47 Debra Locker: PR professional, entrepreneur

Debra Locker Griffin provides big-city caliber public relations with small-town charm by applying the same inquisitive spirit that served her so well in television news journalism. Her three-plus decades of professional excellence have put her in the absolute vanguard of her field. 

Based in Kentucky, Debra’s company, the Debra Locker Group, is an award-winning boutique agency specializing in the lifestyle, spa, travel, spirits, and wellness markets, and is a constant champion for female entrepreneurs. 

Debra founded DLG in 2008 after working in corporate public relations and having a successful career in TV news. The company has been chosen five times as the best PR firm in Louisville by the readers of LEO Weekly, and the editors of Louisville Business First named Debra one of 20 people to know in Advertising, PR, and Marketing. 

Prior to launching DLG, Debra was the Public Relations Director for the International SPA Association. Ingrained in the spa industry since 2001, Debra received the 2020 Women in Wellness PR & Marketing Award from American Spa.

Before beginning her PR career, Debra was a reporter and producer at TV stations throughout the Southeast. She has been nominated for three Regional Emmy Awards for her production work.

Debra’s free time is spent traveling, gardening, working out, and trying new restaurants. She is married to her college sweetheart, is mom to an incredible son who is a rising sophomore at the University of Illinois, and is a fur mom to a vivacious Great Pyrenees/Border Collie mix named Freya.

https://debralockergroup.com/
https://www.instagram.com/debralockergroup
https://www.linkedin.com/in/debralockergriffin/

Kathie’s note: I've been a freelance writer receiving Debra's PR requests and introductions for stories about her clients. She has also offered up a couple of Writers Rotation podcast guests! I met Debra in real life in the fall of 2019 on a fam tour in Shelbyville, Kentucky. What a fun couple of days that was, and she is so gracious.

Writers Rotation intro/outro recorded at Dynamix Productions in Lexington, Kentucky.

Transcript

Debra Locker Griffin [00:00:00]:
I'm Debra Locker Griffin. I am an entrepreneur, public relations professional and storyteller. Writing is the primary tool I've used to build and grow a business in a very competitive industry.

OUTRO [00:00:12]:
Hi, welcome to the Writers Rotation podcast. I'm your host, Kathie Stamps. I love words and writing and people and talking. So I'm talking to people who write all kinds of things in different professions. It's a Writers Rotation. 

Kathie [00:00 33]
Debra. Hey, how you doing? So how is the public relations business these days?

Debra [00:00:35]:
Good. Yeah. I have six clients.

Kathie [00:00:38]:
Cool.

Debra [00:00:38]:
I've gotten to where I'm very choosy about who I work with.

Kathie [00:00:42]:
And what is public relations?

Debra [00:00:44]:
Oh, great question. Public relations is a third party endorsement by someone for your company. So it's not marketing. You don't buy an ad, and it's not sales.  I mean, I have said to people it's kind of like sales without the exact money transaction. Because with PR, it can take a while to see the financial benefit of what you're doing. It's not typically instant.

Debra [00:01:11]:
So what I do is I pitch stories to journalists. That's why former journalists make great PR people.  So I have clients and I pitch them to be on TV, in the newspaper, in magazines. I do Kentucky work and then I also do national pitching. And it's as fun as it sounds. It's very hard, but it is very fun. But yeah,  when you do PR, you write all the time. And I have found that when I speak to college students and that sort of thing, unfortunately they don't realize that. And so I'm not sure how PR is being taught now. My degree was in journalism.

Kathie [00:01:51]:
Oh, interesting. What do they think it is?

Debra [00:01:55]:
They think it's the parties and representing celebrities.

Kathie [00:01:57]:
Oh, Samantha from Sex and the City.

Debra [00:02:00]:
Yes. That's very unfortunate that that's the reputation that PR has, because that's not true. Or at least in my world it's not true. But I don't live in Los Angeles or New York.

Debra [00:02:10]:
So there are a lot of misconceptions about the industry, especially by college students. At one point maybe I can be like a visiting professor or something because I would really like to teach it from the aspect of someone who does it on a day to day basis. But yeah, writing is a huge part of what I do. I have to be able to speak like my clients speak. So when I do a skincare client, I have to be able to explain what these active ingredients are and why they work and why they matter and that involves spending a lot of time with the client and really learning their industry. Not only am I a PR professional, I also am pretty good at all the different industries that I work in. I've learned a lot about bourbon, having several bourbon clients. So you have to be able to talk convincingly to the journalist and convince them to do a story.

