5 PR Pitches: The Good and Bad
10.24.07
I wear two hats. I consult for companies on usability, market intelligence and launch planning. I also blog about new web applications and internet industry news over at Read/WriteWeb. I don't write about my consulting clients, but after several years of experience working on both sides of the promotion game - I think I've got some pretty good advice. At least on what not to do!
I want to post here about some pitches I've gotten from PR people and I don't need to look back further than 24 hours to find most of them that I want to use as examples. I look at probably 30 pitches a day, sometimes more.
I want to emphasize that some of my favorite people in this industry are PR people. I won't say who they are here, but trust me - it's true. Preamble taken care of, check out these pitches I got today and my thoughts on them. After a whole lot of complaining, I've framed things in the positive at the end of this post. These examples are just symbolic, a chance to discuss the issues.
Finally, the following lines of emotional abuse do NOT reflect the opinions of my employer. Richard just wants people to send tips to the tips@readwriteweb.com email - that's his primary concern. Now let's bring on those poor PR folks.
Ben White for BitePR, pitching Piczo and Keibi today
Subject line: Facebook Subpoenaed: How Two Companies are Making Social Networking Safer
Ben and I crossed paths almost a year ago when he was on his way out from working with a company that I was on my way into a working relationship with. Does he say hi when the email opens? Barely. It's super templated, no personal check in - just straight to the pitch. Come on Ben, who are you even representing here between these two companies? I'm fine, how are you? It's been a year, we haven't talked. Whatever.
So what's the value add here? Am I going to chase this story around that you clearly sent out to more bloggers than I can imagine - just because some random company is doing something marginally different than Facebook is? What am I a local beat reporter with no ambition just looking for the first semi-hip story that falls in my lap and hoping my editor doesn't notice how many other people wrote about these two random companies? No.
If we had been communicating over the last year, Ben, and you had got me an intelligent quote about what these companies were doing the day or hour the Facebook suit was filed or settled then I might very well have incorporated it into coverage of that news.
Relatedness to Facebook does not constitute a news hook unless something is launching (is it?) or there's some other time element to it. To be fair - I know that clients sometimes insist that non-news be pitched as news. That's a shame, it doesn't reflect well on anyone. It creates an antagonistic relationship between PR and bloggers if we have to watch out for you tricking us into thinking non-news is news.
Next pitch came from...
Joy Nestor OutCast Communications, pitching something from Salesforce this morning
Subject line: salesforce.com news - interested in a pre-brief?
OutCast drives me nuts for all kinds of reasons. They represented both Zimbra and Yahoo! before the former was acquired by the latter. They represented StumbleUpon before the eBay acquistion. I hear from them regularly and they are really tight lipped with information. There are PR people who at least admit that they have to be manipulative - OutCast doesn't hire those people, apparently.
Anyway, today's communication with Joy was actually some of the best I've ever had with an OutCast person. I appreciate being contacted about news from a huge enterprise vendor, though that isn't my beat, if there's something of interest to me about the announcement.
The problem was this. The pitch email said that Salesforce is announcing product news and would like to brief me under embargo. THEN it says that the news "focuses on" the next annual version of Salesforce. Do I care? Not really, unless there's something really interesting in this year's release that's related to my area of interest.
So at this point I email back and say, yeah, send me the info under embargo - right? No, now I'm offered a number of dates that I can schedule a phone conversation with Salesforce representatives. I do NOT want to spend my precious time on the phone listening to an explanation of the newest version of this relatively complicated, enterprise software. I DO want an email with the high points in bullet points. I've got time to read that - and to write a long winded blog post complaining about their PR.
Even if this was right up my alley, here's what I want. I want details first, preferably with pre-announcement access to the software if possible. Then I want a company representative who is capable of answering my questions to be easily available to me. I love it when all of that happens. If you send out a release with no embargo then I want as a blogger to be able to contact you by phone or IM at a moment's notice to get answers to my questions. Other bloggers are going to regurgitate your press release in minutes, I want meat to write a real review with and I want it fast. If there is an embargo then just let me contact you on a reasonable time frame leading up to and shortly after that embargo.
