Advice from a Tech Blogger about How to Pitch
October 25, 2007 by Eric Eggertson
Filed under Marketing
Note to PR pitchers: When someone offers feedback on what they like and don’t like about pitches, pay attention.
5 PR Pitches - the good and the bad. Marshall Kirkpatrick churns through about 30 pitches a day, scanning for the rare gem that will turn into a story about a Web 2.0 company doing something innovative, launching a product or service, or being gobbled by someone else.
After complaining about what he doesn’t like, Kirkpatrick lists six specific things PR people can do that will help him do his job as a writer for Read Write Web.
Included in his list: "Pitch me on things that are relevant to me, offer me a b.s. free summary before your formal press release and be very clear about the time and time zone of the embargo."
To paraphrase Kirkpatrick, add value, be brief, and customize your pitch. For ongoing information, give him the RSS feeds for your clients’ blogs in OPML format, and throw in a search feed for the companies, too. Then he can follow their progress on his own.
Good advice, not just for pitching technology news.
Photo by Thomas Hawk.
Some recent Kirkpatrick posts:
Photo site review, crime news!, music site relaunch, role of ‘recommendation engines’.
Tags: business, communications, public relations, bloggers, pitching, marshall kirkpatrick, tips
Agreed that we can all use this as a learning experience… I’ll likely post on this issue, too, since we were one of the many folks who got called out. (It was bound to happen at some point, despite staff training & best intentions!)
Ugh, that tweet screenshot makes me want to barf, though. Soooo glad you thought to use it. ;)
Todd:
I was actually thinking more about how the Tweet showed how cranky Marshall was, yet I thought he managed to come back from his rant with some useful stuff.
Didn’t mean to add to Margaret’s (or your) embarrassment unduly.
She’s sort of like the cheery person who says “Have a nice day!” to the co-worker just before he explodes about inane chit-chat interrupting his busy day. In the wrong place at the wrong time.
As for the Facebook message being too coy, well, maybe it could have used some indication of what kind of info she was referring to. But considering people on Facebook are poking, slapping and dry-humping each other virtually (and launching zombie attacks), I think the playfulness was sort of in keeping with the medium.
And hey, have a nice day! ;-)