PR Fuel: Pitch, Pitch, Pitch

Email Pitches

-- Keep the headline simple. There's some debate as to whether the email subject line should say "Story Pitch." I think it's wise to include a tag like that and as a journalist I never shied away from reading a clearly identified pitch. It's when someone tried to slip in a pitch with a vague subject line that I got annoyed.

-- Get straight to the point. A simple greeting and then tell me the news. You've got to capture the journalist's attention within the first two sentences or else the pitch is going into the trash. What's the news peg? Why would someone want to write a story based on your pitch? Simple questions, sometimes complex answers. The key to nailing it is putting the news up-front. Think about it like you're boiling down a press release.

-- Don't include quotes. This isn't a press release; it's a pitch and it's not for publication. Quotes just add length and fluff.

-- Include relevant links to websites or material and clearly label what those links go to.

-- Do not attach any files. I don't care if you've got the best virus protection software on the planet or if you're a bonded email sender. People do not want unsolicited attachments in their inbox.

-- Provide information for one contact person. Unless your pitch is related to an event, service, issue, product or partnership where another party is a material participant, you don't need to provide contact information for more than one person. I've never understood why press releases or pitches are sent where two or three contacts are given. I especially never understood why I would get pitches with a contact inside the company as well as an agency contact. What's the point of the latter if I can call someone directly at the company?

-- Target your pitch appropriately. I still get fashion-related pitches. I'm no longer a journalist and I never covered fashion.

Phone Pitches

-- Don't leave a voicemail message. You won't get a return call.

-- Call in the morning or just after lunch. If it's a TV producer or newspaper journalist, he or she has a daily deadline in the afternoon/evening.

-- I always hit *67 to block the caller ID function so journalists can't see I'm calling. It's especially helpful if you call and keep getting someone's voicemail. Some phone systems unfortunately won't accept blocked calls.

-- If you don't know the journalist, say, "Hi, David, my name is Jane Doe from JD PR." I don't like when someone calls and says, "Hey, Ben, it's Jane Done from JD PR." I don't know Jane Doe and I don't appreciate her acting as if we're familiar with each other. Semantics, I know, but it's the little things that matter.

-- Be brief and to the point. Tell the journalist that you're calling to pitch a story and why you feel he or she would be interested in it. Don't just launch into the pitch. A phone conservation is a two-way street, whereas an email pitch begins as a one-way street.

-- Have an email ready to send the pitch recipient. If I call a journalist with a pitch, I've got the follow-up email ready to go before I make the call. I do this so that if the journalist asks me for additional info, I can get it into his or her inbox while we're still on the phone or just after our conversation has ended. If you wait an hour to send the "more information" email, the journalist has most likely moved onto something else and forgotten about you already.

-- If the journalist listens to the pitch and sounds interested, but does not request any additional information at the time, wait until the next morning (if the story isn't time-sensitive) to send a follow-up email. This puts the story back on the journalist's radar. I like to send these emails around 11:00 AM because I feel by that time the journalist has gotten into the office, looked at his other emails and is figuring out what to write that day or work on.

-- Speak in a cool, calm and confident voice. Sounding excitable or rushed doesn't help you get your point across.

General Pitching Rules

-- Let the recipients know if you're willing to give them the story first and exclusively or if you're embargoing it to a select few media outlets. Anytime someone said, "You're getting it, The Wall Street Journal is getting it, and the Associated Press is getting it," I usually bit regardless of the story because my editors would have killed me otherwise.

-- Keep pitching. Don't put all your eggs in one basket thinking a certain journalist or media outlet is going to cover your story. If you get someone on the phone and he or she turns down the pitch, ask the journalist if he or she thinks it would be appropriate to pitch another journalist at the same media outlet.

-- Make sure you understand lead times for magazines. Most magazines have lengthy lead times (weeks to months), so if you've got a feature or not-too-timely pitch that's part of a larger campaign then you'll need to plan appropriately.