The most horrendously unattractive pitch emails I get usually come from the best nonprofits and socio-eco-friendly companies — probably because they’re running on shoestring budgets. Sometimes I get annoyed at these e-faux pas, sometimes I laugh, and sometimes I really pity the nonprofits or companies for shooting themselves in the foot, especially if they’re ones I like….
So I thought maybe we could all NOT learn by example by looking at a few of the worst pitches I got in the last month:
1. The “this probably isn’t worth your time” pitch.
This one’s from a well-known fair trade company:
Subject: press release
Hey Siel, Hope you’re doing well. I’m sending you a press release that’s the size of a dissertation, but feel free to use anything in here that you might find interesting! Thanks! [name redacted]
Say I wanted to develop a contact or make a friend. What I would NOT do is write an email titled “bio,” attach my life’s worth of journal writings in a long Word doc, then send it with a message like this: “My life’s been mostly long and boring, and you may or may not find something in there worth reading about.”
If you can understand why I would not do that, then you likely understand why the above pitch isn’t a good one.
2. The “I don’t know WTF I’m doing cuz I’m an intern — LOL!” pitch
Hi - My name is [name redacted] and I am the online media intern for [name of well-known eco-nonprofit redacted] and am currently promoting a documentary film by [info redacted].
I wanted to share the followin (sic) blog entry with you with hopes that you could post it in your blog section. Thank you so much for your help.
What this email DIDN’T contain: The URL for the contest page; the URL for the nonprofit; the URL to the blog post in question. What the email DID contain: grammar errors and strange line breaks that made the email look — and perhaps sound — like a bad Billy Collins poem.
I get that nonprofits are shortstaffed, and that they often think young interns will, simply due to their age, “know” online media. Simply writing a Myspace blog, however, does not a social media expert make. Do you really want your org’s entire image placed blindly into the hands of a brand new intern who knows little about your nonprofit / company, and even less about PR / media?
Interns are there to learn — so teach them! Read over a draft of their pitches — or at the very least, equip the poor kids with some good advice, a spellchecker, and a sample email or two to work from.
3. The “I don’t think your blog’s worth even a cursory glance” pitch
This one’s also from an intern, but I’ve had similar ones from non-interns too:
Hi there, My name is [name redacted], and I am a public relations intern at [name of company redacted]. I was wondering if you have any special environmental or “green” sections or subletters coming up? I am trying to track editorial calendars. If you could provide me with any information, that would be great. Thanks!
Dear intern: So you have no idea what medium I write in, much less what I write about — and you don’t care. But when you typed my email — which begins, BTW, with the word “green” — did that not at least clue you in to the fact that, indeed, I might write for an “environmental or ‘green’” section?”
____
I might make these a series, because I really get a lot of ‘em. Just today I got pitches addressed to “Dear Spiel” (this person later realized her error and emailed to apologize; unfortunately, she was hawking bottled water) and “Dear Fred Segal Green” (huh?)….
As a publicist and a blogger I had to laugh at this post, and especially at my own reaction(s).
As a blogger, I think that some of them seem like honest mistakes (we all make typos!) and we’re just human.
On the other hand, the publicist in me cringes at the thought of a spelling error in a pitch.
Comment by maris — October 9, 2008 @ 3:01 pm
I agree about the typos, maris — I obviously make those too, and those’re really the v. least of the probs outlined above :P
The prob with those typos in ex. #2, however, is that the email clearly had gone out to a whole bunch of people (I was bcc’d). If I were sending a huge group email, I’d really, really make sure I use a spellchecker.
Comment by Siel — October 9, 2008 @ 3:04 pm
LOL - I can hardly believe that these are really emails that you’ve received. Funny and sad.
Comment by Joe — October 9, 2008 @ 3:36 pm
LMAO! thanks for the laugh today Siel, i especially liked the “Dear Fred Segal Green” one…hehe :)
Comment by Lisa — October 9, 2008 @ 4:01 pm
It is interesting to get another perspective. I am both a publicist and a blogger and once someone pitched me some jet liner or something like that. In the pitch, they complemented my “about” section. However, if they really read it, they would have known that I can not afford a jet.
Comment by sforshner — October 9, 2008 @ 6:48 pm
Siel, I am thanking God right now that none of my pitches are in your post!
I do both journalism and PR. It ain’t rocket science, people.
Comment by Lisa — October 9, 2008 @ 7:10 pm
Siel - Totally agree. I’m not a fan of the BCC pitch anyway. One of the things I LIKE about being a publicists and one of the reasons I went into this field is to build relationships with the people I work with, colleagues, journalists, anyone I come across. So sending a blanket email, while in some cases is efficient and appropriate, is definitely not my favorite way to pitch. Do you have a PR background?
Comment by maris — October 10, 2008 @ 9:40 am
sforshner — I get a lot of odd pitches like that too. The worst one of those: The hook was that women can save the economy. How? By shopping for expensive cosmetics. Apparently she thought I was a writer for the Bush admin –
Lisa — I agree it’s not rocket science. Sure, there’s something to be said for experience / training, but for the most part, good PR’s just good communication in general — the willingness to consider the other person’s interests / perspective while expressing your own.
maris — To say I have a PR BACKGROUND might be a bit of an exaggeration, depending on how one defines background — but I did work at a PR firm, then as an in house PR/comm person for a few years before starting grad school.
Comment by Siel — October 10, 2008 @ 12:42 pm
Hi Siel,
Thanks for the great post. I am also relieved that none of my pitches were included in the above and I think a bad pitches series would be brilliant.
I do feel for those interns and hope they’ll be in a more strict environment that won’t allow those kind of mistakes in the future (the old “you have to learn the rules before you can break them” type of firm). Loved reading these and agree that it’s a travesty that non-profits lack money & therefore time/staff who can properly train interns.
Comment by Marisa — October 10, 2008 @ 3:54 pm
I think I’ve made some bad pitches in the past, but nothing like some of the ones I’ve seen lately. I’m just now starting to get pitches for posting things on Westside Bikeside, and I think they start with the worst ones first. I’ve yet to get a decent pitch from a stranger.
I love the “LOL, I’m an intern” one. You can just feel the giddy enthusiasm for . . . for something!
Comment by Anonymous Thompson — October 13, 2008 @ 4:24 pm