How Public Relations Teams Build Confident Media Spokespeople

We prepare spokespeople by focusing on what the audience may find confusing rather than using the company's preferred language. Leaders often know their subject so well that they overlook what general readers need explained. We identify terms, assumptions, and claims that might confuse people, then rewrite the message in simple language. This helps make the main idea easier to understand.

Our coaching keeps the conversation natural and relaxed. We ask spokespeople to imagine explaining the issue to someone outside their field during a casual walk. If they can explain it clearly without jargon, they can handle most interviews. Plain language also makes vague claims more specific and accurate, helping people remember the message correctly.

I prepare spokespeople by limiting them to two or three core messages, then helping them express those ideas in different conversational ways rather than memorising a script. We also prepare clear facts, approved examples, and boundaries on what they can and cannot discuss, so accuracy doesn't depend on remembering exact wording.

The most useful coaching lesson is to practice with recorded mock interviews, including difficult or unexpected questions. Afterwards, we review the footage together and focus on moments when they stayed calm, used plain language, and naturally returned to a key point.

One habit that makes spokespeople more confident is bridging: briefly answer the question, then transition with something like, "The most important thing for your audience to know is..." When practised well, it keeps the interview on message without sounding evasive or robotic.

At Enhancv, I'm usually the spokesperson, so I've been on the receiving end of this. Most of our media work is written commentary, and the lesson that made the biggest difference applies to interviews just as well: you sound natural when you only say things you believe and can back up.

Our PR team works from what's real. Before drafting anything with me, they look at what I actually do and think, and at what our own research shows. If a claim can't be traced to one of our published studies or to my own experience, it doesn't go in, however good it would sound. That one rule takes care of both accuracy and naturalness. It's hard to sound stiff talking about your own habits and your own company's data.

Consistency comes from the data, not a script. Our studies give us a small set of findings we know are solid, so every answer draws on the same facts. The wording changes from outlet to outlet, but the substance doesn't, which means I never have to remember what I said to whom.

We also write the way people talk: short sentences, plain words, one idea at a time. If a line would sound strange said out loud over coffee, it gets rewritten. Corporate phrasing is what makes spokespeople sound rehearsed, and it usually hides a vague point.

The lesson that's made me most confident is that it's fine to say less. Not every question needs an impressive statistic or a dramatic story. When I know every line I've approved is true, follow-up questions don't worry me, and that calm comes across as clarity.

I prep my people to talk to the audience sitting behind the reporter, not to the reporter themselves. When someone walks into an interview trying to anticipate every tricky question, they get reactive and defensive. But when they've got 3 to 5 clear messages built around what their specific audience needs to hear, whether that's customers, investors, or partners, the whole conversation has a center of gravity, and they can always come back to those points.

The bridging piece is where most of the coaching happens. I'll throw curveball questions during practice runs, and the person's job is to acknowledge the question, then steer back to one of their core messages. Something like, "That's an important point, and what I can tell you is..." It takes repetition before it feels natural.

The biggest confidence boost I've seen comes from that switch in mindset. Once someone stops trying to survive the interview and starts thinking about delivering a clear message to the people who matter, their voice changes, their pacing slows down, and they stop over-explaining. They sound like themselves, natural and unscripted.

1. I treat key messages as the foundation of a house as opposed to the furniture. I supported the corporate affairs team at City Developments whilst at that organization and, as I said before, I am also supporting the development of key messages at CheapForexVPS. We agree on 3 core points and the facts to back them up and then allow the spokesperson to deliver them in their own words. Scripts can make people sound like they are reading from a brochure and audiences can very quickly lose trust of a spokesperson who is reading from a script. We rehearse with 'real' questions (including ones that are designed to be uncomfortable for the spokesperson) and I test their understanding of the key messages by asking them to explain the point to me as if I were a client sitting opposite them. If they can deliver the point facing me in the room then they can certainly deliver it in front of a camera too. To ensure accuracy I insist that the spokesperson is working from a one-page fact sheet that they have signed off prior to the session.

2. One thing to change a spokesperson to do is to allow time for a 2-second pause between sentences. It makes the spokesperson look thoughtful as opposed to nervous. In sales it's good to allow a client time to absorb a price before you launch into the benefits and features. We rehearsed some simple bridges to get back on track e.g. "Let me think about that", "What I can tell you is...". He did one interview after this and it was slower, warmer and all on message. He even said it felt like a conversation as opposed to an interrogation!

Preparation begins with listening to how a spokesperson naturally explains an issue to a colleague. We often find the strongest language in these honest conversations because it is clear, specific, and free from corporate wording. We use this natural voice as the foundation for interview preparation. Next, we remove anything that may be difficult to understand on first hearing.

Since media interviews move quickly, we help spokespeople express one clear point using simple language, familiar comparisons, and real examples they have witnessed. We also identify claims that need careful wording and practice them until they are precise. Our goal is not to make anyone sound like a trained broadcaster, but to help them sound focused and natural. When the words feel personal, consistency comes more easily.

