Getting the pitch right
There’s been some griping about bad pitches among PR bloggers in last day or so. Shel Holtz tips a form letter written by Dan York in rebuttal to the many form letter pitches he’s been getting for his Blue Box podcast.
Kevin at the Bad Pitch Blog has a right rant about “spray and pray” pitches. And Steve Rubel remarks on the quality and quantity of pitches he’s getting. In a bid to manage them better he’s trying out a new tool, idisk.
Of course, it’s a topic that is raised time and time again. Story pitches that are ill targeted, badly thought out or even “ridiculous and sad” as Steve puts it, are embarrassing and reflect badly on all of us in the PR profession.
But why do they continue to happen? I can’t believe it’s really because PRs are lazy. I can’t remember ever working with a ‘lazy’ PR person. (Well there was that Australian chap in London a few years ago, but he was actually on a working holiday with the ’holiday’ aspect taking precedence.)
But I have worked with many, many overloaded professional communicators. People struggling under a workload that should, ideally, be carried out by three people. Perhaps this offers one explanation. If ’spray and pray’ delivers even a one in 25 chance of landing something, I can see a stressed out executive resorting to it.
I’ve also worked with lots of young PRs at the start of their careers. These folks tend to be very hardworking and eager to learn. But given workloads of their supervisors, they are often saddled with tasks that they are not ready for. Like pitching media for a trade show, for example. These kids don’t really know what they are doing yet, but I don’t think they should be blamed when it all goes pear shaped.
Also, you have to consider another pay off. If you risk pi$$ing off the odd journo with a badly targeted pitch, well, they aren’t relevant to your client anyway, so who cares, right? (Until yours ends up on The Bad Pitch Blog!)
But a career is like a long road with many twists and turns. You never know when your terrible pitch will come back to haunt you. It always pays to take your time and do it right.
Filed under: public relations
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Hey, Sherrilynne:
Think you’re spot on with your point about the young PROs being pushed out to the frontlines of media relations before they’re ready. Or even briefed, in many cases. I’d take that one step further because it seems senior agency people don’t regularly (or ever?) pitch media – it’s left solely to the more junior staff. Admittedly, senior people are usually answering the siren call of new biz, but it’s a shame that the most adept and experienced people aren’t doing the work that many clients value most.
Mary Ellen, I think you’ve summed up what’s wrong with traditional agencies. That’s why progressive new PR consultancy models (like Strive’s virtuality) are thriving. Thanks for stopping bye.