Noticing What Journalists Might Not Have Covered

Reminders. Nudges. Prompts. Whatever you want to call them, feelings around these communications vary widely. I think I might have grumbled before about follow-ups that appear barely before the virtual ink on a first message has dried. 

But today I’m thinking about PRs noticing what journalists might not have covered that perhaps they should. It’s a dangerous game – nobody wants to be the person who emails an editor to demand ‘why haven’t you written about x?’ when it’s clearly a brand-specific request.

We all have our reasons for deciding not to write about the world’s most expensive chocolate/nutritional mushroom mulch coffee/offal restaurant but sometimes there are themes or subjects that we’ve missed which we’d love to get a nudge on.

Your client will, of course, come into play here but as part of something bigger. I’m referencing, in particular, Sober October today because we’re halfway through the month and I should have commissioned something but I didn’t…

So how best to do this? It requires you to be absolutely certain that said subject hasn’t been covered and you missed it (nothing more teeth-grating than *that* scenario), but if you are sure, I reckon a friendly “Q is so funny on the subject of X, I wonder if he’d enjoy experiencing Y… now seems like a good time because of Z” could be a winner.

We’re all human and I know as an editor I miss a lot through distraction and massive amounts of irrelevant information. It’s almost always not too late in our digital-first world to help us (and yourself) out.