Debra [00:03:01]:
It's not easy. And again, that's a good reason to have, well, relationships. So PR basically is built on relationships, and then writing. That's what I think it's built on. But the writing has to be very, very strong. Clearly, you are writing to people who write for a living. So if you're not a great writer, they're not going to like your pitches and they're not going to reply to your pitches. So you need to be able to turn a phrase and use great wording and that sort of thing.

Debra [00:03:29]:
And then also with relationships, I mean, it's public relations, so clearly it's about relationships. I have the opportunity to work with such incredible people, but it's a very small industry, and you don't burn any bridges. Your reputation is really all that you have.

Kathie [00:03:46]:
Ooh, okay, so how did you get started in this? What did you do in a previous lifetime?

Debra [00:03:51]:
I was a journalist. I was a TV journalist. I went to Eastern Kentucky University. Oh, that was you too?

Kathie [00:03:59]:
Go Colonels.

Debra [00:04:00]:
A lot of cool people went there. I graduated in ‘93. My goodness, that really dates me. So my first job was in television. I started at WKYT, which is the CBS affiliate in Lexington, and to this day, the nicest group of people I ever worked with in TV. And then I worked in Knoxville, and I worked for the NBC affiliate there. Then I lived in Louisville the first time, and I worked for WLKY, which is the CBS affiliate. Really, really talented group of people there.

Debra [00:04:33]:
And then my last move in TV was Charlotte, which is a top 50. I think it's more like a top 30 station. And that was a lovely station, too. But it did convince me that it was time to get out of TV journalism. Not all journalism, but TV journalism is, specifically local TV journalism is really, really tough. I know it has gotten way tougher since I left. And now the reporters have to be doing social media in addition to doing their real jobs. But you become very desensitized to lots of things, which is never good. Crazy hours, terrible deadlines, a lot of big egos. And until you've really, really gone up the ranks, the pay is really lousy. So I knew that going in, which made me want to be out of it by the time I was 30 and I was able to do that. I've always loved to write and I've always loved to have strong relationships, which made PR an obvious step. PR also is typically a career that former journalists do go into. They're very, very similar. And when you've been a journalist, it makes you a much better PR person because you know exactly what the journalist needs. 

Debra [00:05:53]:
My husband and I are Kentucky natives and we came back to Lexington and I worked for an amazing company called Host Communications.

Kathie [00:06:01]:
I'm a post-Hostie.

Debra [00:06:02]:
You are? What did you. When were you there?

Kathie [00:06:05]:
I worked in the basement, in the bowels of the building on Main Street in sports. Sports broadcasting.

Debra [00:06:12]:
Oh, yes, yes, yes. Well, I was there for seven years. I was the PR director for one of the associations, because as you probably remember, Host had the sports marketing side and then they managed a number of associations.

Kathie [00:06:26]:
Travel was one.

Debra [00:06:27]:
Yes, group travel. The International Spa association was one.

Kathie [00:06:31]:
ISpa.

Debra [00:06:32]:
Yes. Like it sounds. Yes. So I was the PR director for that association for seven years. I was able to travel to spas around the world, which was amazing. I learned a tremendous amount about the industry. And actually when I started my PR company, I started with a focus on spa and beauty. I had my son Bryce in 2006 and at that time I knew that I did not want to work for anyone else.

Debra [00:07:01]:
I come from an entrepreneurial family. My dad was a developer and very successful in Madison County doing that. I always grew up with a lifestyle of knowing that while he worked a lot, he had great flexibility. And that's exactly what I wanted, especially the moment Bryce came into the world. So it took me two years to lay out the business plan and stuff. But he was born in ‘06 and I left in ‘08 and I started my firm then in Lexington. My company's called Debra Locker Group and we do full-service public relations. We mainly work in the lifestyle niche, which is beauty, skin care, travel (which is absolutely the most fun), bourbon, which makes sense living here in Kentucky, wellness, medical.

Debra [00:07:48]:
I really only work with clients and in industries that I support because I feel if I'm going to be pitching stories, I need to be authentic when I say I love this or I do this, that sort of thing. So we've managed to build a niche around that. And we also, from day one, have worked with women.

Debra [00:08:10]:
That is absolutely our sweet spot. We love to support female entrepreneurs, and we have such great energy back and forth with them, and synergy. And when you do something for them, you really do feel like you've helped them. Whereas, nothing wrong with working with men, but they don't acknowledge things as much. 

Debra [00:08:35]:
That's my path. We moved here to Louisville in 2013 and very much consider it home. My company is me, which surprises a lot of people. I seem a lot bigger than I am. So the buck stops with me. If you're going to hire me, you're going to get me, which is very different than larger PR firms in Kentucky, but also your New York firms and your LA firms, which I do go up against those firms and with proposals and that sort of thing.

