Cowboy Caleb the liberal arts, grown-up stuff & random mischief

Dear PR people: How to Pitch to Bloggers

I get pitched by PR folks alot these days.

Some are very nice like LEWIS who give me free Blackberry phones in exchange for moblogging with it.

Others Most are rather clueless… sending me multiple press releases, asking me to ‘participate’ in blogger-centric(?) surveys and shamelessly asking me to plug their products - these I click on the ’spam’ button. Some even have the audacity to ask me to ‘trial test’ their product with all kinds of ridiculous conditions attached.

I guess unless I feel that both the PR firm and I are going to walk away with something - I’m simply not interested. This Cowboy does not want to do you a favor or give out any freebies to any PR firm unless some of the proceeds are going to a charity (Cat Society is not on my list btw).

That’s right, I don’t enjoy being a tool because I’m Cowboy f78king Caleb with an amazing amount of traffic and loyal readership so basically you PR companies need me and not the other way around.

a good chunk of the PR industry is blogging about the things they should and shouldn’t be doing, but I’m not seeing a lot of practical real-world solutions that would work for bloggers getting pitched. All the advice has come from the PR side of things so it’s all about how they train employees, how they do their work, and why their work is vital to bloggers (newsflash: it often isn’t).

To all the PR companies that are currently or planning to contact me in the future - please read this insightful article entitled “Dear PR people: How to Pitch Bloggers”. Read it and do yourself a big favor.

those are PR firms with too much traditional media background mah. no creativity one.

just tell them to stop spamming. send a nice getting-to-know-you email and invite for coffee to see if this blogger is even the kind “brandname” their product should be attached to first lar. diao. too crazy about the traffic more than doing a little legwork.

p/s: too bad ler for the pussies all over the world! u mean mean stingy bastard.

alot of PR people pitch to bloggers in a wrong manner because they don’t understand new media enough.

being a blogger first (way before i joined the PR industry), and a PR person later, i kind of see how and where traditional PR pitching can go wrong when the other party is a blogger.

i think it’ll take some time and effort for the PR people to get to know new media and how they think/feel/function.

but on their end, bloggers could also be open and try to help PR people get to know them better. there is a win-win situation possible here…but it just takes some effort to find that delicate balance.

Cat Welfare Society lah !!!!

Those dimwits who haven’t got a clue how to pitch to you are likely to be the same lot who can’t do a screenshot to save their lives. The old world traditional idiots who go “OH let’s have a blog” and “OH let’s have Cowboy Caleb talk about us! I’m sure he will! We are that good!”.

Sadly to say, we practitioners are just as clueless as our clients when it comes to new media. I agree with Missy, it will take time… it will take time before those without common sense start growing some.