Instead of paying costs for airfare, hotels, and studio space, Virtual Media Tours offer the convenience of going live from the comfort of your own home - and the results have proven to pay off.

VMTs use Skype or Zoom to connect a spokesperson to media around the globe. When the world changed during the COVID-19 pandemic, we saw a major shift in our broadcast public relations industry, and quickly learned that PR had a whole new meaning: Pivot Rapidly.

Following the shutdown in March 2020, many clients postponed and/or canceled long-planned Satellite Media Tours (SMT) and Customized Media Days (CMD). We quickly digested the information coming in and its impact on our company, and figured out a way to redirect our clients to a new path forward. Simultaneously, we had an equal number of media outlets reach out desperate for quality content. News producers and reporters were, many for the first time, working from home and needed stories with unique perspectives surrounding the pandemic and many needed to be able to conduct and record the segments from home. There was still a need, and we quickly developed a new tactic: Virtual Media Tours.

VMTs work much like SMTs with back-to-back interviews. We handle all the bookings, technical elements and follow-up/reporting. The key difference is interviews are conducted using a mixture of Skype, Zoom and satellite with a spokesperson at home. The spokesperson simply connects with our studio using Skype and we do the rest. Our clients watch everything via a virtual green room livestream so they can provide real-time feedback to the spokesperson.

Producing interviews via Skype and Zoom isn’t a new concept – we typically have a few on each media tour. But producing a full morning of 20-25+ interviews back-to-back with crew and clients spread out over five or more states has quickly become a game-changer for not only our company but for clients and media contacts.