

peasy, simple, right? So before somebody wants

to, or somebody decides they want to pitch themselves to the media, are there

certain things that they need to have in place like with their business or their

brand before they actually do go and pitch?

Yes, I would definitely say first and foremost, you need to,

um, you need to know your, why, why did you even

start your business? You know, what's the mission? Like, who are you serving?

So therefore, when you start on this journey, you know, who you're talking to, you

know, who you're looking to, to attract, and then also

just on the foundation level is, you know, do you have a website

some people say, well, I don't have X amount of dollars, you know, for this,

or I'm still thinking about just the whole layout of my

website. Okay. That's fine. But do you have a landing page

somewhere that you can drive people? That is not your social media.

Because it's something that you don't own. This may be, you may be at a

networking event. This is a one time you're so excited, you're talking to X amount

of people and they go look you up on IG and IG is down,

but what's not going to be down is uh, it's going to be

your website or this link That you provide to them with your landing

page. Um, I love to tell people I was in

transition of where I really was thinking about what is

our website going to look like? And so I said, well. As you're figuring this

out Candace, you still need a house for your information.

And I would say for almost like a good year and a half, maybe two

years, I operated off a landing page. had

buttons that people could click and would take them to booking their

consultation. I had everything, you know, like laid out of who CMPR

was, who we serve and, you know, click here and open up until,

you know, where our services were. So there are ways around it. And so

I think people don't think about. You need to

have, uh, what do people, um, social real estate,

It's important to have that because you created this business or even it's a

personal brand that you are building and people need to

know where to find you. So it's like, you have to do something, you know,

a lot of people like, I don't have the money to do this. I don't

have the money, uh, mailer light. I think

constant contact, maybe MailChimp by now, you can

create a landing page. Um, if there's

somewhere else that's free that you can create your own website and then what you

do guys, because you're like, well, I don't want people to click on this link

because it doesn't, you can then take it to bit. ly and

then you can customize that link. So it would say bit.

ly slash, uh, CNPR. Right. Work

with CNPR. And so that is literally what you would put on your business cards.

That's what you're gonna, you know, post everywhere else. And once they click it,

yes, you know, they'll open up and they'll see like the URL. But you can

customize it. So there's a lot of different ways, but people need

to, before they're, Going on this journey is

number one, know your why, what is your mission? Why are you doing this? Why

are you now in a space of wanting to tell your story and understanding the

importance of having social real estate? are people going

to find you? How are they going to learn more about you? And that's why

I definitely do believe anyone that has a business or a personal

brand, you need to have, um, a digital footprint. You need to

be on social media. That was

literally the next thing I was going to ask you. Did you feel like, um,

People needed to have a social media presence if they're going to pitch the PR

and you answer that question, because there's such a controversy right

now about not wanting to be on social media and it being draining and all

these things. So, when it comes to the social media piece,.

What is the, like the, the bare

minimum that somebody should have with their social media for it to

be attractive to someone they're pitching to? So I

will say this, you definitely need to be on there, I won't say that you

always need to be actively posting. If you have at least

like, 12 posts on there. You have enough of

where someone can go because some people are like I absolutely loathe

social media. This is not my thing. at least that there is somewhere

that someone can find you on social media, I would say. Of course,

I am going to be the one that's going to say you need to be

active on there. Um, but I understand for just some people, it is just

Not their thing. And they also may not be in position of say

hiring somebody who could take that, you know, load off of them.

So I would say the bear, um, I would say like

twice a week of posting like the bare minimum.

But of course, if you can do five, some people say they've started to see

a change when they are posting seven days a week,

twice a day. You may say, absolutely not. Like that's

insane. But for some people, that's how they've seen, like, I went

from 3000 followers to 10, 000. Well, someone may say,

Oh, well, that's great. Yeah. But you have to take into

consideration what, what they did to get to? this, you know, result.

So I would say minimum is, you know, twice, twice a

week. Okay, that's helpful. So now the person they

have, they know their why, they have their story, they have

a website or at least a landing page, they have some type of social media

presence. So now, what would be the proper

way for them to actually start pitching to these media outlets?