To Joy's credit, when I asked she said it was possible that I might be able to just get the info and skip the talk. We'll see.
Christine Emerson Weber Shandwick, pitching for Transpera yesterday.
Transpera is going to announce a mobile content partnership with some big brands sometime soon. There was no mention of any embargo in the email but I'll stop there. You probably don't want to read about a mobile content partnership with some major brand, right? Me neither. Unless it is hot as hell. And it's probably not.
If I've ever written about a mobile content partnership with a major brand I apologize. There's lots of blogs that cover mobile news and while they tend to not have as much audience as general interest tech blogs - fact is that there are many industry sub-topics for which "big news" is NOT of general interest to people outside that niche.
Matt Tatham Hitwise
I asked the HitWise folks to include me in their press list more than a year ago and I'm really glad they did. They used to make such good blog posts, that added so much timely value to my tech reporting, that I monitored their blog's RSS feed by SMS. I don't anymore because it's full of shopping crap.
Today Matt from Hitwise sent out some interesting Hitwise traffic numbers related to the Facebook Microsoft story. At 2:45 PM PST. What was I going to do with it then? The first round of stories on the topic hit the web by 9am PST today (Google, Microsoft fighting over Facebook investment) and the second round, announcing the Microsoft investment in Facebook, was covered by Read/WriteWeb at 1 PM PST - and we weren't real quick to the punch on that one. Some traffic stats would have been nice for either of those stories (though I wrote neither, I'm just saying) but 2 hours later they are close to worthless. (Ok, to be fair, I saw by RSS that lots of people, like mainstream journalists, were covering this news hours and hours later.)
Beyond that, have you seen Techmeme today? It's all Facebook. Is Hitwise on it? No. I don't know why it couldn't have been a blog post and email people with a link to it. When you put your announcement on a blog post, it increases the chances of inbound links and of RSS subscribers, otherwise known as mini-long-term-stakeholders in your messaging.
Margaret Clark SHIFT, pitching mystery client doing a thing with some stuff
I think I'll let the following screenshots sum up this pitch. I am in awe of this one.
(Update: See Margaret Clark's response in comments, where she's a very good sport about included here.)
The Good News
I hope all these examples don't just make your ears burn - there's some advice hidden in here.
1. Keep in touch and remember where we know eachother from. If it turns out that I don't like you that much, then keep it formal and focus on adding value to my workday.
2. Send me a backgrounder with details about your announcement as soon as I agree to embargo it, if you've got an embargo (which I think are fine, btw). Make yourself available to answer my questions by phone and IM on very little notice when time-to-write is near.
3. 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. It's good practice to include both my local time zone and GMT, just to be respectful of those outside the US and as a second point of reference. I presume you're pitching European bloggers too.
4. Put it in a blog post, ad value to my blog post and let the link love fly. And if you're trying to get in on other news coverage - get me that info before I write my blog post, if you can anticipate it. Otherwise I'm probably not going to be interested.
5. Avoid doing what Margaret whatsherface did above. (Update: Sorry to be so rude Margaret.)
6. One thing I haven't mentioned here, if you're a PR person - you know what I'd love? An OPML file of all your clients' blogs. Heck, through in a news search feed for their names too. I'll plop it right into my feed reader and you will win big points with me. That would just plain be very cool, would it not?
Ok, thanks for reading all this and good luck in everything you do.
October 24th, 2007 at
Marshall you are my fav blogger for so many reasons that I’ve lost count. This just adds one more.
I love the screenshot from Facebook - her message and your reply are priceless
You forgot to add, if you have a big announcement, make sure that the last bit of info is ready so that the super fast and effective blogger can post the news as soon as he’s ready
October 24th, 2007 at
[…] What Bloggers Want from PR Pros — Part 1 Published October 25th, 2007 Uncategorized Here’s what Marshall Kirkpatrick wants — as it appears in this post on his personal blog http://marshallk.com/5-pr-pitches-the-good-and-bad. […]
October 24th, 2007 at
Marshall, I agree with Chris, you’re my favorite blogger too. Another great post.
