Only a few weeks in office and Denver Mayor Michael Hancock’s communications team is developing strategies to lift his national profile.

Hancock’s media specialists, led by communications director Wil Alston, are working on ways to get him into national publications and onto television news shows, and his name into the smartphones of the country’s top reporters.

“We think the ability to raise Denver’s profile is going to be driven by the ability to raise Hancock’s profile,” Alston said. “We have to be proactive. He is a new mayor. He has good legs locally, but he doesn’t have a national presence.”

The idea is that more national exposure will bring business and tourists to Denver and spur the local economy.

Alston said that among his top priorities as communications director will be to work on developing Hancock’s national profile, while press secretary Amber Miller will work with local media.

Mayors across the country have successfully raised their national profiles by working with the media, including Cory Booker of Newark, N.J.; Kasim Reed of Atlanta; and Antonio Villaraigosa of Los Angeles.

The marketing of Denver’s mayor worked for John Hickenlooper. Shortly after he was elected in 2003, he was presented to East Coast media as a brewpub entrepreneur with unconventional ideas of streamlining government and attacking homelessness.

“Hickenlooper was wonderful because he had a bunch of new ideas about government,” said Tom Clark, executive vice president of the Metro Denver Economic Development Corporation, who was on the trips.

“Instead of giving sound bites, he would engage reporters, asking their opinions,” Clark said. “It’s a time-honored tradition. But if you have an uninspiring or undifferentiated politician of any ilk, you don’t last long in those meetings.”

Less than 18 months after Hickenlooper was sworn in to office, Time magazine named him one of the nation’s top five mayors. In November 2005, Governing Magazine picked Hickenlooper as the only mayor among the top public officials of the year.

Clark is working with the Hancock administration to set up similar media meetings next month and believes Hancock’s inspiring personal story of rising out of poverty and his ideas about spurring Denver’s economy will create the same interest.

“Michael has a compelling story, and that will get you in the door,” he said. “He will be able to talk about his ideas, . . . and that will move things along.”

The strategy carries risk.

Lindy Eichenbaum Lent, Hickenlooper’s communications director in 2003, said the plan back then was to tell Denver’s story, not the mayor’s.

“Hickenlooper was never one to toot his own horn,” she said. “It wasn’t about him. It was about Denver. We focused on telling how we were making the most positive impact possible on Denver and welcomed any opportunity to tell Denver’s story to a national audience.”

Katy Atkinson, a political consultant, said it’s not a good idea to elevate the man over the city.

“If you are trying to get a story out that Denver is open for business, I would think that is a good idea,” she said. “You can do everything you can to be successful, get on to ‘Good Morning America’ and a guest spot on ‘Glee.’ But if he is not getting the kind of coverage he needs here, that is not going to work.”

Eric Sondermann, a political analyst, said he would counsel patience to Hancock.

“National recognition will come with local success,” he said. “His priority should be firmly grabbing the reins of the office, putting his team in place and dealing with the immediate challenges on his plate. He’s going to be in office for four years. He will have plenty opportunity to pursue a national presence.”

Jeremy P. Meyer: 303-954-1367 or jpmeyer@denverpost.com