A revealing quote from lobbyist Coffey: "There are not enough reporters or media outlets anymore." That necessitates creative public relations.

A revealing quote in PoliticsNY's recent promotional section, Power Players in Public Relations and Lobbying, from Chris Coffey, CEO of Tusk Strategies. a public affairs company based in New York that represents "clients like LVMH, McDonald’s, TransPerfect, and Henry Munoz."

His mother was Mayor Ed Koch's chief of staff and Coffey, at 21, started work for candidate Mike Bloomberg and stayed for 11 years.

Part of the Q&A:

What skills do you think are most useful to succeed in this industry?
There are not enough reporters or media outlets anymore. You have to be really creative about getting news out in an interesting and dynamic way.

Indeed, there are far more people working in public relations--as consultants, on staff, etc.--than in the media.

What do you do?

That means, among other tactics, presenting news as an "exclusive" to a favored outlet; creating your own written content, to be published as a submission under your client's byline (or that of a surrogate); using new(er) platforms like Instagram or TikTok; and pursuing promotion on social media like Twitter (now X) or Facebook.

But we need more reporters and media outlets not just to publish the news promoted by the "Power Players," but to question and assess the promotional efforts.