October 24th, 2007 at
[…] http://marshallk.com/5-pr-pitches-the-good-and-bad […]
October 24th, 2007 at
It’s tough being popular
I actually delete most of these. To be frank, I think Tatham’s pitch was fine, though maybe not timely enough for you, others will be writing about Facebook - The Evil Empire for a while.
But the point is that bloggers are now thrown into a churn pile with the media, and as a former journalist who is now getting pitches like this, it make me want to cry. As a PR pro who has to engage in blogger relations periodically, we try to customize to the blogger as much as possible. I like briefings - which is more like a technology analyst — for influential bloggers as opposed to churn pitches.
October 24th, 2007 at
Marshall - I don’t think the last pitch from Margaret was so bad. She offered a story idea. And you responded, asking her for more info. You even ended it with a
. That says to me you found her email of value even if she was a bit coy. I am sure she’ll provide the name, background, etc. Why else would she contact you? Also, kind of rough when you call her Margaret “whatsherface.” Come on, man. That’s a bit harsh.
But this topic is worth discussing. PR people who put out releases with blind folds on are the worst. Nothing is worse than getting a press release for something that has no relevance to what you do.
I hate the goddam things. They say nothing. I wonder how PR folks can handle spitting them out all day.
October 25th, 2007 at
[…] 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. […]
October 25th, 2007 at
You criticize one PR for being too brusque, and another for being too playful. Sounds like Goldilocks and the three PRs!
Thanks for including positive suggestions about how people can pitch to you in a way that helps. If only more people considered the recipient’s needs before firing off news releases en masse.
October 25th, 2007 at
Great point Marshall.
I also receive many pitches and most of them are so bad and poor that I can barely believe they actually read them before sending them out.
Pitching through Facebook can be a good idea, but only if it’s done properly! I mean, that message was really worthless and basically she didn’t say anything.
You are doing them a favor with posts like this. Keep on doing it!
October 25th, 2007 at
Hi Marshall -
Margaret works for our agency, and we’ll certainly use this as a “learning moment.” Once I’ve had a chance to discuss this with our teams (and with poor Margaret!), I may post something, too. The only mistakes I can’t abide are the ones we can’t learn from, and you’ve provided plenty of examples - both ours & others’ - that will ensure that our approaches get better, more relevant, etc.
Thanks!
October 25th, 2007 at
Your round up point #6 is just great. I’ve been trying to get around to signing up for Grazr and this might be a great excuse to try to get it right. Wasn’t there something called jetpack or something as well. Anyway, great idea.
October 25th, 2007 at
[…] Marshall Kirkpatrick discusses five ways not to engage in blogger relations. […]
October 25th, 2007 at
It is an abuse of power to publicly humiliate people who are trying to their jobs — including names and pics is just plain rude. Those examples of less-than-perfect PR are just as compelling without identifying details.
October 25th, 2007 at
Working with these new social media outreach tactics, we are all walking a fine line between traditional PR and a “more casual” approach, and learning as we’re going. In this case, I definitely learned the perils of being too casual - and more importantly, too vague. Rest assured that the next pitch you receive from me (and there will be more – and better!) will include relevant & newsworthy details. Thanks for your insight, and for the tough lesson. Sincerely, Margaret “Whatsherface” Clark
October 25th, 2007 at
@Cathy - I think you may be right. Thanks for pointing that out.
@Margaret - thanks for being such a good sport, you drop me a line any time.
October 25th, 2007 at
Another good reason to sometimes just pick up the phone and call reporters, bloggers, influencer’s, etc. It forces us as PR people to be more prepared for our pitch, have a direct conversation and build a relationship.
October 25th, 2007 at
Hi Marshall,
How are you, it has been a while…just kidding, but your point is definitely taken and a lesson has most certainly be learnt due to this post so thanks for that. I completely take on board the feedback with regards to timeliness and will see this as an opportunity that went begging as a result. So in addition to a slightly bruised ego, I also have a great opening line for my emails to you now!
Ben White
October 25th, 2007 at
This post was hilarious Marshall. I think PR people are awesome but the unique ways they approach are always interesting. And now I’m on that side of the table as well - it’s harder than it looks.