Yes. So I would say, um, depending upon,

of course, you know, your, your business, let's just. I don't know. Let's

say, um, the skincare business. Let's say it's the skincare business,

right? And, you have your why of why you

started. Obviously, you started your skincare business because there was a problem.

And you felt that, you know, I keep on looking for

XYZ. And, okay, we had a former client, that good, good Shea.

She, um, with eczema. And it just

so happened the products that she was looking for. It just did not work

and she is from Ghana. So she said, well,

let me pull the resources from my country. Uh, the shea butter,

like the pure, like 100 percent shea butter. And that's

how her business was started. That was created because there was a

problem. She wanted to, you know, help her skin

condition. She couldn't find anything that worked for her. And so

she said, well, then I'm just going to, you know, create it.

so I'll give you, you know, that, that example, and I'm

having pregnancy brain. Um, I just

got I see that in your face. my

It's okay. Uh, what's the proper way to pitch Thank you.

Okay. So that's what I was telling you. I was trying to lay it out.

because the proper way to pitch is she knows her why like, she

started, it came from, a personal reason, right? It was an issue and this is

my solution. So now she feels like. you

know, this worked for me. And then I let, some people try it out.

You know, people have been sending me testimonials like this really works.

And then that's when she may say, okay, I want

to be featured, I don't know, in Refinery29

or Cosmopolitan, Women's Health Magazine, right?

Um, even when it comes to trade publications that talk about,

skin conditions, that could be an option too. So I think just depending

upon your business is, where's my audience? And also,

who's the audience that I'm looking? attract now

with trade publications. If she's saying that this product is so good

that I would love to connect with, um, dermatologists

because maybe they will bring my shea butters and oils into their

business. Right. Then definitely. Don't forget those

trade publications because those are the people are going to be reading those because it's

very specific to their industry. If she's like, I want

to reach the, woman of color, let's say, from ages, you

know, 25 to 45, then maybe that's essence.

And so she's looking up, essence and the beauty segments

that they have on the website, or she's actually going to the grocery

store and looking at Essence in their, their beauty

section and seeing who wrote those articles

and then getting on LinkedIn or seeing if she puts it in

Google and see if you can find their, you know, their DM. Some

people, you guys, and even on Twitter, they actually will give you their email

address. just have to do the research, right? A lot of the times it's

there, especially on the digital side of it. Sometimes it's to the

left hand side of your screen. If you hover over someone's name, it says,

you know, written by Candace Nicole, over, you know, the name.

And then sometimes if the email is there, it'll show on the left lower side

of your screen. Just remember what it is. And there you go. You have your,

your contact. Because how you pitch

yourself is you want to make sure you're pitching the right person. that's why I

was saying this is skincare. So therefore she knows that she needs to

find like a beauty editor, a beauty journalist, so then she can

pitch. And then of course, you know, be able to craft your

story. I would definitely encourage people to

read several articles that this person has contributed to this

publication and says, okay, this sounds about right. And

even with her situation, because the back, the background story is

eczema getting on essence and typing an eczema.

It's going to bring up everything. And so she may say like,

actually, they haven't talked about this in two years. So this is a

definitely a good time. And maybe you should, the eczema may.

activate a lot in the winter months, this would be

definitely the time to start that conversation of how to

prepare your, your skin, especially if you're dealing with eczema,

because it may react in the winter time right now is

starting that conversation. So what I'm basically

saying is you have to do your research. So think about

just because you come across a contact at the Washington post,

They may handle the finance at the Washington Post. The email

addresses are all laid out the same, you guys, right? just like different

names. So if you come across Sarah Smith, Google Sarah

Smith on LinkedIn, or just on Google, you know, at the Washington Post

and see if it's the finance person, don't email them.

Please don't just because they work there does not mean they're going to forward you

over to this person over here. Okay. Um,

so you just have to do, you know, the research at the end of the

day of how to fit yourself. No, that's, that's good

feedback now. So when you were talking, it made me think of something I saw

on threads and you can, you can choose not to answer if you don't want

to, but I saw someone post like the

contact information of.

People at these different companies. It was like a list of like

50 or something like that, and they just put it out there and

they're in the comments. There was, you know, some banter about whether they should

have done this or should not have done this. So, as a

PR professional, what's your take on that?

