11 Things Publicists Should Do TODAY To Set Themselves (and their clients!) Up for Success in 2024

Use December to get ahead of the competition and plan for a great new year

Dec 05, 2023

Happy Tuesday, Top Tier Community!

It feels like some things are speeding up (holiday shopping, getting last-minute gift guide placements) while other things are slowing down (editorial assignments and probably responses from writers/editors as Q4 budgets are spent and vacations are starting up).

That makes now the perfect time to start looking ahead to 2024. We’ve compiled a list of 10 things you can do NOW to help get prepared for the new year. Instead of being frustrated that you aren’t hearing back from media, channel that effort into making a few shifts in your business that’ll help move the needle next year.

Below, we’re sharing tips for relationship building, industry education, where to find more opportunities to work with writers on assignments, how to strategize on positioning your clients as experts, networking and more.

Help Us Help You: Earn a FREE Paid Upgrade By Spreading the Word About Top Tier Consulting

We wanted to remind you about our new referral program — it’s a great way to get a FREE upgrade to a paid subscription and it couldn’t be easier:

1. Share Top Tier Consulting. When you use the referral link below, or the “Share” button on any post, you'll get credit for any new subscribers. Simply send the link in a text, email, or share it on social media with friends.

Refer a friend

2. Earn benefits. When more friends use your referral link to subscribe (free or paid), you’ll receive special benefits.

Get a 3 month comp for 3 referrals
Get a 6 month comp for 5 referrals
Get a 12 month comp for 25 referrals

Visit the leaderboard

Ok, now back to this week’s topic:

1. Get an AI detector to check your clients’ email-based interviews for robot-written responses that could get a journalist FIRED

Earlier this year, we talked a lot about the hidden dangers of relying on ChatGPT for your PR efforts. And all of those concerns we raised are still incredibly valid … even more so considering how far the technology has come in the last 6 months.

And while we presume you’ve heeded our advice and aren’t using AI for anything you create that’s journalist-facing, have you had this important conversation with your clients? When it comes to email-based interviews, having a client use ChatGPT to generate their responses is truly setting everyone up for failure. That content they are copying/pasting is automatically plagiarized because ChatGPT sources from other published works. Most outlets have now created written guidelines that journalists must adhere to when it comes to the use of AI in our work: it’s FORBIDDEN. That means your client using AI in their responses will put a journalist’s job at stake. Our REPUTATION is on the line here.

And if a writer gets burned by this and our livelihood is negatively impacted, you can bet your bottom dollar they will never work with you or your client again … and they’ll warn all their colleagues about you, too.

An easy way to avoid getting blackslisted is by A) educating your clients and B) investing in an AI detection tool. Yes, they aren’t always completely accurate, but it’s an additional layer of protection that could save everyone a lot of time and embarrassment.

Required reading: The Hidden Dangers of relying on chatGPT for Your PR Efforts

2. Be the first to know what writers need by watching for these hashtags on Twitter: #journorequest and #PRrequest

Ok, we know Twitter is a touchy subject these days … but it’s still an amazing (and often under-utilized) resource for media/publicists. If you aren’t already following these hashtags on Twitter, you might be missing out on many great coverage opportunities with it. The #journorequest and #journorequests hashtags are what writers use on Twitter to alert everyone that they are searching for products, experts, destinations, and anything else they need for their assignments.

If you find these opportunities quickly, there’s a good chance you’ll be first in line for a story … especially if you catch them before they cross-post to Qwoted, HARO or their Substacks and get bombarded with pitches. There’s even an account associated with this hashtag and it’s a way to find these leads all in one place! As a bonus, you’ll also be more aware of which journalists are currently working — and for which outlets and in which niches.

Required reading: 8 Ways to Stand Out from the Crowd When replying to a Writer’s Call for Sources

3. Send thank-you emails/cards to journalists you worked closely with this year

Want to knock the socks off a reporter you worked with on an assignment (or many assignments) and leave an amazing impression? It’s really simple: Send them a heartfelt thank-you email (that doesn’t include a pitch!!), letting them know how much you enjoyed the collaboration + what the coverage meant to you and your client. End your sentiments by stating how you’d love to continue working together next year.

Wanna kick it up a notch? Send an actual handwritten card or postcard via snail mail. We rarely receive any acknowledgment for our work, so any gesture along these lines will make our hearts sing. And that attitude of gratitude goes a long way toward giving us the warm fuzzies that make us want to work with you over and over again!

Required reading: Ethics Check: 7 Do’s and Don’ts for Sending Journalists a Holiday Thank You Gift

4. Upgrade to a paid Top Tier Substack Subscription

Yes, of course we’re going to do a shameless self promotion here … because we’ve been working as freelance writers, editors and reporters for a combined 41 years.

Between the two of us, we’ve written for nearly every major publication out there, whether it’s a print magazine, newspaper or online outlet, crafting profiles, services pieces, gift guides, tutorials, essays, reviews, reported features and every other type of article you’ve heard of.

We’ve worked with hundreds of editors, thousands of publicists and have looked through more pitches than you could possibly imagine. We formed Top Tier Consulting to help you benefit from all of this experience and educate you on how to best work with writers so that you can become even better at your jobs.

Every week, we share deep industry insights in this Substack and many of those live behind a paywall.

What will you get access to when you upgrade?

Full access to our weekly newsletters
Access to our extensive archive of paid posts
The ability to attend/participate in our monthly Zoom Top Tier Talks
Discounts on all our most popular group workshops

We hope you’ll agree that we deserve a little compensation for the valuable insights we share. The $10 monthly fee amounts to treating both Jill and Nicole to one cup of coffee a month, but the perks are worth far more :)

5. Start brainstorming fresh talking points for your sources

Now is the perfect time to start working on FRESH 2024 talking points for your clients to include in your pitches. That’s because when you pitch a client as a source, you want to give writers an idea of what they can speak about.

