Guess I picked the wrong day to give up sniffing glue
SocialSplash
· 1 year ago
I submitted my startup couple days ago. I believe i followed all the rules. Hopefully you guys will write about it soon.
Samirb
· 1 year ago
Great post, I wish you had added a few of the bad pitches, and maybe just block out names and stuff like that. I can't imagine how frustrating it must be to read some of the stuff you guys get.
Stephen Arbib
· 1 year ago
I followed the 12 steps to getting featured and still didn't get featured :( Oh well, I'm sure you're very busy there so hopefully you'll get to our press release at some point. Otherwise, anyone from Mashable want to meet over lunch?
Adam Ostrow
· 1 year ago
Hey Stephen - One thing I didn't add to the list on purpose was we don't mind if you try repeated times. Keep letting us know about new things you're doing :-)
Guest
· 1 year ago
9. Trying to Setup a Lunch – While we would love to go sit down to a fine meal with you, unfortunately, I don’t think a Mashable staffer on the editorial side has been “out to lunch†since Pete started this whole thing a few years ago. The blogger lifestyle isn’t for everyone of course, but the fact of the matter is we generally don’t take more than a 10 minute break during our workday, let alone a couple hours to enjoy a three course meal.
Reader
· 1 year ago
Mashable editors,
We feel so bad for you, you get so many news tips you don’t know what to do with them. Stop complaining. You’re blog isn’t that great to begin with. I wouldn’t try to piss off your readers by adding a bitchy post to your blog roll. Find a way to sort through your tips, like everybody else, and leave us out of it. We don’t care.
Sean P. Aune
· 1 year ago
Just a guess, but we didn't give your site coverage, did we?
Sean P. Aune
· 1 year ago
Yes folks, I know it's hard to believe, but my name is really spelled "Sean", and not "Shawn". Sean is the original, and Irish, way of spelling it, and, call me silly if you must, I actually appreciate it when people spell my name the way it's meant to be spelled. I know, I'm kooky like that. (And if you must know, the P. is for "Patrick")
Stan_Schroeder
· 1 year ago
Hey, Shawn, whatsup?
Sean P. Aune
· 1 year ago
... I will kill you in your sleep. You won't know when... you won't know how... but it's coming, little man.
Super Zoe
· 1 year ago
Interesting. Thanks for making me glad I left PR and went to the other side. Reading this post brought on a wave of relief that I don't do pitches anymore.
heh
· 1 year ago
A friend of mine recently suggested that I add mashable to my list of daily reading...
I guess I picked the wrong day to start because this 12 step guideline is a truly disgusting read. Misspelling your names? Holy crap get over yourselves...
And then when I thought it couldn't get any worse, Sean, you actually post comments drawing more attention to your name/self.
I'm actually sitting here contemplating how much money I'd part with to give you a bonafide super bowl winning punt directly in your gonads.
heh
· 1 year ago
And let me stop you before I suffocate from puffing into this barf bag... no, I didn't submit anything and, no, you didn't refuse to feature anything I'm involved with in any way.
Now please feel free to judge my grammar and sentence structure and whatever else that apparently adds value to your grotesque, infantile perception of the world.
Unfeatured
· 1 year ago
This is the epitome of lame.
Whatever possible positive perception I might have had for Mashable has been crushed by this ignorant blather. You shouldn't be allowed to represent your company if you're going to represent them in such a profoundly asinine fashion.
Get over yourselves, you pathetic tools. You'll take suggestions however you're given them, and if you don't feature the next Facebook on your precious little web site, you'll be the ones losing out on the precious publicity, attracting the precious advertisers, that pay your precious salaries.
I'm cutting myself now. I blame you.
Tamar Weinberg
· 1 year ago
"Unsolicited Phone Calls – Most of our phone numbers are private, but nonetheless, some sleuths are able to find them and cold call us."
Woohoo! I'm on vacation AND I got my first cold call today for Mashable editorial coverage! That was golden. Not only that, but my phone number is also entirely private -- I have no idea how they even got it.
