Getting Ink

What PR Agencies Should Know About Pitching Bloggers

It's been around five years since I first started blogging. I’ve been blogging here at Getting Ink since 2004, and this year started a parenting blog over at Who’s the Mummy, where I've also been publishing an index of the UK's top 100 Mummy bloggers. As a freelance journalist, I've also been ghost-writing a number of blogs for clients in the technology, HR and consumer sectors.

Despite this, it's probably only in the last six months I've really started getting a lot of pitches from PR execs for blogs, in the same way I'd expect to get pitches as a journalist. My impression certainly is that PR agencies are hugely interested in tapping into the blogging community, but are also unsure quite how best to go about it. Here are some things I've noticed about UK PR agencies pitching bloggers:

• Most PR agencies don’t know one blog from another. So I get a lot of irrelevant pitches, for nappies (my child is four), or crafting products for a photography blog (hmm). Today, I got pitched a recycling bin. I have no clue what blog that was for.
• Most PRs don’t know how to evaluate blogs. This tends to result in companies taking one of two views of blogs. Approach A is the big retailer that said to me this week: “There are too many blogs we need to look at, so we’re not looking at any this year.” Then there’s Approach B, where a PR agency said to me: “We’re just sending to everyone we see on Response Source.”
• Of the 100 or so PR agencies I've dealt with as a blogger, I can count on one hand the number that have asked about my traffic. And I can count on one finger the number that asked any detailed questions about my traffic.
• It’s tempting to assume bloggers are less savvy than journalists. This is a big mistake. And when you start your pitch with “I just read your post on [insert title of most recent post here] and it really made me laugh” it's just as cringe-worthy as when you take the same tack with a journalist.
• Bloggers talk to each other – on social networks, via Twitter, through email and at meet-ups. So when you send the same offer to 50 people at once, it’s safe to assume we know everyone else has been offered the same thing. And if your pitch is bad, people will hear about it. Remember that ‘name and shame’ debate in journalism a few years back? Bloggers are now having that exact same debate - except, unlike journalists, most bloggers don't NEED PRs and don't see dealing with bad pitches as just part of the job, so they're less tolerant of poor practice, if anything.
• Some PR agencies treat bloggers with much less professional courtesy than they would journalists. As a journalist, if I reply to a PR pitch to ask for more info, I don’t think I’ve ever been deliberately ignored. As a blogger, it’s an almost daily occurrence. I’d say, personally, this doesn’t seem like a good long-term strategy. I certainly take down names, and make a note of who plays nice and who doesn't.
• Nobody seems to know whether you offend a blogger by offering to pay them, or whether it’s more likely to offend if you ask them to do something for free. There are some really clumsy conversations going on as a result. Bloggers are scared witless by the stories around the FTC regulations, and there's a lot of uncertainty going on. 
• A lot of PR agencies think bloggers should provide free consulting. Bloggers get sent a lot of questionnaires and surveys by PR agencies. "Would you just fill in this survey, it should only take 15 minutes, to tell us how you like to be approached and what sort of thing you're interested in?" Well, that's all well and good if blogging and working with PR agencies is my job - but the majority of bloggers don't do this for a job (or it's a sideline) so why should they take 20 minutes out of their day to provide you with free consultation? When one blogger replied to a PR agency pointing out that she charged an hourly rate for consultation, she got an INCREDIBLY rude reply that I guarantee that agency would never have sent to a journalist.
• The companies that REALLY get blogger outreach REALLY get it. And they’re building really strong, interactive relationships with key bloggers, that are going to give their clients a massive advantage in 12 months time and beyond. But these companies are still few and far between.

Now for a brief plug: I've decided to put some of my tips and tricks into a new, half-day 101 training workshop for any PR agencies that are interested in pitching bloggers, and gaining insight into how to identify, evaluate and work with blogs more successfully - you can see more details over on the 101 PR training website, or you can email me. At the moment this course is going to be run in-house for agency teams, but depending on interest, I may look to run a public workshop in January, so please drop me a line if this would be of interest.

