The “art” of pitching news stories

If you are in line with an article I came across on Bignews.biz today, you’re probably not reading this.

The article posed an interesting question:

If you were given the choice of selecting one of two similar newspaper stories and one of them had an interesting photo, which would you select?

I think most of us would select the story with the photo. In fact, the Poynter Institute has been conducting sophisticated reader research in this area since the early 90s. Their results have repeatedly found that ”short text, especially with visual elements, (my italics) is accessible and attractive to readers.” 

I’ve done small-scale reader experiments in my classroom, and invariably students say they look at the photos in a newspaper first. When I was a print reporter, there wasn’t a single story idea conversation with my editor that didn’t include the question “What about art?” Some of the stories I did weren’t even “stories” in the traditional sense. They were photo and graphic-centered pieces where the only text was a short intro and captions, some statistics or a list of some sort.

Why PR people hate journalists

When I left public relations to go to journalism school, I vowed that I would answer every PR person’s phone call, respond to every email, and generally treat publicists the way I wish I had been treated. But a few months into my job, I found myself becoming that which I had dreaded most – a reporter who skimmed releases and deleted them, who checked Caller ID and dodged phone calls from unknown numbers, and who complained about her inbox getting slammed with useless “PR crap.”

One of my dear, dear friends left the newspaper for a PR firm in town, and I’m ashamed to admit that when even he called me to pitch me an idea, I was annoyed.

To this day, I feel bad about it. But this — the complete and utter lack of any type of communication from the media – is why PR people hate journalists.

Why journalists hate PR people

According to the Web site eZine University, as many as 75 percent of news stories start as press releases.  From my experience as a reporter, especially in the features and business departments, I would say this is not far from the truth.

This begs the question: If journalists are so dependent on press releases for stories, then why do they show such disdain for PR people? When I worked in public relations, nothing was worse than pitching what I thought was a good story idea to reporters, only to hear “no” at best and be completely ignored at worst, over and over again.

At times I felt like a telemarketer — “Hello, would you be interested in….No?…..OK, thanks for your time.” “Hello, would you be interested in…No?…OK, thanks for your time.” 

The future of media is online

I stumbled upon a great post today regarding the future of media education. I fall squarely into the first category – get a degree in journalism or communications, specialize in either print, broadcast or digital media, get an entry-level reporting job, and dig in.

To my mass media students, however, I constantly preach the “you need to know more than AP style” mantra. For the journalism students, I find myself integrating more broadcast and basic multimedia into my writing courses (Audacity and Soundslides) and then tell them to take courses in Flash, HTML and public speaking, at a minimum. In the PR classes, I encourage them to learn Web site design, become intimately familiar with the blogosphere, and break out of the “my client’s name must be mentioned in a newspaper for it to count” way of thinking.

This isn’t just the stuff of ivory tower studies, either. Back in April, Media General announced a big layoffs at the Tampa Tribune. As the very first sentence of this Trib blog post reads, the company plans to “shift more resources to delivering news online.” Then, later: “The Tribune also will redirect many newsroom employees to focus more time on delivering news and other content to the paper’s online partner, TBO.com, as part of a continuing evolution, ‘to take those walls down.’”

To the dark side…

I made many, many friends when I was a reporter. We shared the same lofty goals, the same frustrations, the same nerdy obsession with city council meetings. But in the past few years, nearly all of us have left journalism, a few for teaching (as I did) but most for public relations gigs. 

Call it what you will - selling our souls, going over to the dark side, getting a sizable raise – it seems to be a growing trend.  Steve Rubel has an intersting post on his blog, Micro Persuasion, about the hiring needs in journalism vs. public relations: by the year 2014, the demand for journalists will rise about 5 percent. In the meantime, demand for PR people will go up by as much as 26 percent.

If thse figures are correct, my friends and I are on to something. This leads me to ponder a few things: Are we evolving (devolving?) into a nation of information, as opposed to news? With initiatives such as citizen journalism on the rise, will the terms reporter and publicist become one and the same? How much did I pay for journalism school again?

We need each other

Journalists and PR pros, I’m talking to you here – show a little love! No matter which side of this relationiship you are on, you comprise two of the most powerful industries in America. Think about this – how does the general public learn about what’s going on in their neighborhood and in the world? Journalists, that’s how. And, how do journalists find out about what’s going on in their neighborhoods? PR pros.

When it’s done correctly, the relationship can be good for everyone. I used to put together an entertianment calendar, and I lived and died by press releases. The good ones made my life easy – instead of having to go surfing to find concert listings, for example, they were delievered right to my inbox, all the legwork complete (and correct).

The bad ones, however, just created more work, which didn’t make me want to answer the phone when that person’s number came up on caller ID. Now, as PR pro, I know that my chances of getting my clients “ink” increase greatly if I can give a journalist relevant, accurate information that will actually help them instead of cluttering their email.

See? Win-win. All we need is insight into how the other half lives.