One more thing to note, guys: contact AT mashable DOT com is NOT for editorial inquiries. It's for site problems and concerns. Please use NEWS @ mashable DOT com only!
Dave Cashless
· 1 year ago
And No. 1 Thing To Do When Pitching a Story to Mashable: Make certain your pitch is in the form of a top "xx reasons why you need to know about my company" formatted message.
Adam Ostrow
· 1 year ago
now that is a good idea :-) the "12 tips" format was actually sort of an attempt at some self-deprecating humor.
Reader
· 1 year ago
I don’t have a site, but if I did, I wouldn’t want your coverage after a post and response like that. I fail to see what you’re trying to accomplish here. I suggest you get over yourself; life will be much sweeter when you do.
SearcHâ—† EngineS WEB
· 1 year ago
You should be grateful that people are sending you stories.
Stop patronizing them.
Be thankful.
You both need each other.
Who are you to criticize others - look in the mirror first.
Get the best stories REGARDLESS of how they send it to you.
Your only obligation is to your readers to give them the best possible information
Adam Ostrow
· 1 year ago
We do hunt down the best stories however they are sent to us. The point is that following some of these tips makes it both easier for the PR person/startup and for us, which increases the odds we never miss an interesting story.
Maggie Mayhem
· 3 months ago
I find it relatively humorous that everyone is so upset about this article. First of all, taking this article so personally that you scream at Mashable for taking things personally makes me so dizzy I need to huff into a paper bag and stick my head into a bucket of ice water. Second, these are useful tips. Anyone reading this post that wonders why they weren't accepted for Mashable coverage, probably had their question answered. And last...do any of you commenters know what it is like to comb through submissions? Anyone here work at a record company? A newspaper? Has anyone here ever hired staff before? I run a music company (website launch coming soon, Mashable. ha) and while my inbox in no way rivals that of the big dogs, I can tell you that providing guidelines for communication is not only considerate, it's mandatory. After the millionth email I received where the format was "yOu sHouLd LiSteN tO mY bAnD cAuSe wE roCk," I wanted to strangle puppies for the rest of the afternoon. I think that if you all did your research, you'd find that Mashable isn't the only site/resource/company/etc. that provides guidelines for submission or contact. PR/Media representatives are used to tailoring their pitches for their target contact at any given outlet. I don't believe that any negative feedback posted on this thread came from an actual PR powerplayer. Most of these comments seem to have been posted by readers of Mashable...which....this post didn't really apply to you, did it? So get off Mashable's back and put your self in their shoes for a day. Better yet, post your email address, and I'll forward you the hundreds of daily asinine and grammatically nauseating "pitches" that I get. Then we'll see where we stand.
Reader
· 1 year ago
Fail!
Mark "Rizzn" Hopkins
· 1 year ago
Such hostility here.
Listen, I'm not sure the source of all this hostility, but we do get a lot of pitches. A LOT of pitches. At least a few hundred a day.
We sort through them as best we can, but there are some things that are done that simply cross the line, and not only decrease the chances that we'll cover, but decrease the chances I'll ever cover anything from you again.
For instance, there's been a particular PR person that I won't name by name that is so insistent that I cover one of her clients that she literally calls my house 21 times a day. I've tried blocking the number and declining the chance to talk further (since I've already covered her client once before, and it wasn't that great of a story), but she still persists in literally harassing me until I cover the story.
I know this sounds arrogant, but when you're blogging for a site of a certain size, some folks will stop at quite literally nothing for coverage. Adam's post is a polite way for us to set some guidelines to get covered. If I had written the post and had my druthers, I would have posted a podcast containing 43 irritating voicemails from the same PR person I have in my GrandCentral account right now and called that the coverage for her client's company.
SearcHâ—† EngineS WEB
· 1 year ago
It doesn't matter how much they call you.
Your ony obligation it to get the best for your readers!!!!!
Yes you have to work your ass off - but that is the reason you are in the top 10 in Technorati in such a short time.
The harder you work the better your position will be against the giants who are ahead of you
Get the absolute best and get it as quickly as you can!