Aways include a bulleted list (3-5) of sample talking points in your pitch rather than just sharing their credentials. Look for news hooks and other timely/seasonal angles, find fresh ways to touch on a topic that’s been covered to death, and hop on trends and newly released studies.

Required reading: How to Work Your Sources into Articles Around the Holidays
Required reading: How to SELL Writers on Your Client vs. Just Telling Us They Exist
Required reading: 8 Things You Need to Do to Help Prep Your Clients for Interviews

6. Add writers to your contacts so their emails don’t end up in your spam folder

It happens all too often: We send an email to a publicist (or respond to one of their pitches) and never hear back. There could be a lot of reasons for this, but don’t let the reason be because our email landed in your spam folder … it’s an especially common problem with Gmail accounts, which is what many freelancers rely on these days.

Go ahead and update your email contacts list and add those writers you’re pitching (or at least the ones you’re really hoping to work with) so that you don’t miss an important and/or urgent request!

Required reading: Are You Guilty of Dropping the Momentum When Working With a Writer?

7. Prep for a new year of networking

There’s been a lot of shifts in the editorial world the last few months — between layoffs and outlets folding, it’s hard to keep track of who’s where.

Now is the time to peruse articles in publications you’d like to get your sources into. Find out who is writing them and jot down their names. See if they are staff writers or freelancers. Follow these writers on social media (especially Twitter and Linkedin, which are a goldmine for networking with writers). Writers often take to these platforms to announce that they are sourcing for specific topics and if you happen to catch their feeds, it can be a great way to find some calls for sources.

Check out writer Muckracks to see where else they are publishing. If that writer has a Substack, sign up for it. Substack has a search feature where you can search for a particular writer’s name and many writers recommend other similar writers at the bottom of their Substack newsletters.

Start a list of writers to target in 2024. Update your existing list of who you send pitches to. Check mastheads of publications to see if editors have moved around.

P.S. If you’ve worked with a writer or editor at a publication and they’ve since moved on to a new outlet, reaching out on Linkedin or Twitter is a great way to get back on their radar and in with their new pub.

Required reading: 4 Reasons Why You Need to Build Relationships with Freelancers Now
Required reading: Relationship vs. Transactional Pitching—Here’s What it Looks Like

8. Join Facebook forums (if you aren’t already on them)

We frequently talk about this in our Top Tier sessions. There are several Facebook groups where publicists and writers interact that are great places for publicists to be a part of. Do some searches through Facebook to see what you can find (as there are many) but here are two that we regularly recommend:

Sharing Opps: PR-FRIENDLY, which is free to join and has 4.2k members (a mix of publicists and writers posting about what they are sourcing for) and
PR, Marketing and Media Czars, which involves applying and paying a fee for access to the 20k members. There are also Czars spinoffs that focus on niches like travel, pets, beauty, and more.
Binders Full of Publicists, PR Folk (and the journalists who love them) is another great resource filled with 1,600 members and it’s free.
Wellness Writers, Editors & Experts is another spot to hang out if you have clients in the health/wellness space.

Writers are constantly in these forums and sourcing in there!

9. Book a 1:1 Session with Jill and Nicole

Love our Substack, Top Tier Talks and group workshops? We also offer a variety of consulting packages and love working one-on-one with PR agencies and solo publicists alike.

We have a few slots open for the rest of the year, and a dedicated brain-picking session on one of the following topics could REALLY put you ahead of the competition for 2024:

Want to workshop a few pitches with two top-tier writers? Try our Pitch Perfecting session.
Looking to build deeper relationships with journalists? You’ll love our Become a Journalist’s BFF session.
Have a slew of questions you want answers to? Book an Ask Us Anything session.
Are you putting together a press trip and need help with the details? We offer a Press Trip Invites and Itineraries session.
Need fresh ideas for sending mailers to writers? Book our Press Package session.
Scheduling an in-person or virtual media event? We can help, with our Hosting the Perfect Virtual/In-Person Media Event session.

Have other ideas you need help brainstorming or creating an action plan for? We offer Custom sessions, too!

Learn More About Our Services

10. Check out editorial calendars

Oh hey, remember editorial calendars? Some pubs still use them! Start bookmarking publications you want to target for 2024. Pay attention to their editorial calendars. A lot of outlets will post those right on their website. This tells you what themes their upcoming issues will be focused on and can help serve as a guide for pitching content to editors and writers for those publications that will fit in with the editorial guidelines.

At TTC, we get asked a lot about lead times. Our answer to that is you can never pitch too early but you can definitely pitch too late. Different publications also do things differently. As things slow down near the holidays, peruse publications that you want to pitch in 2024 and see when they published articles around upcoming health awareness months, holidays, seasons, how early — or late — they hopped on trends.

Required reading: Do Journalists Care About National Days (like national ice cream day or national lipstick day)?

11. Take a masterclass on affiliate marketing

If you rep clients with products, you already know they basically HAVE to be on an affiliate network to secure editorial coverage these days. We have partnered with publicist Sarah Karger on all things affiliate marketing, and she’s been the guest speaker at our various Top Tier Talks and workshops this year to share her expertise.

But did you know she also created the Ultimate Masterclass and Introduction to Affiliate Marketing for Publicists? If you haven’t signed up to take this yet, now’s a great time to do so … affiliate marketing will continue to dominate the e-commerce industry in 2024.

—

Did you learn anything new today? Any questions on this topic? Our comment section is open and we ALWAYS reply!

Top Tier Consulting