A Consumer’s Guide on Whether to Use a Spokesperson

Feel rattled by circumstances beyond your control? Anticipating a visit by the news media? Afraid to have a conversation with a reporter?

It’s time to ask yourself: Do I need a spokesperson?

Here’s what experts say:

* You can enlist an amateur spokesperson--a friend or relative--in situations where your prime objective is to avoid getting a message out. Amateurs are best if they perform simple tasks, like repeating one sentence over and over: “He (she) prefers not to make any comment at this time.” But trusting an amateur to be more aggressive, to represent your innermost feelings and emotions in their language, is playing with fire.

* You can find a professional spokesperson by checking the Yellow Pages under “Public Relations,” but, says Stan Rosenfield, who runs his own PR firm, many firms will not take clients they do not know or who are not referred to them by someone they know.

“We’re really not spokesmen for the public,” Rosenfield said. “It’s not part of your privilege when you were born that you are entitled to a professional spokesperson.”

And if the cold calling works, the price of a professional--figure $15 to $30 an hour--still might not. That tends to leave people back at the beginning, asking an attorney or a friend to speak on their behalf.