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A thread (
https://abs.twimg.com/emoji/v2/... draggable="false" alt="🧵" title="Thread" aria-label="Emoji: Thread">) for businesses pitching stories to journalists about expectations of securing coverage based on a couple of recent experiences... (1/11)
I& #39;m really lucky to get people pitching me interesting ideas for news stories, many of which are exclusive/have exclusive lines - and I& #39;m thankful to those who do! But I have had a couple of experiences recently that think are instructive for businesses to know...
One example was a company coming to me to tell me about a new (large) funding round they had secured and wanted to give me the exclusive. It was great: they& #39;re a growing business in a culturally interesting area, and their valuation was big. But...
They wanted mainstream (read: national newspaper) coverage. I tried to explain why the readers of those publications wouldn& #39;t be interested, and they wouldn& #39;t get coverage commensurate to what they thought the importance of the news was. I offered to pitch it to editors I knew.
But no, they wanted a paper, so said they& #39;d try independently. They got 200 words in a daily, where they were barely mentioned, and all the things they highlighted as cool weren& #39;t covered. They then came back and asked if I& #39;d be interested in doing a non-exc followup (no, obv).
I get it: this is someone who I know, who has spent a lot of effort, time and money investing in their business - with great success. But their area is a niche one, and as an impartial, detached journalist I can tell a paper wouldn& #39;t be as interested as a tech website
Case study number two: the CEO of a business came to me last week with a pretty big story about a contract issue in their industry. Problems are: (1) it& #39;s a contract issue, and (2) the industry - and where they& #39;re based - make them non-mainstream in the eyes of many.
But it& #39;s a good story and IMO is quite significant, so I& #39;ve pitched it in good faith to editors at a number of publications, who told me (1) and (2) above. That CEO has followed up today with me in a message. "The story didn& #39;t appear anywhere," as if they& #39;re disappointed in me.
Again, I get it. It& #39;s their business, and the contract issue affects them significantly. But personal interest in a story clouds your judgement as to its importance, and even though I may think it& #39;s a story, I& #39;m not the last person who needs to be convinced - my editors are.
