The Art of Pitching Media and Bloggers

Posted by Ruth Atherley of AHA Creative Strategies on August 02nd, 2011

At AHA, we have spent a great deal of time focusing on what makes a great pitch – to media, to bloggers and, depending on the objective of what we’re working on, to other external and internal stakeholder groups. A good pitch tells a story. It should be a short story, but it is a story – one that piques curiosity and provides relevant information through stats, facts, details and writing that paints a picture. More and more often these days, you can also use video or audio in a pitch. We often create video news releases or pitches for…

The Key to Great Media Relations: Act Like a Journalist

Posted by Ruth Atherley of AHA Creative Strategies on July 13th, 2011

I grew up at Maclean’s, Canada’s national news magazine. It was my first real job out of university and I was a part of the Maclean’s “family” for decades. Until I started AHA in 2003 (with co-founder Paul Holman), I was listed on the masthead as a Contributing Editor. At Maclean’s I was surrounded by some of the best journalists in the country (and I would argue, in the world). They were smart, knowledgeable and dedicated. Quite a few of them took the time to help me, mentor me, show me the ways of journalism and taught me how to…

A good pitch can hit a homerun

Posted by Ruth Atherley of AHA Creative Strategies on July 29th, 2009

I have spent a lot of time in my professional life pitching story angles either as a journalist with an idea for an article, where I had to get my editor’s buy in, or as a PR person putting forward a pitch to media about a client’s organization. Since many of my colleagues and friends are either journalists or communicators, I also spend a fair bit of time discussing what makes a good story, even when it isn’t about a specific pitch.

One of the things that AHA clients rely on us for is to help them with media…