10 Things NOT to Do When Sending a PR Pitch

or, Promoting Yourself, Your Business, Your Product, or Your Client Is REALLY Not This Difficult, People

In April, I laid into PR folks who suck at their jobs, and I stand by my complaint. Really, they have no excuse. But if you have no PR or marketing training I can understand why you would make some mistakes when you’re first getting the hang of your business. I want to help you, really, I do. But before I get into that, let me give you some context for why I’m writing this post.

I recently joined an excellent mailing list called Help a Reporter Out (HARO for short). If you’re a source, or someone with information to share, you sign up to receive daily collections of queries from individuals who are looking for people to interview, feature, whatever. If you’re a reporter, you can submit your detailed query and tell sources how to contact you. It’s a brilliant idea, and the guy who runs the joint, Peter Shankman, is smart, engaging, and very good at what he does, so I learn a lot even when I don’t have a query to post or a response to send.

But this week, I did have a query to post. Two, in fact. Here is the one I sent for sources for Biz Chicks Rule:

Summary: Chick CEOs and Business Owners
Name: Kristen King
Email: kristen@b5media.com
Title: Blog co-host
Media Outlet/Publication: http://www.bizzia.com/

“Women’s business blog Biz Chicks Rule (http://www.bizzia.com/), part of the Business Channel at global media network b5media, seeks female executives and business owners for profiles, Q&As, and guest posts. Our audience is mostly female (duh), primarily North American, and very interested in stories of real women climbing the corporate ladder and making their own way in business.

All industries are welcome. Particularly interested in women who developed an innovative product or service or succeeded in traditionally male-dominated arenas, but not a requirement.

E-mail pitches to kristen@b5media.com with ‘BCR Pitch’ in the subject line. This is an ongoing need, so lay it on me, baby.”

I did get some phenomenal pitches and I will have a ton of great content for you in the coming weeks and months as a result. But I also got a boatload of crap, and so I give you…

The Top 10 Annoying Things Respondents Have Done That Have Made My Life More Difficult Instead of Easier

1. Asking me questions that are clearly answered in the query, like “Would you consider a female entrepreneur?” Uh, yeah, that’s kind of what I meant when I said “business owners.” DELETE.
2. Failing to include “BCR Pitch” in the subject line even thought I explicitly asked that it be included. Your e-mail is NOT the only one I have to read, and this is NOT the only query I have out right now. Throw me a bone, please. It’s CALLED Help A Reporter Out, after all. And if you can’t follow simple instructions in a call for pitches, how can I trust that you’re going to facilitate the interview I want or get me the product I need to review? You’re only hurting yourself here. DELETE.
3. Using ONLY “BCR Pitch” in the subject line. Do you know how many message I have to go through that are all labeled “BCR Pitch”? I didn’t think I had to specify that it just needs to be there somewhere, not the ONLY thing there, but apparently that wasn’t as obvious as I thought. Is this my fault? I really don’t think so, but I’m open to being knocked down a few notches on this one. WOULD delete, but there are too many. Sigh.
4. Pasting a press release into the message and then hitting send. And the professional PR people are the worst offenders on this one! Did they not go over this on day one of PR school? A press release is NOT a pitch. It is a press release. DELETE.
5. Attaching a press release and saying “See the attached press release for my pitch.” See #4. DELETE.
6. Saying things like, “It’s complicated. I need to know if you’re interested before I get into it.” And I need to know what in God’s name you’re talking about before I can tell you whether I’m interested. Why are you wasting my time? DELETE.
7. Sending a novel instead of a pitch. Okay, well not literally a novel, but does it really take 1000+ words to tell me what you are telling me and why I should care? “My business/product/client is ABC. This is innovative/interesting/a perfect fit because XYZ.” I want a little more than that, but really, 300 words is more than enough. Sheesh. DELETE.
8. Using words completely wrong. I can’t give an anonymized example of this one because all of the truly awful queries that did it are too easily identifiable by the egregious errors. But when I say egregious, I mean like saying that something is chartreuse when you mean that it’s obtuse. What kind of interview will you be when you can’t even make sense when you have all the time in the world to look stuff up and craft what you’re saying? I shudder to think. DELETE.
9. Making a way bigger deal of yourself, your company, or your product than is even remotely believable in any possible reality. I get that you’re excited about whatever your thing is, but I’m pretty sure your goal is to interest me in it, not to make me think you’re totally delusional and potentially dangerous. DELETE.
10. Making me click on stuff “for more information” without giving me any information in the first place. I get that SOME is technically more than NOTHING, but you’re supposed to use links and attachments as a SUPPLEMENT to your pitch, not in place of it. (See also #5.) I don’t have time for this, dude. I asked for a PITCH, not a link, and certainly not more work to do. DELETE.

Once I simmer down, I’ll follow up with some of the BEST things folks have done in these pitches to give you a How To list. But in the meantime, I have a bazillion more pitches to read!

Oh, and if I find that you pitched me AFTER reading this list and you STILL commit one of these heinous acts against the public relations field, I will not be held responsible for my actions. Consider yourself warned.

Contents © Copyright 2008 Kristen King

(image: SXC.hu)