=Ryan
rstewart@adobe.com
October 25th, 2007 at
The guys over at the Bad Pitch Blog follow a three-strikes, you’re out policy. They redact names on the bad pitches they post until they’ve gotten a bad pitch from the same perpetrator three times. That’s always seemed fair to me.
October 25th, 2007 at
Interesting stuff, Marshall. At least you point out the good with the bad and keep the communication channels open.
The real question I have is what will happen when some PR pro finally launches the “Dumb Things That Reporters and Bloggers Have Said to PR People” blog. I’m sure we all have some doozies that wouldn’t look any better in print than the bad PR pitches do.
The bottom line is: We all have bad days, and we all have room to improve. Thanks for keeping us on our toes…
October 25th, 2007 at
Actually, Marshall, I think it’s fine that you called out these people, as I noted in my blog today.
Cathy could disclose that she has a vested interested in this post, as she’s a VP at SHIFT.
And, others are just trying to show their hipness that they read this blog. In the words of Uncov: FAIL.
October 25th, 2007 at
Nice post Marshall! I cant count the number of wasted PR words that i trash in my email per day!
As per Marshalls point, dont ‘try’ and catch bloggers attention. Do that with a simple bulleted list of the news at the top of your email, right underneath the nice 2 sentence introduction. And maybe include a link out to the release on the companies website. We’ll go there if interested, you really shouldn’t jam releases down our throats.
Traditional PR tactics just don’t work with blogs. Keep things simple, form a genuine relationship and actually read the blog you submit info to on a regular basis.
PS. don’t hype us up with ‘top secret embargoed details’, we’ll agree, just send the info.
October 26th, 2007 at
Oh, another point. So much for my brown-bags and emphasis on transparency and full disclosure while I was at an agency.
October 26th, 2007 at
OK, Pep, you know too much. Happy to be transparent and fully disclose — just typed too fast yesterday.
October 26th, 2007 at
And just to be clear, as I learned from working with Pepper the past two years, I recognize that social media is all about transparency, disclosure, participation, conversation and more “permeable” communications.
What I’m raising as an issue is whether *both* sides of the conversation between blogger and PR person are being approached with the same level of transparency and disclosure.
Bad pitches and deaf/dumb/blind approaches by PR people are obviously frustrating. They don’t work — whether it’s a blogger, reporter or whomever. They also make good fodder for posts like Marshall’s when the frustration reaches a boiling point.
I’m simply suggesting that bloggers and reporters consider the other side of the conversation. Would they want to be called out publicly whenever they did or said something stupid? Or when they didn’t really do their homework? Or when they were trying to kickstart a conversation w/o an introduction, and did so awkwardly?
These are all human endeavors, and the great thing about our humanity is the capacity to constantly learn and evolve. Let’s all keep workin’ at it, and we can get it right together.
October 26th, 2007 at
[…] 5 PR Pitches: The Good and Bad (Marshall Kirkpatrick) […]
October 29th, 2007 at
[…] In Marshall Kirkpatrick’s recent post, 5 PR Pitches: The Good and Bad, he takes a handful (five, predictably) of PR folks, by name and agency name, to task for incorrectly pitching him on behalf of clients. Despite the premise of the post, some (not all, to be certain) of these examples more accurately offer advice on how not to pitch Marshall Kirkpatrick — advice which is worth listening to but which may not apply to all bloggers. […]
October 29th, 2007 at
[…] Next, explain what are you going to demo without showing it. Then demo, and then a discussion who is this for, why is it cool, etc. Short and sweet, no more than 30 mins per briefing. Emailing people the slides will help them do a better write up. Supplementing slides with pictures and videos is hugely helpful (and you can recycle these on your site!). Marshall has more tips on his blog. […]
October 30th, 2007 at
[…] A topic that continues to cause conflict among PR and social media professionals is that of how to pitch to bloggers. Marshall Kirkpatrick gives examples of a few bad pitches he has received, and some helpful advice to avoid inclusion in such a list. […]
October 30th, 2007 at
[…] Yesterday, in a post in response to a piece by Marshall Kirkpatrick, I somewhat snarkingly pointed out that Marshall had reproduced a supposedly private one-to-one Facebook email conversation to illustrate what he thinks is wrong with many PR pitches. (I’m a big fan of Marshall’s blog, and his observations on the PR pitches in question were on the money. He and I emailed back and forth a bit on this and he was a very good sport.) […]
October 31st, 2007 at
[…] Within the last week, a few bloggers and reporters have gone on rampages against “bad PR.” Does the punishment fit the crime? Is this a wake-up call? I’m not looking to stir things up, I just want to analyze the situation and see what we can learn from it. […]
November 1st, 2007 at
Wow… anyone in PR/marketing who is considering approaching the blogosphere should read this…
Hey Marshall, I am that one guy you met that one time at that thing!
