Ask any junior digital PR exec and I bet they’ll tell you the scariest part of their job is pitching a story to a journalist. Look at LinkedIn, and it’s filled with horror stories from digital PRs who’ve had bad experiences with journalists, or journalists complaining about the quality of the pitches they get. Pitching
Ask any junior digital PR exec and I bet they’ll tell you the scariest part of their job is pitching a story to a journalist.
Look at LinkedIn, and it’s filled with horror stories from digital PRs who’ve had bad experiences with journalists, or journalists complaining about the quality of the pitches they get.
Pitching to a journalist is tough because they get so many (and most aren’t worth it), so you’ve got a battle to stand out in the inbox of a journalist who is constantly under pressure to write more stories in less time.
This guide will walk you through the key points you need to know to achieve greater success pitching to journalists for your digital PR campaigns.
Before you even think about your pitch email or call, take the time to think about what you’re pitching and if it’s actually worth it.
This is where most digital PR people fall down because the “story” they’re pitching isn’t actually a story to anyone but their company.
So before you start, ask:
News moves quickly, so anything that happened last week or last month is probably already out of date. If you’re pitching original research, how old is the research?
As a rule of thumb, if your research is three months old, it’s out of date.
News stories aren’t free promotions for your business or sales pitches. They need to be interesting to a wider audience.
If you didn’t work at your company, would you find what you were pitching interesting?
If not, chances are no one else will, especially journalists.
Has what you’re pitching been covered recently by a journalist? Has another company released similar research in the last few months?
If they have, there’s little chance a journalist is going to cover your story for a while.
If you don’t have a completely new story, are you offering a new perspective, angle or opinion to a trending topic?
Before sending anything to a journalist, research whether they actually write about the topic you’re sending them.
If you’ve got a research report about B2B accounting software, pitching it to a journalist who covers lifestyle or health isn’t going to work.
This needs to grab the attention of a journalist if they’re ever going to open your email. My best advice is to use the headline of your news story as the subject line, and include any other relevant information to help it stand out, like if you’re offering the story as an exclusive.
This would look something like:
If you’re pitching a local angle to a story, make sure you’re clear about why it’s relevant to the patch the journalist works in.
For example, if you’re pitching a national story about the most expensive towns to live in to a journalist in St Helens, then you’re subject would look like:
Britain’s most expensive towns: Where St Helens ranks
Leading with the headline and adding relevant information helps the journalist understand why your story is worth paying attention to.
Journalists are busy and don’t have time to uncover the main point of your article if it’s buried seven paragraphs down an email.
The best thing is to work with the BLUF principle.
This “Bottom Line Up Front” approach is what journalists use to get the main point of the story at the top. And this is what you should also use in your pitch to get the most important information up front.
Include your short pitch and article in the body of the email so a journalist can read it easily.
Also, include images and videos in a link that won’t expire, so a journalist can access them if needed.
Don’t add any attachments to your pitch email.
Attachments can increase the chances of your email not sending if files are too large, and increase the chances of your email landing in spam.
Make it easy for a journalist to follow up with you if they want additional information or want to arrange an interview.
Add a phone number, email and details of anyone available for them to interview.
All the information and content relevant to your story should be included in your pitch email.
Failing to include important information can result in a journalist ignoring your pitch.
Chances are, they’re going to be too busy to follow up to ask for missing information, so they will just ignore your pitch.
Be sure you’ve included all the relevant information, good quotes from experts, links to images and videos and the details of anyone available for interview (as well as their background).
If a journalist does follow up, react quickly to get the information they need.
One of the biggest mistakes digital PRs make is creating a media list of hundreds (even thousands) of journalists and just sending it to everyone at once.
The theory being that you’ll get enough volume to have good stats to show to a client.
But if you’re trying to land coverage in a top-tier publication, this approach never works.
Instead, you should tailor your pitch to a specific journalist and offer your story as an exclusive first.
If they’re not interested, then you can move on and send your story to a bigger list.
You’ll know how annoying it is when someone’s trying to sell you something you’re not interested in or that isn’t relevant to you.
Now imagine that’s happening to you hundreds of times a day. That’s what journalists go through with PRs sending them irrelevant pitches.
Before sending any story to a journalist or publication, do some research and make sure they cover the topic you’re asking them to write about.
If it’s not something in their patch, you’re not going to get them interested.
It’s just a fact that not every pitch is going to land you coverage on the first attempt.
But don’t be afraid to follow up with journalists if they don’t respond immediately.
It is often just the case that they’ve missed your original email but are interested in the story.
A simple, polite follow-up, resending the information, can be enough to put your story back at the top of their list.
If you’re just not getting coverage at all, consider trying to come up with a new angle for your story and repitching it as a new item.
Embargoes restrict journalists from writing about your story until an agreed date.
They can be useful for specific announcements, but are often not worth using.
Exclusives are stories that you send to one journalist with an agreement that you won’t give the story to anyone else until they’ve published (giving them first rights on the story).
These can be great when pitching to top-tier journalists, like national newspapers or certain industry publications.
We’ve got a team of digital PR experts and former journalists who’ve been on both sides of the pitching process.
They understand what does and doesn’t work and can help you target your story at the right journalists and increase your chances of getting coverage and links.
To talk to us about our digital PR agency services, get in touch for a free strategy session.
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