Debra [00:09:03]:
And I'll be honest with you, when you hire them, the president will be on the calls with you, but then they disappear and you get a junior account executive. So that is something that I'm very firm with, in that when you hire me, you get me. When I do need help, I will bring in other PR people who are as senior as I am, and they're amazing, and I always recommend them to anyone. In addition to wanting it to be me and being very authentic, I wasn't a great manager, and I learned that mainly when I was at Host. In TV, you don't exactly manage people. You're just all kind of doing stuff. But when I was with Host, I was managing a team, and I was very blessed that they were wonderful people.

Debra [00:09:47]:
However, I learned that a lot of my creativity was being sucked away from managing them, and that's not the way I wanted my life to be, because creativity is such a huge part of what you do in PR. So I knew again then when I created my firm that I didn't want to manage anyone.

Kathie [00:10:06]:
Cool. Now, do you find clients or do they find you? Or both, or how does that work?

Debra [00:10:10]:
Great question. I'm very fortunate to reach the point that they usually find me. It's a lot of word of mouth. It's a lot of, you know, hey, Debra did this for me, maybe you should call her. I have had board members of different groups and stuff be like, oh, we need PR, and this is who you should hire. That actually happened with a wonderful, wonderful historic home site that I represent in Louisville. 

Debra [00:10:36]:
It's definitely word of mouth and then also, Louisville to me is such a great small-business town. I didn't see that as much when I was in Lexington, but I've been in Louisville longer, so I feel like we are really great at supporting other small businesses. There are a lot of women's groups here. There's just a lot of networking in general.  I do find that word of mouth is just easier here. And I also, I definitely take time to recommend people. Makeup artists, photographers, website designers, all those things.  I make sure that I give a ton of referrals as well. But yeah, it is mainly word of mouth at this point, which is awesome.

Kathie [00:11:14]:
Okay, how do you keep track of everything? Are you a spreadsheeter?

Debra [00:11:18]:
Oh, my gosh. I am a crazy spreadsheeter and I write them, I don't do like a list online, so I have two notebooks that I keep with me at all times. One has my daily tasks and I divide it by morning and afternoon. And I love it when I can check them off. And then I have weekly tasks and I love it when I can check those off. I am so anal about list building that having one online would not give me the satisfaction of being able to check it off, which is why I do it by hand. So, yes, I live, live, live by my list.

Kathie [00:11:55]:
How has PR changed over the years? Or has it?

Debra [00:11:57]:
It has. But it will always go back to storytelling and relationships and writing.

Kathie [00:12:03]:
Yeah, I mean, the basics are the basics, period.

Debra [00:12:06]:
I would definitely be considered an old school PR person at this point. I'm not in my 20s, which a lot of them are. So you will always write, you will always need to have relationships, need to be able to tell a story. What has changed? There's a few things. One, social media,  obviously I feel like social media changed everything in the world.

Kathie [00:12:26]:
Everything.

Debra [00:12:27]:
But it really did change PR a lot. Everyone's an influencer. Everyone knows their own content, everyone wants to tell their own story. I'm not saying this is good or bad. I'm just saying sometimes people who are not experts are being considered experts now because of the way that they portray themselves on social media. And that can make PR more difficult. And it can also make people think that they could just do PR themselves.

Debra [00:12:53]:
Kind of like how everyone thinks that they're a photographer until they try to shoot something and they're like, oh, yeah, I'm not a photographer.

Kathie [00:12:58]:
Well, if you have a computer, then you know how to write, because computers. (haha)

Debra [00:13:03]:
Exactly, Kathie. Yes. So social media is a huge thing. And then what is called pay for play or paying for coverage. Yeah, that was not a thing when I was a journalist. 

Kathie [00:13:17]
I think it's kind of gross. 

Debra [00:13:18]:
I think it's very gross. And my clients don't do it. I mean, I'm just going to be honest. And so people who work with me, salespeople and stuff, they know that I'm not gonna suggest it to my clients. They know to stay away from me. If they have a sales pitch, I will on occasion, if it's the only way to get the story in there, I will suggest an advertorial. In a very focused magazine. So an advertorial, which, I mean, you know what that is, but I'll explain it.

Kathie [00:13:47]:
But it should say. It used to say advertorial.

Debra [00:13:51]:
Yes. They usually now say sponsored or partnered with.

Kathie [00:13:55]:
Which, that's fine. 

