Pillar 07 · Activation
Pitches
Makes sure a story is strong before it reaches a journalist, and that you are ready when the journalist says yes.
The quality test every story passes before it reaches a journalist. If a pitch is not strong enough, it is reworked before sending.
Pitches is the method’s outreach-quality engine, the gate every story passes through before it reaches a journalist. It is the pitch-side twin of Audience Story: the 6As write the article, TRUTH pitches it.
The TRUTH test originated in Paul Blanchard’s book Fast PR, and is Full Funnel PR’s standard pitch quality check across all client work.
You do not have to spell all five out in the pitch itself, there is not the time, but give enough for the journalist to see you have thought about it. Keep it readable on a phone. If it needs 500 words to explain, the story is not ready.
Four things sink most pitches, and each is fixed upstream rather than in the pitch. A lack of metrics, because journalists need numbers to judge significance, fixed by the North Star. A lack of boldness, because clients resist naming losers, fixed by Tension. A lack of patience, because pressure for instant results produces rushed pitches and damaged relationships, fixed by the operating rhythm. And a lack of preparation, because a strong pitch is less likely to produce coverage if the spokesperson has not been briefed and trained for the interview, fixed by media training.
Throughout, the journalist is the channel, not the end audience.
TRUTH
- Topical
- Why now? A current news event, a data release, a trend at a tipping point. The strongest answer is a live trigger from Radar.
- Relevant
- Why this journalist? The story fits their beat and their readers, inferred from what they have written, never claimed.
- Unusual
- What is new or different? A contrarian view, original data, a reversal, a first or last ever. Usually drawn from the 3 Uniques.
- Tension
- What is changing, and who wins or loses? Name the conflict explicitly. With no conflict there is no story.
- Human
- Who is affected in the real world? Always a measurable real-world impact number. If none exists, that is a cue to create research.
When the pitch lands: the interview
A pitch earns the interview. The interview earns the coverage. Scaleups and SMEs lack the market power to win consistent coverage from their own news, but they can win strong coverage relative to their size by telling stories about the future, if the story is strong and the spokesperson is compelling.
Media training is particularly worthwhile when you have a major announcement expected in the next six months. It is part of the preparation, so you are ready before the pitching starts.
- Profile interview
- About you and your business. Built on four things: why you care, who else believes, proof the business works, and where your market is going. Rehearsed with a journalist who covers your sector, or with Matt.
- Expert analysis
- Never about your business. Insight on an industry issue, often live on air. Built on one clear point of view that either explains or argues a case.
Every interview gets a briefing: the scenario, a guide to the interviewer, a proof point for each message, and prepared answers to the difficult questions.
Before the interview, we develop and practise the key lines: short, quotable soundbites for each message, and analogies that make a complex product or market easy for an audience to picture. Journalists quote the line that explains the point most clearly, so it is worth arriving with that line already written and rehearsed out loud.
Training runs in three parts: a workshop, a mock interview, and written feedback on how to improve.
Media training is delivered by Matt Phillips, five years as lead spokesperson for the BPI with more than 100 media appearances, including an accountability interview with Jon Snow on Channel 4 News.
Go deeper
Writing on pitches
- How to pitch a story to a journalistMatt Phillips PR ↗
- How to decide which journalists to pitchMatt Phillips PR ↗
- How does a small business get in the FT?Matt Phillips PR ↗
- What a grilling from Jon Snow taught me about handling the mediaMatt Phillips PR ↗