Pitch Perfect: Three Southerner's secrets for winning press

From bloggers to segment editors, getting a story about your destination published is all about the pitch.  If you have a lazy Ctl+c/v pitch strategy, I'm here to liberate your  results.   

Earned media is basically borrowed media.  And borrowing something is all about manners.  Put yourself in the seat of the recipient.  Did you send them 10 pages on your company  and leave it up to the press to decipher what would be a good angle for their audience?   Asking someone to do your work is bad manners. 

Secret #1  When you lead the horse to water, spike it.

You've got seconds to answer their question " Why should I care?"  Your intro needs to be sharp and provocative enough to read on.  Spend time on one concise(good looking) page that tells the recipient you know who they are, their readers are and what interests them.  Spend another page on your idea for a story/series/etc, and just one more on your destination with  standard PR yada.  Remember the tone of your pitch should work well with  the media outlet's audience and your brand communications. Strive for a balance, when in doubt, serve the reader first.

Secret #2  Friends come to the kitchen door.

You're not selling a vacuum, why go through the receptionist?  You're bringing valuable content to them, and that makes their jobs easier. Friends do that. (^^,)  A little secret to getting published to HuffPo and other mainstream news blogs is to find the specific segment editor and email them directly.  It's not easy to find, but 90% of content on these blogs is unpaid guest content.  Use search until you find the name of the editor, then one of the media outlets's public emails.  Use the format of the public email (ie: fnLast@mediaplace.com) to the editor's name/email and have back ups ready.  You can also call and ask permission to submit directly - but do not throw a well-crafted pitch into the ether.  This is a sale, you have to treat it as such.

Secret #3 We never show up empty-handed.

Yes, you're bringing a story idea/guest blog/industry insight, but that's self-serving.  You know it, they know it.   Let's try harder.  A simple compliment to a specific piece of work is nice, an offer for data not published is a great hook-up, preparing media for the story so they don't have to is pure gold.  Don't send them to your website - take them to a video story to share, a tumblr account just for their readers, etc.

Earned media is so important to a destination strategy.  Historically unaffordable for smaller DMOs, the mega-news online ushers in a new self-serve frontier.  To cut out time and show true authenticity, turn on your camera and vid-pitch.  The fact that it's real overshadows editing faux-pas.