How To Learn More About The Journalist You’re Pitching To
Building a relationship with a few journalists and media representatives can help your business. You’re able to provide the journalist with the type of information and story that they’re looking for, while also getting attention and awareness for your business brand. Before you can build a relationship with a journalist, and before you can pitch a story idea to them, you have to learn about them. You have to do your research.
What You Want To Know About The Journalist You’re Pitching To
The first step in the process is to make a list of the key points you want to learn and research. Here are a few key points to make note of:
- How often do they publish a story?
- Where do they get their story ideas?
- Who is their audience?
- What type of story ideas do they like to cover?
- What type of information, facts, and data do they usually use in their story?
- How do they share their stories?
- Do they have a blog?
- Do they participate in social media? If so, what sites do they participate on and how often do they interact? How do they interact on social media?
- What’s the goal and mission for the publication they represent?
- How does your information, business, audience, products and services fit into your target journalist’s interests and niche?
- How do they get their story ideas?
- What is their contact information?
You may think of a few additional questions you’d like to know the answers to. Write them down. Now it’s time to start digging.
Read their publication. The best source of information about any particular media representative or journalist is their content. Read what they write and get a good sense about who their audience is, what they like to cover, and how they usually cover stories.
Read the blog. If they have a blog or they are active on social media then start following them and read their posts. Learn how they interact with their readers and followers and what information they like to share. Many journalists like to ask questions on social media as well. Responding to those posts presents an opportunity to begin building a relationship with them.
Most journalists publish their contact information. In today’s age of technology you’ll find that most journalists and media representatives prefer to communicate via email. Some may respond to phone calls, however they’re often more receptive to a message in their inbox than on their voicemail.
Ask around. You may know people who know people. Talk to the folks you know and learn more about the media representatives in your community both online and off. Finally, don’t be afraid to ask the journalist themselves. They may surprise you with an answer.