Debra [00:13:56]:
Yes. An advertorial looks like a story, so it looks like it was written by someone like Kathie. And sometimes the magazines do employ writers to write advertorial. Also, sometimes I get to write the story as the PR person. Regardless, the story will be approved by the client, which is a luxury because typically your client is never going to see a story before it airs.

Kathie [00:14:21]:
Right. So I have always explained that as two different prepositions. This story is about you or this story is for you. So in journalism, this story is about you. And in paying, however you want to phrase that, advertorials or just, you know, regular commercial writing, it's for you. Therefore, you do have complete yay or nay.

Debra [00:14:49]:
Editorial control over it. Pay for play or, you know, paid media. TV stations are now doing this too, which, again, with my background in TV, it really does hurt my heart. I have a lot of friends in sales and TV, but a lot of times, especially on, like, morning shows now, many times the guest paid to be on there. I hate to burst your bubble.

Kathie [00:15:14]:
What about the nonprofits, though, right?

Debra [00:15:16]:
Nonprofits typically can slide in there for free still. And they should be. You know, I do a lot of charity work, too, in addition to my PR work, and I always will certainly pitch the TV shows and get the free route, but so a lot of those are paid. They're not all paid, but I just want people to know that, you know, it's not as authentic as it used to be. Not saying that's bad. Not saying that's good, but just in my world, it's not what I prefer to do.

Kathie [00:15:45]:
How do you practice what you preach with PR for your own company?

Debra [00:15:48]:
That's a great question. I have social media channels that are dedicated to business, so I have my business ones and my personal. And I don't mix them. So if I'm posting an article or something, that will go in my business pages, it will not go on my personal pages.

Debra [00:16:05]:
However, if I'm out at the distillery that I represent and I'm just having fun, that will go on my personal pages. So I'm very, very, very thoughtful about my social media. And I do my own social media. I feel like actually everyone should do their own social media. And then I do a fair deal of networking. I really do. I'm not the person in the room who's going to be standing up and volunteering to talk. However, if the need comes, I will.

Debra [00:16:32]:
Something that surprises a lot of people about me is I'm actually an introvert. I'm in a very, very extroverted business, but at my heart, I'm an introvert. So there are many times when I will be the quiet one in the room, but I feel like if you're quiet, you're going to learn a lot more and people are really going to like you instead of the loudmouth in the room. And I also believe in manifesting too, if you put it out there that, you know, I want this client or I'm fascinated by this person. I read every story about them. I just want to meet them. You know, I just want to have coffee with them.

Debra [00:17:09]:
I feel like the vast majority of people will be like, hey, yeah, I'll have a coffee with you. And then it might not work out now to do their PR, but maybe a couple years down the road when they have a new product, they'll be like, oh yeah, I remember her. I liked her. So there is certainly the networking and the word of mouth.

Kathie [00:17:36]:
Yeah. Networking is for real.

Debra [00:17:38]:
Yes, absolutely.

Kathie [00:17:39]:
And  it is not a quick fix.

Debra [00:17:41]:
It is not.

Kathie [00:17:43]:
And being a member of any organization, whether it is an organized organization or friends, like, I have my ladies group, eight of us that meet every month, and we would do anything for each other.

Debra [00:17:57]:
Yes. I have such a great tribe of women, and I feel like I surround myself with other women, other women who have great tribes. That female friendship is just, man, you cannot beat it. And I mean, I'm in my 50s. When I hit my 40s, I really started seeing that. And then when you hit your 50s, you're just like, my time is limited and if I don't like you, I'm not going to hang out with you. So your filter just really goes away. But I value my friendships so very, very much.

Kathie [00:18:30]:
Oh yeah. And I just saw something, I don't remember where it was. Women who gather with women, the more the merrier and the more often, live longer.

Debra [00:18:39]:
Yes. And I believe that. Not that I would ever want my husband to be deceased. However, if he were to before me, I would totally like move to a commune of women. You know, like, let's have tiny houses or whatever.

Kathie [00:18:52]:
Yes. What are some mistakes or just, you know, bad acting kind of things that you see in this industry?

Debra [00:19:00]:
I will go back to the being a publicist sort of notion. I've never been a publicist. I've always been a PR professional since I started. Well, since I started doing PR. I organize events. I'm not an event planner, but I will organize media events. But I am not someone who's just always at events and has celebrities with me and is surrounded by influencers. That is not me. And in my opinion, that's not public relations.

Kathie [00:19:24]:
Do they call that PR, really?

Debra [00:19:28]:
It's typically called a publicist, which again is a very Los Angeles term or New York term.