People just sharing context on social media like that.

yeah, I'm definitely against it. I think it's, it's, it's very

unprofessional. Um, and especially when

it is. Personal emails, like it has

the person's name, like Tiffany at Core Water, you know what I

mean? Like, y'all don't email that. I don't even know if that exists.

Okay. Don't, to be like, Oh my goodness. I love Core Water.

Uh, Do not. I don't know if there's a Tiffany that works or anything of

the sort. I don't even know what their URL is, but anyhow, their domain is

so. Especially when it's that, and you probably saw the same

thread that, um, my PR girlfriend, Reagan, saw

she brought this up to me. We were just talking about this yesterday,

yesterday, um, because she,

algorithm is different on threads, you know, everyone. Right. So.

Majority of mine, I feel because I started talking about more podcasts on

there is a lot of podcast people, but now it's starting to be a mix

of like journalists and like PR people. Um, but on

hers, she sees a lot of PR stuff first, actually, right?

And she was saying, she says, man, I need to start doing some lives

because. this misconception of PR on threads is

crazy and she says and people are selling these lists I'm like

what and she's like, yeah, and I'm like, it's like illegal

Like if I was to find my name on this list or hear that my

name was on this list. I would be very

heated um I am against that

1000 percent and I want to encourage you guys

is Is You can find this information

out by just doing the research now. If you still want to

say, and I don't know how much money they're selling these lists for, or it

sounds like they just posted it out there, you know, for free. But if you

come across anyone that's selling a list, if you still want to do it, you

know, that's totally up to you. But here's the thing. I

encourage you to question yourself about how serious you

are. your business or about your personal brand that you're

just always looking for this easy way out y'all. I'm just being so

transparent right now. yourself to say, you know what,

I'm not going to purchase that list for 47. You

know, yeah, it's under 50. That's you say, that's nothing. Yeah. Okay.

But I challenge you if you're looking for someone at women's health magazine,

men's health, the today show, whatever it may be that you challenge

yourself to find them yourself. There's so

much, um, in you finding that out.

I'll even tell you, if you're looking to be on, you know, local news or

even national news, the person that you are looking for is the producer.

Sometimes, you know, on Twitter, the, um, the anchors, they

have their email address, um, there as well. You can reach out to them, but

nine, nine times out of 10, if they get your email and they

are, they liked the story, they're going to send it to their producer. So it's

really the producer that you guys need to need to find.

again, I'm just, I'm against it. Call me old school. but that's

how I found my contacts. Even before all these databases popped up and

everything. And before you could like schedule emails to go out at

a certain time, I was getting up at like 4:30 four o'clock in the

morning, calling the assignment desk because the morning producer

is going to be there at that time because I want to get my client

on the morning news. so I need that, I need that email address. So I

need to, I need to call the assignment desk. Because they're, they're

going to be on site. You see what I'm saying, you guys. So I encourage

you to do the work. That's why I'm such an advocate actually

going into, um, into this. Another kind of like subject is, this

is why I always speak about learn before you hire.

Don't just always look out, you know, the easy way of, I'm just going to

buy this and I'm just going to hire this person to do that. And I'm

just, what if this list doesn't work anymore?

These are old email addresses or whatever, or. if

they're just putting it out there for free. I don't know,

whatever happens to that, this person is like, well, where did you get my email

from? What are you going to say? Threads?

Okay. Well, I'm going to block you now. You know, I mean, it's just on,

these are certain things to ask yourself, you know, you guys. So

yeah, I'm against it. Um, do the work. Do the

work. And even you just telling that story about how you used to wake up

early to make that phone call. Like, I think social media has made us

want the easy way for everything in business. And it's like,

before social media, there was so much work,

not in like a draining way, but you had to do some work to get.