As a business owner who regularly answers press questions for my own company, I can speak to this from the spokesperson side.

What helps me most is knowing the two or three points I actually believe and can back up, then speaking about them the same way I would explain them to a customer. Trying to memorize polished lines usually makes people sound stiff, and it makes it harder to stay accurate when a question comes from an angle you did not expect. If you understand the reasoning behind your message, you can say it in your own words and it still comes out consistent.

The lesson I would pass on to any spokesperson is to stay inside what you actually know. If a question moves outside your experience, it is better to say so plainly than to stretch. That honesty tends to make people sound more confident, not less, since they are not worried about getting caught saying something they cannot support.

Start with a tight message map: three clear points the spokesperson must return to, each backed by one simple example or fact. Prepare accuracy by checking those facts with product and customer-service teams, then translate technical details into short soundbites suitable for broadcast.

Use timed mock interviews to practice delivery, interruptions and bridging back to core messages so consistency holds under pressure. The most effective coaching lesson I use is teach-first-then-expand: force the spokesperson to answer the question in one strong sentence, pause, then add context.

That structure reduces filler, sharpens clarity and builds confidence quickly during live interviews.

Natural and accurate aren't opposites — the trick is to stop memorizing sentences and start owning three ideas. I coach executives to walk into any interview with three messages they can explain in their own words, each anchored by one concrete proof point. When a spokesperson knows why each message matters, they can phrase it fresh every time and still stay perfectly on-message, instead of sounding scripted or drifting into improvisation.

The coaching lesson that most reliably builds confidence is rehearsing the hardest question out loud, repeatedly, until the answer is short, direct and calm. Once a leader has a clear first sentence for the question they dread, the anxiety drops and clarity rises, because they stop bracing for the interview and start having a conversation. We build this rehearsal discipline into every leadership engagement at Stratos Coaching.

Sam Mahmoud, Founder & Head Coach, Stratos Coaching.

The most useful lesson we teach is that silence is a tool, not a weakness. Many spokespeople rush their answers because they believe quick responses show expertise. In reality, a brief pause often helps them give clearer answers and avoid filling gaps in knowledge with guesses. We practice pausing after each question and before sharing any claim or prediction.

One leader we coached knew the business well but often hid key points behind long introductions. We introduced a simple rule to improve their delivery. Start with a clear answer, then add context only when it helps. This made the leader more confident because they stopped searching for the perfect opening and learned to trust a clear first sentence.

We teach leaders to replace defensive details with clear decision logic. When a question is sensitive, spokespeople often share more facts than the audience can absorb. Their answers may be accurate, but they can sound evasive when listeners cannot understand what guided the decision. We encourage them to explain the main principle first.

We ask what problem they wanted to solve, what tradeoff they accepted, and what evidence changed their view. This approach makes complex decisions easier to understand without oversimplifying them. It also helps spokespeople return to their main message when interviews become unpredictable. People trust answers more when they understand the reasoning, even if they disagree with the outcome.

I think people sound most natural in interviews when they understand what they're trying to communicate instead of memorizing exactly what to say. A prepared statement might look good on paper, but it can sound stiff when someone tries to repeat it word for word. I'd focus on helping a spokesperson understand two or three important points and practice explaining them in their own language.

For a business like Entropy Survival, accuracy is especially important because emergency preparedness is a subject where exaggerated claims can undermine trust. A useful exercise would be to ask someone to explain a product or preparedness recommendation as if they were speaking to a customer who had never heard of it before. If the explanation becomes complicated or overly promotional, I'd encourage them to simplify it and stick to what they can confidently support. I'd also practice answering unexpected questions without guessing. It's perfectly reasonable to say you need to verify a detail before answering. To me, confidence in an interview comes from knowing the subject well enough to have a conversation, not from having a rehearsed answer for every possible question.

Have spokespeople practise by teaching something they actually do, because people sound natural when they're showing how rather than reciting what they've been told to say. Nothing our company has published describes coaching a spokesperson, so please treat the lesson below as my suggestion. For accuracy, agree beforehand on the three facts that must be said exactly, and let everything around them be in the spokesperson's own words. Consistency then comes from those fixed facts, and the natural sound comes from everything else.

At a brand our size the spokesperson is usually me, so I prepare by splitting an interview into two parts: the few facts that have to be exact, and everything else, which should sound like a conversation. The exact part is short, mostly what a piece is made of and where it's made, and I give those details in the same words our product pages use, so every interview and every reader who clicks through to the site meets the same version. Everything around those facts stays unscripted, because a memorized paragraph starts to sound like a press release the moment a journalist asks a follow-up. The coaching point I'd give any spokesperson is one I put into words in a 2018 interview with VoyageLA: you can stay yourself, whatever is happening around you. Applied to a media interview, that means answering the way you'd explain a piece to a customer, which is usually when people sound clearest and most confident. Script the facts, never the sentences.