10 #PRFail tweets to help practitioners land coverage

For industry pros, it’s the Scarlet Letter of social media. The dreaded hashtag means you misfired your pitch or—egad!—called a journalist by the wrong name. Beware these blunders.

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If you’ve been in PR for a while, you’ve probably run into a smug journalist or two on Twitter.

Journalists are the most verified profession on Twitter, making up about one-quarter of all verified accounts, and most are daily users. It’s common for journalists to take to Twitter with screenshots from their inbox, scorning the worst PR pitches they’ve received, tarring them with the hashtag #PRFail.

Even though the relationship between journalists and PRs can be contentious, a survey of 1,300 publishers found that nearly four out of five writers and editors agree: PR pitches are a valuable part of their workflow.

So, how can you learn from others and avoid the PR Wall of Shame on Twitter? How can you increase your open, response and placement rates, while building mutually beneficial relationships with journalists?

Here’s what not to do, straight from the journalists’ tweets:

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