Shameless plug: new PR training workshops

This summer, what could be more fun than coming to London and enjoying a lovely training workshop with the folks at the:101? Okay, so strictly speaking, there are lots of things more fun than PR training, but as far as training goes, this is pretty good:

We're offering spots on our Nationals&Broadcast and Journo:101 summer masterclasses for just £99 per person in July and August, plus in-house workshops and copy coaching sessions from £50 per person. Bargain.

These courses are ideal for anyone who wants first hand tips and advice on selling business or consumer clients (on indeed, your own business if you're an entrepreneur) into national print or broadcast media. Our friendly trainers all have years of experience working with PRs, and can provide fantastic advice on working more effectively with journalists, and putting together fantastic pitches for all kinds of publications and programmes.

If it might be of interest, check out our shiny new 101 website here for more details.

Thanks

Sally

One Alfred Place

Just a quick post to say a big thanks to the lovely Rob at One Alfred Place, who hosted the:101 this week for a training event.

We feel obliged to point out the food at One Alfred Place is seriously good, the facilities are very professional, and the attentive service was much appreciated. Iggy the concierge was a huge help in sorting out details for our event and suggesting we feed our clients pastries and coffee in the morning, which I think was appreciated by our guests. Gary says sorry he hogged the coffee, but it was quite early, and he's usually more of a late riser. 

I suspect One Alfred Place is used to a slightly fancier clientele than a herd of rowdy journalists - one hack did think he might actually be fleeced on the way out of the building in case he'd nicked the cutlery - but if you're in PR and looking to impress clients, we'd give it a big, two thumbs up recommendation.

Thanks again to Rob and his team. 

New Nationals/Broadcast Workshops

The:101 is running two nationals and broadcast workshops in the next few weeks, in London and Manchester.

We have a few spaces left for the Manchester workshop (Oct 6th) and just one spot left in London (Nov 12th) so please drop me a line if you're interested in coming along.

The workshop is a practical one-day course for PR execs and marketing people who want to learn about selling stories into mainstream broadcast and print media. The course looks at the practicalities of pitching - who to contact, when to get in touch, what to say - and also some techniques for increasing the success rate of pitches by tailoring stories for different audiences, using the news agenda and working with case histories and third parties.

Our trainers have experience of working with the likes of GMTV, This Morning, BBC News, News of the World, Guardian, Telegraph, FT and a wide range of consumer magazines and websites.  There will be lots of great advice, role plays and the chance to test out your techniques. Places are £250 per person, with discounts for groups/charities/freelancers/non-profits.

You can also book or find out more at the:101 website.

Thanks!

Sally

Knowing Your Trades

So, I'm still alive. Just needed a bit of a break from blogging while I recovered my enthusiasm for sharing random thoughts and over-opinionated rants with a bunch of hyper-critical strangers.

Seriously, thanks for all the comments and emails over the last week or so. I'd like to say the great advice, lovely sentiments and wise thoughts prompted me into blogging again. Well, I'd like to say that, but actually the reason for blogging again was that I couldn't wait to share this gem:

I trained a B2B agency this week in media relations - how to turn fleeting email exchanges with hacks into long-term working relationships. We started by chatting about differentiating between titles - how magazines can all look the same, but they see themselves as very distinct products. So, I asked, what's the difference between Computer Weekly and Computing?  After a long pause, one PR ventured: "Is only one of them a weekly?"*

It's an easy mistake to make - nobody is born knowing about trade publications, after all. But if your job is pitching trades, there are three things you have to know:

1. Who reads it (job titles, circulation figures)
2. When it's published (day and frequency)
3. Who does it compete with, and how?

If you want to have long-term working relationships with hacks, a good story is vital. But so is knowing that my magazine has a bigger public sector readership than its competitor, or that our features section goes to press on a Tuesday.

* This is the wrong answer, obviously.

Seven things I've learned this week

1. Things like copyright infringement become less stressful when you just hand it all over to the lawyers. Also, I'm a bit mean when riled. Sorry, Richard.

