UK journalists blacklisting PR execs
with irrelevant pitches

Survey reveals journalists fed up with ‘misdirected’ pitches

20 November 2007

An online survey undertaken by Rainier PR has revealed that more than two in five UK journalists (43 per cent) have blacklisted a PR person over pitches they felt were irrelevant. 180 journalists responded to the online survey over a period of 48 hours.

The Rainier PR survey also found that 37 per cent of journalists felt that less than one in 10 press releases or pitches were relevant to their publication with one respondent commenting: “90 per cent of the PR I receive is poor, I just don’t bother with anything that doesn’t have a subject line that interests me.”

The findings reveal a distinct lack of care and research by the PR industry when pitching stories and follows the post by Chris Anderson on his blog, The Long Tail which listed “lazy flacks” he had blacklisted because “they can't be bothered to find out who on my staff, if anyone, might actually be interested in what they're pitching”.

Stephen Waddington , managing director of Rainier PR and author of Wadds’ Tech PR Blog, today urged the PR industry to seriously consider the long term consequences of pitching irrelevant stories.

"Bad PR techniques have always had the capacity to wind up journalists to the extent that they refuse to deal with them. The difference now is that some PR fools are causing irreparable harm to press relationships because email - and overreliance on it for pitching - means it's simple to blacklist a bad PR person. Agencies and their clients need to be aware that journalists seem to be reaching break point, and so the PRs representing them need to be able to cut the mustard," said Waddington.

Waddington was also keen to point out that the media landscape is changing – journalists are now more likely to pull stories from sources rather than have it pushed at them.

"Blogging and citizen journalism have only augmented the issue, with journalists having more story sources than ever. Unless PRs can deliver the content in the right way and are honest about its likely newsworthiness, this survey spells goodnight to anyone prone to flaky pitching," he said.