We finally made it to summer. It’s now that time of year to look forward to warm weather, doing a little cleaning up around our office, planning fall/winter PR campaigns, and pitching fun, light and colorful summer stories. Summer means stories that talk about the beach, outdoor activities, family vacation, baseball season, and of course the weather.
I have found that summer months are some of the best ones to pitch stories. It is often a time when reporters are more inclined to listen to your ideas. They also are more interested in-depth pitches and consider various angles and hooks they sometime would not consider.
In the summer, journalists seem also to be looking for stories that are lighter, the type of feel-good stories people like to read about when lying around the pool or at the beach, especially if there is a family activity aspect to them. Family staycations, backyard activities, best ice cream, summer venues and outdoor concerts, al fresco dining, best beaches are always popular. The summer season is especially effective for my hotel and restaurant clients. The Madison Beach Hotel located in Madison, Connecticut, is launching on July 1 its 2015 line-up of outdoor concerts, a series of weekly happenings that will take place on the beachfront throughout the summer. They are also hosting a complimentary summer-long weekly film festival for the whole family to enjoy underneath the starlit sky on Madison Beach’s lawn and S’mores on the Beach every Sunday. All these activities continue to receive substantial coverage. As far as our weekly outdoor concerts, usually one or two of our artists who perform during the concert season have a story that are feature worthy, so I look for those early on and start alerting the reporters about our summer line-up to give them enough time to plan for a spotlight, which recently led into a more in depth interview and turned into a feature.
The summer is also is a great time to pitch morning and weekend TV. So many people are on vacation they have trouble filling segments with on-camera interviews. So if you plan ahead, it can be a great time to book morning TV when they’ll appreciate good visuals and ideas more than usual. Fireworks stories leading into 4th of July coverage are always welcome as well as in-studio or outdoor cooking demonstrations featuring easy- to-prepare summer items, grilling tips and beach-related items.
Summer pitching at its essence is just like pitching at any other time of the year, the old rule still apply: whatever the angle target your pitch and provide value to the journalist, good content and easy access to sources for quotes. My number one rule with pitching for the summer or any other season is not to do it unless I have a solid story with a hook.
The Grassy Strip Music & Arts Series at the Madison Beach Hotel is a weekly line-up of free outdoor concerts and movies for the whole family to enjoy during the summer.
–Team Connecticut