2. That stupid new brain game on Facebook? More addictive than crack (I imagine, obviously, not having tried crack)

3. Twitter is much less annoying when you don't have Twitterific popping up on screen like a hyperactive bunny ever five seconds. Have used it much more in the last week, and started blocking the Twitter tw*ts.

4. My PR client is more excited about being in a scholastic magazine than the coverage I scored in the Daily Mail. Go figure.

5. Accidentally sending personal messages to an email forum for journalists is A Bad Thing. But also quite funny when it's other people doing the accidental sending.

6. Chris Middleton: Internet fibber. FACT.

7. I really, really need a weekend off. So we're heading to Harrogate while the sun shines. See you Monday!

New 101 Course in Manchester

We're taking bookings for the latest Nationals&Broadcast:101 course in Manchester on October 6th - do drop me a line if you're interested.

There is lots more detail on the 101 website here, but briefly we will have a team of fantastic ex-TV and national newspaper journalists helping PR executives to create pitches to sell stories in to national print and broadcast media.

We think it's a unique opportunity to find out what really makes a story interesting to the mainstream press, and how to pitch that story effectively. The cost is £250 for the day, discounts available for students and non-profits.

Just thought I'd share...

Nothing to do with PR or journalism but it was Flea's first day at pre-school today - a big day for both of us, not least because it's first time we've been up before 9am in the best part of a year!

Am now obviously going to be much more productive with all those hours of child-free time in the day. I plan to get on with a proper To Do list, just as soon as I've had a coffee and a quick read of the papers, and maybe checked out some Amazon bargains...

Five quick PR tips

One of the reasons blogging has been light this month is that I'm spending a lot of time out and about this summer, delivering our new telephone pitching workshop (plug here).  Not that I'm complaining - it's interesting work, I'm making loads of great PR contacts and have found a few really good stories in the process.

However, what's really interesting when you're meeting PR folks regularly is how often we take for granted what is common knowledge. I was really surprised, for example, to train one agency in Manchester last week where they commonly send attached images with press releases. Another agency in London was struggling to sell clients into the nationals - but the staff didn't have a regular schedule or time to read the national papers.

So, I thought it might be worth putting together some of my best  tips for PRs. Perhaps most of these are completely obvious, but  if you have any other gems you'd like to share, feel free to add them!

1. Don't send attachments until a journalist asks for them. Yes, we probably have broadband but we may well be accessing our email via a BlackBerry or a dongle, and downloading a 2MB image won't put us in a good mood. If you must, embed a small (like, 200k) image in an HTML email but better yet, just tell us what sort of pictures you have IF we're interested.
2. If you're replying to a request posted on Gorkana, Response Source or similar, change the subject header to include your client's name and what you're offering (So: SAP and Retail: customer interview available). Otherwise we end up with 60 emails, all with identical subject lines, and it's very easy to overlook or lose your message.
3. Don't rely on media databases when it really matters. The vast majority of databases rely on researchers keeping up with who's been fired, promoted or laid off, and the industry moves so fast that is never going to be 100 percent accurate. Even worse are the systems that rely on hacks themselves to inform the databases of changes. Some journalists on the bigger freelance databases haven't updated their profiles in five or six years. Call the editorial assistant or switchboard and get the right person first time.
4. Make some time to read the papers, every day. Don't just rely on Google Alerts or press clipping services. A good tip is to share out all the papers round the office and make a point of reading one paper for a whole week. Make a note of which sections appear on which days, which columns, case study slots and similar appear when. Combine this data with your new knowledge of the news agenda, and your pitches will be much more credible.
5. When you ring a journalist, don't tell them you have a lovely new press release from your client, Widget Incorporated. Tell them you have a story about how businesses can cut recruitment costs (or whatever). Outside of your offices, your client is rarely the news  - the story is news, and you should lead with that. Of course, quickly follow up your, "I have a story about X" with "Is now a good time to talk about it?"

Summer Break

Getting Ink and Getting Ink Requests are taking a bit of a holiday by the seaside, with a sparkly pink bucket and spade. They will be checking on email when they pass a friendly hotspot, but we don't expect to hear much from them as they've been working very hard and deserve a bit of a break.

See you in 10 days.