I had a bit of a breather tonight, so I spent about an hour going through my old ’starred’ e-mails on Gmail, and you know what? I am a bad person.  I had at least 10 pitch/introduction e-mails in there from the last month that I meant to follow up on and never did.  This, of course, makes me a giant hypocrite considering I send and manage the sending of these very types of e-mails and am disappointed when people I think will write back, never do.

So I’m going to apologise. Yes, other PR people of the world – I’m sorry for not answering you back. I promise to do better next time.

However, in my own defense, most of the pitches weren’t great, which is why I forgot about them in the first place.  That’s why it’s never too late for a bit of a ‘blog pitching basics’ refreshment post…

  • Don’t pretend to have read a blog if you haven’t actually read the blog
  • Using completely generic statements (‘love your insight, love your blog’, for example) is really tacky. Personalise.
  • It’s rude to ask a blogger outright to post something or tell a blogger you’d like him or her to put a link on their sites to your client/company/product.
  • It’s also uncouth to ask a blogger to plug one of their professional competitors, i.e. pitching a Microsoft employee on an Apple product
  • Understand what the blogger covers before pitching. You don’t have to read every post from the beginning, but at least read the About page. I’m constantly amazed at how many people don’t seem to do this.
  • If a blogger doesn’t return your e-mail but you know that your request is relevant and something you truly believe they would be interested in, find a different platform to connect on like Twitter.
  • Have a think about why the blogger didn’t e-mail you back.  It’s probably because the pitch didn’t grab them right away. Find a different angle or ask for advice on how you can make it work for them.

There are so many resources out there for ‘how to pitch bloggers‘, but with the increase in pitches I’ve seen over the last couple months, I’m not sure those posts are being used to their full effect.

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