Today, I am throwing myself under the bus. The bus of wow, did I really do that? All because, I once wrote a really, really, really bad pitch.
A little bit like a child who goes back into their journals from when they were little, and realizes where they started and how far they have come, I decided to use my inexperienced attempts to share some new learning.
After two years and four blogging conferences, I can admit, that up until a few months ago, I was a very unsavvy blogger when it came to writing a pitch. While I am nowhere near an expert, I believe that I am finally starting to “get it.”
This weekend, I attended the fantastic Blogalicious conference, where I learned and reflected on the art, the savvy, and the business of blogging and social media. The more that I talked with people that I highly admire as beacons of success in their field, I realized that I had in my possession, the BEST example of what not to do…written by me. And what better to show what I’ve learned than to share it as a non-example.
My Bad Pitch
“I would love to go to Type A this June! I am going to BlogHer as well, but hubby is on board with that. Adding in a new conference has him looking a little perplexed. So I would propose a $120 sponsorship (the cost of the ticket including the current 20% off discount). My plan would be to talk up _________s at each meal or “beverage” event and recruit at least five new members. It would be an easier pill to swallow for my dear husband if I only had to pay for the hotel.
I wonder—could we make little square ____________stickers, or add the logo to our bloggy business cards? That way we could plug, plug,plug every time we give out cards. I would be happy to “pilot” such an endeavor. (I am a teacher….we love stickers!) 
So….thank you for your consideration and support, as always, working with __________ is something that I feel lucky to be a part of!”
There are so MANY things wrong with this pitch.
- If I wanted to be treated as a professional, even amongst friends, I need to act like a professional. Using words like “hubby,” “bloggy” is decidedly not professional.
- A “beverage” event? Really? What is that?
- Type A? Type A what? I know that it is a conference, but the least I could do would be to call it by it’s formal name.
- Stickers? Really? As in, seriously?
One of the sessions that I attended was with Carol Schiller. Carol is a blogger and does social media for a brand…..she gets it. The examples that she gave during her session,”You’re a Rock Star, Now Act Like One! The Art of Writing a Pitch that Doesn’t Suck ,”were concrete and eye opening. She would probably tell me among other things, I omitted vital components like:
- Giving it context and explain how it will translate for the brand in the long term.
- Describing what will I deliver and how will it help the brand?
- Encapsulating what problem needs to be fixed and how will it look/feel when it is fixed.
- Providing testimonials of my work. (yes, you read correctly, testimonials. Anyone want to do one for me?)
Carol would go on to tell me that the brand DOES NOT care about how my “hubby” will react to my going to a conference. Also, she would likely tell me that what I really need to ask for is to be HIRED not sponsored.
Oddly enough, I do consider myself to be a highly professional person in my real life career as an educator and even in other areas of my life. I cannot even imagine how I let this pitch leave my email inbox last winter. To say that I did not know better does not seem like a good enough reason, even though it might be true. As embarrassed as I am by this pitch, I am proud that I now know better and look forward to trying my hand at more creative, more targeted, more professional pitches in the future.
What about you? What are your tips on making a great pitch? Or better yet, tell me I am not the only one that has blundered this badly!
xo
Elena
Thank you to Carol for her insights and presentation. You can learn more from Carol at her blog.
{ 11 comments… read them below or add one }
Wow, Elena – Way to go! It was terrific to meet you at Blogalicious and I’m delighted to see how much you took away from that session. You have done a fantastic job analyzing your own approach, and created a truly excellent example of how to improve a pitch. See you at the next conference!
@CarolSchiller
Great advice! Thanks for passing it along. I am behind on the blog learning curve as I have never been to any blogging conference. Keep tossing these tantalizing tidbits out for us to learn from!
Cheers.
I’m so glad that you shared this!
It shows new and seasoned bloggers that everyone started somewhere and had to learn.
This is an excellent learning tool.
I was there in that session as well. I probably would have done something like your original pitch as well before going to her session. Thanks for the recap. I’m planning on implementing her advice. Great post.
I have a confession I have never pitched to someone and I have to learn how! ASAP lol I love the fact you admitted it was bad and you grew from that.
Great advice! Thanks so much for sharing your actual pitch, and then breaking it down for us. What I love is that you were able to make that pitch work by using it to give a concrete example of what you learned at the conference. I wasn’t able to make it to Blogalicious, but thanks to this post, I feel as if I’ve experienced a bit of the conference for myself.
Oops! Another thing one should probably do is make sure the link from her name to her blog is correct. Mine wasn’t. Here’s the correct link: http://www.jumptandem.net
I have never written a pitch in my life…if I do I know exactly who I’m going to ask for help! Thank you for sharing this info with us.
I have never pitched anything in my life. I am far too intimidated to try that. Thank you for sharing this and showing that everyone starts out somewhere and we all learn as we go.
This is excellent. The fact is, I don’t send out many pitches. I am too busy with what’s coming in to send anything OUT. I honestly wonder how much more I could accomplish if I did work on pitches and really tried to build my site beyond daily posting.
This is an excellent post and I needed to read it. I think sometimes we think of blogging as a hobby instead of a business and our emails convey that. Off to read Carol’s post. Thanks so much.