I came across a great post from Saul Hansell, a tech writer for the New York Times. He addresses his interaction with PR people and specifically offers advice on email pitches. Like many journalists, Saul's email inbox gets slammed with pitches from PR people. Most of them bad, but some of them very good. What makes a lot of them fall into the bad category? They are lengthy and catchy, but ultimately don't communicate what the company is or what the product does.

We work with many clients who get hung up on the "marketing-speak" and over-complicate product/company description with jargon and flowery words. As PR people, it's our job to "dumb down" the message and communicate it succinctly and effectively to the press. Chances are, you will not know more than the editor you are pitching - you just need to know enough to gain their interest - so it doesn't make sense to over-sell them or be "convincing."

In our pitches, we try to communicate first why a particular journalist's readers would care, then a quick few sentences on what the product/service is. We always err on the side of brevity and take out all of the typical fluffy filler. As Saul mentions in his post - even if the editor can't fit your client into a story now, he can always file away the email and search for it later when the topic does arise. This is only effective, however, if you plainly describe the product and company in the email to easily be found in an email topic search later.

Have you received a particularly bad pitch lately? Please share in the comments below...