November 1st, 2007 at
[…] The recent Chris Anderson and Marshall Kirkpatrick episodes have created a lot of hand wringing across the world of blogs on how PR people "don’t get it". […]
November 5th, 2007 at
[…] Things have really been tough for PR folks last week, in fact all of this year. Bad practices are catching up with PR people throughout our industry and no longer can we simply shake our heads and turn around on this problem. […]
November 5th, 2007 at
[…] Email Pitches to Bloggers: Where to go with Blogger Relations Published November 6th, 2007 in PR, Social Media, Strategy, Quick Post, Commentary, Blogging Ethics, Blogger Ethics and Blogger+Ethics. Marshall Kirkpatrick is Angry at Bad Blog Pitches. […]
November 6th, 2007 at
[…] 5 PR Pitches: The Good and Bad (Marshall Kirkpatrick) […]
November 6th, 2007 at
[…] 5 PR Pitches: The Good and Bad (Marshall Kirkpatrick) […]
November 13th, 2007 at
Great post. Thanks Marshall.
To me, good PR is not about the blast. It’s about being respectful and building relationships with people, who care about what you have to say and vice versa. The reality is: all of our inboxes are flooded these days. If your message is meaningful to a handful of key people, that is much more powerful than spamming your contact list with a teaser or canned release.
November 15th, 2007 at
[…] Instead of calling this person out by name, thus damaging his reputation or brand online, I have left it anonymous. Part of my personal brand is not singling out individuals, unless they grant permission or ask for a brand assessment. I didn’t block him, but I am no longer friends with him on Facebook. […]
November 16th, 2007 at
[…] The PR Confessional: PR flacks: Confess your public relations sins before you get outed on blogs. Choose among Chris Anderson, Marshall Kirkpatrick, Aaron Brazell, Kevin Dugan and B.L. Ochman to confess your sins. […]
November 16th, 2007 at
[…] We don’t really know what was going on behind-the-scenes here. Maybe Amazon PR really didn’t know the news was postponed/canceled until the 11th hour and as such weren’t able to notify journos in a timely manner. All too often these types of situations get thrown at the PR team and although it’s not their fault, they’re the ones left to pick up the pieces and salvage the damaged relationships as best they can. We, as PR people, have to remember to be flexible. When stuff like this happens, you have to take a deep breath and move forward. Be honest about the situation and realize that you can’t strong-arm people into handling things the way you want. And as we see in this example, if you try to do so, you’ll just end up making your team and the company behind you look bad. Really bad. Not to mention add to the already loud complaints about the PR industry as a whole. […]
November 16th, 2007 at
[…] 1) PR Squared’s Todd Defren has demonstrated some serious leadership in a time when his firm came under fire from Marshall Kirkpatrick and Chris Andersen. His ability to not only address the problems, but create solutions, his continued commitment to ethical communications, and his willingness to tackle tough issues continue to impress me. Here’s to you, Todd. Trial by fire suits you well. […]
February 7th, 2008 at
Seriously…I have to remember when reading Marshall post make sure you aren’t drinking. Almost lost a laptop…PR people are the best. Are we friends…do I know you…if I do do I even like you. Way to cut through the BS…hehe
March 5th, 2008 at
[…] http://marshallk.com/5-pr-pitches-the-good-and-bad […]
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May 14th, 2008 at
[…] 5 PR Pitches: The Good and Bad […]