Kizzi Nkwocha - Media consultant

A former journalist and TV and radio presenter, Kizzi Nkwocha knows everything there is to know about the media, and the media business, and provides that knowledge to a wide variety of companies and individuals through his public relations agency PRhq.

He specialises in a very unique kind of media relations, not only helping clients to secure press coverage, but also advising them on how to cope with and capitalise on existing media interest. He also plays a broker role, negotiating commercial deals between his clients and media companies for exclusive rights to stories; rights normally secured by the media paying the client a fee.

His agency represents a diverse range of companies, and also a number of famous TV and sports personalities, meaning his client list is pretty eclectic, including Jubilee 2000, the Malaysian Tourist Board, the King of Uganda, Atlantic crossing teen Michael Perham, Dragons Den funded businessman Levi Roots, cricketer Wasim Akram and boxer Chris Eubank.

We spoke to Kizzi about his career to date, and what his work via PRhq involves.

By Unicorn Jobs

You’ve had a fascinating career – give us a quick overview, which came first the TV or PR work?

I started off as a journalist a long, long time ago. I think I was the youngest newspaper editor in the country when, aged 21, I edited the Recorder group of newspapers in West London. From there I moved into magazines and, eventually, to national newspapers, ending up at the News Of The World.

After five years at ‘the screws’ I decided to have a crack at PR. So I rented out an office in Harley Street – No.1 Harley Street, no less – and bought a stretch limo. I only had one client at the time, but it quickly grew from there. The Guardian interviewed me about the PR company, and then Channel 4 featured me in a documentary on the industry, and that’s where the TV work grew from. I eventually ended up presenting my own show on Sky.

Why did you decide to call your company PRhq?

I wanted a pretty unique name that summed up everything about the company. ‘Public Relations head quarters’ seemed to say it all.

How do you describe the kind of PR work you do?

Most of it is deal making – marketing and selling great stories to the right media, and taking a percentage of the fee.

I get approached by some amazing characters – sometimes funny, sometimes sad. Last week it was the man auctioning off his dad’s ashes, the week before it was the young guy who at 24 became the youngest man in Britain to be diagnosed with breast cancer. A few months back it was Reggae, Reggae Sauce businessman Levi Roots. Needless to say, it makes for a pretty eclectic time.

Most of what I do is down to wit, grit and bullshit! I take ideas and turn them into headlines. I think PR Week said that if each PR person was a city I’d be Las Vegas. I guess that’s more or less right.

You work for corporate clients as well as the ‘personalities’ – how do the two sides of the business relate?

The corporate clients pay the bills, while our personality clients are good fun. The personality work gives me a chance to promote myself too, and make some more money. The two work well side by side, you really can’t have one without the other.

With your personality clients, are you actively securing them press coverage (so devising stories, issuing press releases) or mainly helping them cope with and respond to existing press interest?

I’m not keen on sending out press releases, I think it’s a lazy way to tell the story. But to answer your main question – is it securing press coverage or responding to existing interest – it’s pretty much a bit of both. The latter is the real challenge, because you’re not completely in control. We often get good results, but it varies. Occasionally even I have to raise an eye-brow.

A few years back I was representing a politician (sorry, no names) who was caught in a pretty compromising position. I stressed to him that the most important thing he had to say during a press conference was ‘sorry.’ “You need to say the words ‘I’m sorry’”. He must have taken the advice to heart because the next day there was a front page picture of him at the press conference where the photographer had zoomed in so you could see he had written, on the back of his hand, presumably as a reminder, the word ‘sorry’.

As I say, in that territory sometimes you get mixed results.

Do you negotiate payment from media for getting exclusive stories from or interviews with your personality clients, or is it all more traditional PR, where no money changes hands between media and client?

It is mostly about negotiating fees, though with a little traditional PR thrown in.

Give us an idea of your typical day at work.

There’s normally conferences with news editors in the morning, interviews with radio or TV in the afternoons, and meetings with clients as and when possible. I’ll also often be overseeing the launch of something, or coordinating a press conference for this or that. Each day varies, but there’s always a lot of deal making, and quite a bit of soothing clients’ egos. That’s not my favorite part.

You represent clients – companies and personalities – from all over the world. Are you representing them primarily to the UK media, or to media worldwide? How do media differ in different territories in terms of how a publicist connects with them?

I work in most English speaking territories. Because of my ‘unique’ brand of PR, everyone speaks the same language: exclusives and fees. Of course not every country has the same news priorities, but there are stories that sell well almost every where in the world.

Are web-based media, and social media like Facebook and Twitter, becoming important in your line of work?

Hugely. So much so that I recently launched ukmediatalk.com – a professional networking site for journalists and people working in PR. We’ve got around 800 members at the moment and its growing every day. Ukmediatalk’s an opportunity for media people to talk to each other professionally without the personal social element that other networking sites seem to demand.

I’ve also got a Facebook, Twitter, MySpace and LinkedIn account and update them daily – usually with my mobile phone.

What are your opinions on the issues of ethnic diversity in the media and communications industries and how do you think they should be tackled?

Head on. I think we need more people of colour working in the media. Especially in multicultural places like London, Manchester, Birmingham etc. That’s why it’s important that I keep on doing this – so that others can see you don’t have to have been born with a silver spoon in your mouth to make it in the communications industry. I was brought up in a kitchen sink estate in Peckham, South London. Most of the kids there didn’t have anyone to look up to or anything to look forward to. If I can make it as a journalist and then as a PR professional, anyone can.

What advice would you have for someone embarking on a PR career interested in working in your area of the industry?

Get a job on a local paper, TV or radio station. It’ll help you learn the language of news so that you can talk to journalists in a way that they understand.

Tell us something interesting about yourself that we couldn’t find on the internet.

Bugger. Everything’s on the internet these days. Ummm…How about: I’m a keen chess player and love reading Milan Kundera novels over and over.

Kizzi on the web

PRhq’s website
UKMediaTalk’s website