Some headway in your business. And it's like, that has just totally been

taken away from social media. So I'm glad that you mentioned that because

that kind of stuff is still works and it does pay off. Um,

now I did want to ask, so if this person pitches, they send their picture

or whatever, and they don't hear back, is there like a cadence where

they should follow up or what does that look like? So,

um, I do like three follow ups and here's the

thing. Just think that this journalist or even the producer

they are getting I'll say this. This was maybe about

two or three years ago. was speaking to a journalist and she said

that on average she receives about like 75 to

100 emails a day people pitching her for stories,

right? It's not like you send your pitch

out on a Monday and if they don't respond

by Monday evening, you're like, hi, so and so, I just wanted to follow up.

You know, they just may not have gotten to it. And so you need to

factor that in as well as, uh, the follow up time.

so if you send it out on Monday, I would say maybe like

Wednesday or Thursday is, you know, uplift, you know,

that email for them. And then of course the following week,

maybe the next like Wednesday or Thursday, and if you don't hear from them,

that's fine. Here's the thing. Don't take it personal. They

still may have not gotten to your email. actually still may

have read your email and archived it because maybe

in 30 days they're going to reach out to you

because this is going to be great for this story. They may have

opened the email. just forgot it may be in their

spam so they won't find it until x amount of time frame

anyways It's so many different things of

Where don't let the the first thing that you think about

is They're not interested You know, my story brings no

value right now. Some of them, it would be nice if

they opened it up, happen to open it up and say, okay, thanks. This is

a great story, but this is just not a good fit at this time. Takes

you seconds, right? To do that. It would be great if they do that, but

of course try to get into their their mind. They

have a ton of emails. And so some of them actually will open up your

email and never respond. You know, and that's

just, and that's just what it is, right? There's no guarantee.

You can't force anyone to open up your email, let alone them respond to your

email. Um, you just have to, um,

Keep on the journey, you know, like believe

in yourself. I will say this. If you've emailed

maybe like 50 people, outlets, and you haven't

heard from anyone, then maybe you do need to go back,

maybe look for someone to consult with that it's NPR and say,

Hey, can you at least, you know, review my, my media pitch, or

maybe. You'll have other research that you can tap into where you

tweak, you know, your story there, there may be a reason with that. If you

haven't heard back from anyone and it's been like? 50 emails that you sent

out. That's super insightful. And I know as a publicist,

you do this for your clients. Do you also offer

like teaching, um, how to pitch? So someone can do this

themselves. Tell us more about that. Yes. So, and I'm, I'm going to be

bringing back some of those things. Um, as well, because I used to

teach on this all the time, uh, title is one of our services ready set

pitch, but the webinar was ready set pitch of where I actually told,

showed people how to, how to pitch themselves and people have

had, you know, great, great success. So I would say if

anyone is interested in that now, you're like.

this is great, but I do not have the capacity or whatever. Just

send me a DM, can schedule a time to talk on, IG

at Candace Nicole PR. but really what that is about

is I'm teaching you how to

formulate your media pitch. thinking about the different angles to

suggest to them. and it's because what you don't want to do is have a

great story, but then you don't give them. prompts of

like, this is my idea for a segment. It's like, you're, you're wanting

them to do all the work. This is a great story. And now I have

to figure out how I'm going to, you know, present this on the air or

whatever, already have some, some ideas in place, even how to

find, media contacts, um,

different platforms that you can join of where leads will come to you.

you just tell them what you want to hear about, or you upload yourself as

a source on this website, Quoted is one of them, it's Q

W O T E D, you actually upload yourself as a

source, and you say, I'm a, I'm a business owner,

or if that's not the case, you know, um, I'm an expert in,

and civil engineering, software creation, or whatever that may be, if

you're a woman, Put that there. Um, if you're a

founder of something, if you happen to be, you put that there. So therefore,

if someone at us, weekly is looking to speak to,

uh, someone who's an expert in civil engineering,

query will end up in your inbox. Because you

have put that hashtag that you are an

expert in civil engineering. Now, it may be a question that you can't

like answer or whatever, or maybe something for you. And then you can submit

yourself and you may be able to be quoted in us weekly. Um, so I

break down like free things, cause that's always a big thing for people who

are looking to learn how to pitch themselves

is Well, how do I get, you know, these queries, these

leads that everyone is talking about? So it is a lot of

great, great leads out there. Wow.

