10 Things A+ Publicists Do That Make Writers Want to Work With Them Again
Use this checklist as a blueprint for building a long-lasting relationship with journalists
Hello, Top Tier community!
We are tackling a super fun topic today … all the things publicists do that we absolutely LOVE! We suggest using this as a checklist as a blueprint for exactly how to get reporters excited about working with you over and over again for years to come!
But before we dive in, we have a few noteworthy items to share:
Pitching 2024 holiday gift guides? Here are our most popular HGG Resources!
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The ULTIMATE INSIDER’S GUIDE to Holiday Gift Guide Pitching Workshop (one full hour of best practices, sample subject lines, a checklist of what to include in your pitch, advice for how to stand out from the crowd, tips for getting your sources included, examples of real HGG pitches that worked and answers to your most pressing questions)
Christmas in August Zoom Q&A with Affiliate Marketing Expert Sarah Karger (this will answer ALL your affiliate-related HGG questions!)
A Real-Life Example of an HGG Product Pitch Format that Most Writers Will Delete (hint: Don’t do this!)
What NOT to Pitch in a Holiday Gift Guide (seriously, save these pitches for another time)
A Handy-Dandy Checklist of 10 Things to Double-Check Before Sending Your Pitch (don’t send another pitch before making sure you’ve included everything a journalist needs!)
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Press Package 101 Session
Looking to mail out samples of your clients’ products in hopes of landing coverage? Great, but there’s a list of things you should know before dropping them off at the post office — things like planning, packaging, and communications will make all the difference in your ROI. We’ll help you make your packages more enticing, while actually saving your clients money in the process. And we’ll discuss how to target the right audiences, how to handle post-delivery follow-ups, and more.
Press Trips Invites and Itineraries Session
The two most important aspects to pulling off a successful press trip is nailing your invites and itineraries. First, we’ll dive into journalist targeting and invitation etiquette do’s and don’ts. Then, you’ll learn how to build a press trip itinerary that will actually land you coverage. We’ll focus on striking the perfect blend between offering media the chance to experience a destination, while zeroing in on quality and unique experiences that can lead to coverage — and help you find that elusive balance between keeping writers entertained vs. not overbooking them.
Hosting the Perfect Virtual and/or In-Person Media Event Session
Events are efficient ways to connect with a lot of media in one setting. During these sessions, you’ll learn the ins and outs of how to create a media event that journalists will A) Want to attend B) Will stay engaged at C) Will work into coverage. We’ll teach you how to target the ideal attendees who are there for article ideas and not just the free swag. We’ll talk venues, guest lists, and what to say in your presentation, plus how to coach your clients to interact with media at events in the most beneficial way.
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The above options are just a sample of topics, based on questions we get asked about most frequently. But if you have something you’d love to discuss that you don’t see on the list, we’re happy to create a custom session around it. Let’s dive deeper!
Now onto this week’s topic …
A question we get asked a lot is: What makes a writer want to work with a publicist again and again? It’s a great question, as some publicists are inadvertently doing things to turn a writer off to working with them, while others just seem to excel in this department. Having been asked this a lot over the years has inspired us to do a deep dive into this topic for this week’s TTC newsletter.
1. Our interactions are positive
We get asked about writer pet peeves a lot and believe it or not, argumentative publicists are one of them. Thankfully 99% of the publicists we interact with as writers are friendly, professional and understanding but there is definitely that 1% that take a different approach. We’ve had publicists try to argue with us and challenge our decisions when we tell them that a source or product isn’t right for the article we’re writing on. Writers have to choose sources and products that will make their editors/readers happy and when they say someone or something isn’t a fit, the decision was made with what’s best for the article/reader in mind.
Sometimes a writer will put a link to a source’s website into a story but their editors will remove it. An editor may change the title of an article after it goes live. An editor may even completely cut a source or product out from the story. At the end of the day, we realize those things are incredibly frustrating, but all of this is out of our control.
Now if there is a typo or something missing in a source’s title, please be professional when emailing a writer and asking them to change it. We have had our fair share of angry emails in situations like these. Trust us, going back to our editors to tell them we need them to make a correction in an article is stressful. Having a publicist be mean about it makes that so much worse. You’ll always catch more flies with honey, and assuming positive intent is a good idea.
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