Kathie [00:19:33]:
Showbiz. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Debra [00:19:35]:
So there is that. There's also the thought that it's easy. I feel like again, the kids coming out of school feel like they can get someone in the Wall Street Journal like within like two months of working with them or something like that. I mean, I've had the Wall Street Journal. It takes years and sometimes it's actually not even as worth it as like having your local newspaper. And that actually is something else that is kind of a myth. Oftentimes clients and/or new PR people feel like you have to have, you know, the Today Show, the Wall Street Journal, New York Times, Vogue, and those are all amazing. And you should aspire to do it if that's what your client wants and if they are a fit for that.

Debra [00:20:16]:
But don't be forgetting your local newspaper, your local magazines, that's the stuff that people read. And those are the people that are going to visit the distillery, the store, the whatever. It's not the people that read Vogue who live in wherever, it's those people who read Business Lexington or Tops or gosh, we have so many great ones. Sophisticated Living, the Voice. It's those people that read that that are going to actually come and visit you and spend money with you.

Kathie [00:20:43]:
What are you reading these days?

Debra [00:20:45]:
I am reading Christina Applegate's memoir. It's something like the Girl with the Sad Eyes, I think is the title, but it's her new memoir. I've always really liked Christina Applegate. I think she's a great actress. I think she's been so brave with her MS battle. And she has had one heck of a life and not in a good way.

Debra [00:21:04]:
So I really recommend that one. It's very eye-opening. I have started reading a lot. I have a membership at the library and I actually love going. I love the smell of the library and I love holding a physical book.

Debra [00:21:20]:
I feel like libraries are really hot right now. Because nostalgia is such a trend. And I feel like they're one of those nostalgic things that is really in.

Kathie [00:21:31]:
And they have so much. Like, you can rent things just. Not rent. You can check them out. You know, like probably  a vacuum cleaner or something. I mean, they just have things at any given library. You can just check out all kinds of stuff. And the tech. They're fabulous. I love libraries.

Debra [00:21:50]:
Oh, I love that we have that in common. And I do feel like a lot of women today do love libraries. And practically everyone I'm friends with loves to read.

Kathie [00:22:00]:
Yes, for sure. Okay. So relationships. You meet someone, you don't know each other, and now it's 500 years later, you know everything about them. It's your relationships, the care and feeding.

Debra [00:22:15]:
Yes. The relationship between a client and a PR professional is so important. Typically, I work with the CEO or the owner or the president. That just makes everything easier. I have at times worked with marketing directors. Good ones, bad ones. I’ve found that they got in the way a little bit because when you do PR, you're almost always on deadline, so you need to have that direct contact with the spokesperson.

Debra [00:22:41]:
And that relationship is so built on trust. And the trust has to be established. I mean, I definitely have had clients that, you know, it took them a while to where they listened to me and they understood what I was doing and they understood why I asked them to get up at 4 a.m. to do a live TV segment.  That takes a while. But then when you do it and you see the results for your business, you get it.

Debra [00:23:07]:
But they really do have to put a lot of trust into you. The majority of people have no idea how PR works and that's why they hire someone like me. But they can definitely have pushback because they're leaders, you know, they've established a business. It's just a very interesting relationship because you have to give a lot of tough love, you know, like, hey, you didn't say that correctly. Or hey, yes, I do need you to be up at 4 a.m. in the studio and I need you to be dressed this way and have your makeup done. And they will give you tough love too. Like, hey, I didn't like the way that I sounded in that sound bite or did I really say that? So there has to be a lot of, just a ton of communication.

Kathie [00:23:46]:
And do you charge by the hour, the day, the month, the year? Like is there an industry standard or is that just how you do it?

Debra [00:23:55]:
That's a great question. And it really is different by person. I typically do a monthly retainer and it's ideal if you can do a year retainer because that really gives you the opportunity to get to know the person, the business, their industry, that sort of thing. I can also do a six month or a three month, depending on the opportunity. For example, if you are opening just a new boutique or something, you're not going to need me for a year unless your story's like incredible. So like a three-month contract, you know, leading up to the opening, the opening and then post opening is completely fine for that sort of thing. I really think about what the person needs, what their goals are. And there are times that I will do hourly if it's something just super specific, like a really, really specific project.

Kathie [00:24:45]:
Yeah, that makes sense. All right, Debra, this was fun.

Debra [00:24:49]:
Thank you for asking. People don't usually ask me to do things like this, so I really thank you so much, Kathie.

Kathie [00:24:55]:
Keep in touch.

Debra [00:24:55]:
Goodbye.

OUTRO [00:24:56]:
Thanks for listening to this episode of Writers Rotation. Like and subscribe for more. And remember, writing is a marketable skill. Smiling is a remarkable skill.