That's, that's good to know. And um, we'll put information

for those webinars that you're going to do in the show description and all those

things, but you've really given us a lot of great information for how

to pitch yourself. I'm like over here in trees, like, Ooh, maybe I need to

look into this for 2025 for myself. So

if you have any final tips that you want to wrap up with, you can

do that. If not, we can segue into our quick, rapid

fire questions. I would say no matter what,

always remain a student, um, in your life, in your

personal life, in your professional life. We do not know everything. I'm

always learning something new. about myself, but then

also just within my career. a lot of people like, I

don't need to know anything else. I don't, I don't need to take another webinar.

I don't need another certificate. And I'm like, the lies you tell,

um, because everything is evolving. I mean,

AI, there are still people who are against AI. And I'm

just like, you really need to like, Get,

in, in sync with, with everything.

Um, because they're starting to talk about it in spaces where you

would never think about, right? And here's the thing, you guys

look at it, look at AI as it's, it's, it's a tool, you know, it's

something that you can use. Like if you have a You know, a brain fart.

If you are just stuck, there is now a tool that you can

use that can kind of get things moving and you can tweak it your

own self, but I've utilized it before. And I'm like, Oh, thank

goodness. Because I just could not think any more after eight

hours of thinking of how to respond to this email a certain way.

Right. And I'm like, uh, please create an email where I am

declining, blah, blah, blah, blah. And if the subject is about,

and I'm like, okay, there you go. Copy and paste, boom.

It's, it's a tool, you know, so

yeah.

it's so helpful. Like you said, it's a tool though. It's like, let it be

your assistant. So, um, definitely we'll

put all of your contact information so people can connect with you in the show

description. So to wrap up, let's just do a quick rapid fire

this or that. Um, so or

Tea. Tea. Oh,

really? Everybody always says coffee. What's your favorite

kind of tea?

I would say green, yeah, green tea

and, um, green tea, like by itself, like nothing is in

there, Yeah.

morning person or night owl. uh,

night owl. I need to be working on, uh, my early

person's out, but I am a night owl. Yes, same

here. Um, okay, last one because I know you have connections in both areas,

DMV or Queen City?

Now see, this is, this is

challenging because there's no place

like home.

Oh man, can I play the fifth? Um, so,

uh, okay, okay I'm gonna, I'm gonna,

I'm gonna say this. Of where I am right now in this season,

it is Charlotte. I have the queen city. I

have always described this city as, um, I've had a

love affair with it because I've seen so much

growth with the business here with myself

personally. Um, and even

before getting married and, you know, now I'm expecting, I saw

so much change, you know, in, in myself,

um, the DMV, like I said, it's home. There's, there's no comparison. It's,

you know, You're on, what is it, like Constitution Avenue

Independence, and you're just like, oh, it's just so nice. And I could just get

out and walk around and go to the museums for free. Um,

it doesn't exist anywhere else. I remember I'm like, what do you mean I have

to pay to get into this museum? It's free back home. Yeah, it's the nation's

capital. That's why it is, uh, you guys. But I didn't realize you had to

pay to get into, and this is adult age. I never realized you had to,

like, pay to get into other museums. I thought it was like

free. Um, but as of right now, definitely it would be the

Queen City. And it's just because of all the, the

new things that have been blooming, you know, in

my, in my life. And it's still, it's a great city

to be in. Honestly, it really is. And I think definitely to, to

raise, raise the family. Yes, I,

so I'm in the DMV now. I'm originally from Philly. Living in

DMV now, but I was in the Carolinas, like

right on the border between, between them when I was pregnant with my daughter,

fell in love with it down there. So after my husband retires, he has like

two more years in the military. We're going to head back down that way. Like

in the next five years, cause it's just, I don't know. It's just something about

down there. I'm like, It's so peaceful and it's

blooming as well. It's like city and suburbs. So

I totally get it. Yep. But, um, Enjoy this

conversation. I'm going to be thinking about how I'm going to pitch myself to the

media soon. and like I said before, we're going to put all of your

information in the show description. thank you for all of the information that you

share with us, your perspective, your 17 plus

years. of experience. I know people

definitely benefit from it and we will see you

guys in the next episode. Thank you. Thank you for

listening to the Mom CEO Suite Podcast. If you enjoyed

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