New school PR and the Twitter pitch
You may have heard Samuel Johnson’s quote before: “I did not have time to write you a short letter, so I wrote you a long one instead,” which got us here at Ellis Jones thinking about new-school public relations approaches and the advent of Twitter media pitches.
Realistically, journalists are short on time and these days, even more on resources. They get hundreds of press releases a day, many often completely irrelevant, so in essence you’d think a Tweet would be an effective way for them to get the information they need quickly and efficiently.
The PR consultant on the other end will have thought hard about how to pitch the story and spike the journo’s interest, After all, it’s hard writing short copy which captures all key messages, especially when you only have one to two sentences in which to do so.
But even if PR consultant spends half an hour getting the Tweet right – is the save on time and money paralleled in one of the fundamental ROI markers for PR consultants and journos alike – the relationships that underpin the stories that get ‘sold in’ and the stories that get published.
Are our longstanding journalist – PR consultant relationships which were built on working lunches, informative and well written press releases and phone calls now being replaced by often faceless and fleeting Tweets? Or can we (and will we) find ways of connecting and building trust and relationships over 140 characters.
More than likely it’s a mix of both. Putting in the time to build solid working relationships fostered over time is vital but perhaps once developed, the road is paved for quick and cost effective pitching and information sharing through Tweets, which will in turn have relevance and a face.
