Story Pitching: How to Stay in Tune with Reporters' Needs

8/8/2019 Story Pitching: How to Stay in Tune with Reporters' Needs

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Tom Banse

Thanks for joining us. We will begin a few minutes

past the hour to allow everyone time to settle in.

Sian Wu

Story Pitching: How to Get in Tune

with Reporters’ Needs

November 2010



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• Environmental and Health Focus



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Offices

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Bozeman Portland Salt Lake City Anchorage



Have a question? Need help?



1. Research your pitch

2. Practice your pitch

3. Practice good reporter etiquette

4. Understand your audience: the media

5. Make it memorable: hooks and angles

6. Special Guest: NPR Reporter Tom Banse

What we’llcover today



Tuning up:

research your pitch 1



First ask:

• How will media achieve my

end goal?

• No media is a strategy

Think strategy



• Aggressive?

• Informative?

• Buzz-building?

• Base-activating?

What kind of story do you want?



• Has this been covered before?

• Who’s been quoted on this?

• How is the issue currently framed?

• What types of outlets would be mostinfluential?

• Who writes on this?

• Do we want to go national or localfirst?

Do a sound check



Know their beats



Make a note of:

• What they’re interested in

• The stories/blogs they’ve written

• Who doesn’t want to be called

• Who is on social media

• Their status after your pitch

Keep tabs on them



Practice good

reporter etiquette 2



Be mindful of their lives:

• Pitched by hundreds of people

• Working on daily deadlines

• Need to answer to their editors

• Need a good visual (especially truefor TV)



• “Just calling to follow up.”

• “Wanted to make sure yougot it.”

Irksome words

Sometimes I just

popup for no particular reason, like now.



Build relationships

Support their work by:

• Spreading good reporting to your

networks

• Posting stories to your blog andnewsletter

• Following reporters on Twitter and

retweeting their content

• Commenting on stories online



Find them on Twitter

Media on Twitter:

• http://mediaontwitter.com

Muckrack:

• http://muckrack.com

Journalist Tweets:

• http://journalisttweets.com/search



Grace under fire



• What are their pitchpreferences?

• What are theyinterested in?

• Where can you readmore or connect?

Listen



Know when to let go



Understanding your

audience: the media 3



Stay in tune with a reporter’s needs

• Access to spokespeople

• Quality images, logos andvideo

• Embargo lift date and time

• Transparency

• Timeline of important decisions

• Access to primary documents



TV needs

• It’s all about the visual

• Don’t make them go the distance

• “If it bleeds it leads”

• Keep in mind competition andsweeps weeks

• Demonstrations and personality



Stay in tune with a reporter’s wants

• Peculiarity

• Proximity

• Prominence

• Promptness

• Peer review



• Blatant self promotion

• Internal news

• Opinion—ax to grind

• Pitch robots

What strikes a bad chord?



Mending fences

• Recognize ideologically hostilepress

• Show them you’re a real person

• Change up your spokespeople

• Hit other outlets



Make it memorable:

hooks and angles 4



Develop your news hook

What’s:

• New

• Interesting

• Surprising

• Timely

• Relevant or

• Localize a national story



What are the impacts that haven’tbeen covered yet?

• Economic

• Political

• Environmental

• Social

• Health

Identify the problem, substitute abetter question and reframepositively

Find the right angle



It’s not all about you

Let the news lead with your organization as asupporting character in the story



Warming up:

practice your pitch5



Practice your pitch

• Role play with a coworker

• Think of tough reporter questions

• For email pitches:

• Lead with the big news

• Keep it short

• Use AP style and proofread

• Stay jargon-free



• Know the main messages

• Line up facts and figures

• But don’t read from a script

Be prepared



Know your land mines

What topics are no-gozones?

Who can speak to that?Don’t say anything youwouldn’t want to see inthe story:

• On the record

• Off the record

• On background



• Consider how media will help you achieve your goal

• Know your reporters really wellby being a news junkie

• Understand reporter deadlinesand inboxes

• All good stories need a good

hook• News stories aren’t all about you

Reminders:



Special guest: Tom Banse

Tom Banse

NorthwestRegionalCorrespondentNPR News



Sian Wu

Program DirectorSeattle [email protected] x102

@ThatsSoEco

Tom Banse

Northwest RegionalCorrespondentNPR News

We welcome your questions!



Explore More RM Trainings• Blogger Relations – December

• Coming up in 2011:• Communicating science TBD

• Branding TBD

• Interviewing and public speaking TBD

• LinkedIn for nonprofits TBD



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