If you have to hire more good people -do so
Just thank God you are in the position that thousands of bloggers dream about - really dream about. You are now apart of Web 2.0 history
You will just have to work harder, get advanced technology or get more people - is that so hard to understand? But what ever you do. don't let any gems slip by
rizzn
· 1 year ago
@SearchH
Covering every single story isn't our responsibility. The goodness of the story is not related to the number of times they call me while I'm sleeping.
Don't get me wrong - I love my job here, and I love having all these readers, and i AM committed to getting the best story possible.
There's a difference between what we do and straight newspaper journalism, though. We do a lot of work with startups looking to get noticed. When we're hunting down a journalistic style story to get it right though, info is info, doesn't matter where it is.
When you're coming to me with your company, and you want us to cover you, and you can't, for instance, actually send us an email, and you do the #1 thing on the no no list and just send us an invite from your app? We're not going to cover that. It looks like spam. It blends in with the hundreds of other pieces of bacn-looking emails we get from a million different services in a given day.
We're not doing this to say we're so much better than everyone else, so kiss our butts. We're posting lists like this to say - hey, if you want to work with us and really get your great story covered, these will increase your chances.
Look at it this way - like it or not, appearance matters. If you're Einstein, Bill Gates or Kevin Rose, but you look like you walked out of a BumFights video, it doesn't matter how great you are, you're not going to impress people.
Think of these guidelines as a way to put on a tie and dress yourself up, so you stand out against all the other applicants applying for the job of being featured on the site.
heh
· 1 year ago
Nice to see you defending this crap... way to validate that you're a bunch of douchebags instead of just admitting you shouldn't be a bunch of snappy assholes.
SuezanneCBaskerville
· 1 year ago
If folks are expected to spell Adam correctly, shouldn't Adam reciprocate the proper spelling courtesy by spell checking the headlines of the articles he posts?
Yesterday's headline, "Are Chartiable Tie-Ins the Key to FB App Success? Dank Apps Thinks So", at http://mashable.com/2008/04/17/dankapps/, has what should be "Charitable" spelled as "Chartiable".
Mashable should work harder to have proper spelling, proper grammar, complete sentences, and correct word choice.
Valer
· 1 year ago
Thanks for yet another clarification on getting coverage. Frankly, it's all clear and understandable that you deal with huge amounts of information and requests.
We at BlogUpp! have met most of the points mentioned in all these directions. Nevertheless, it's SO FRUSTRATING that after sending several kind requests, asking for JUST A WORD on what was wrong with the submitted startup - there is no single reply (no doubt the messages were read).
The quality of the submissions you are receiving WILL get better if your team would consider showing just little respect and common sense, by replying with just a line describing a reason, so that to know what needs to be improved.
That habit of yours works pretty negative towards your overall image.
Zuzanna Pasierbinska-Wilson
· 1 year ago
Adam - loved your post. If only PR agency people (I used to be one of them) learned to say 'no' to their clients when the story is not good enough...But let's not blame junior PR people, they are only doing what they're told, they don't know any different. It's account managers and directors who have the responsibility to educate them.
Cameron
· 1 year ago
What a shitious post! Makes you all seem like a bunch of arrogant fuckheads. Mashable just went down in my estimation.
hardball
· 1 year ago
@ "Rizzn"
"There's a difference between what we do and straight newspaper journalism, though. "
LOL, straight up there is. You are bloggers, you are not journalists.
Now get over it and get a different job if you don't like it.
You set up your turd pile to attract the flies, and guess what, that's your job.
Nils Van Brabant
· 1 year ago
I think the N°1 rule is to answer at least, after applying more than 5 times by email for a startup coverage review and to have the honnesty to talk in a one to one email conversation.
That's what I call respect before anything else. Even if you receive ten thousand emails a day.
Nils Van Brabant
taylor g
· 1 year ago
thanks very much for the great tips! http://credit1.info hopefully i'll get to use them soon
Zm
· 1 year ago
This "heh" person has major problems. I give up trying to figure out how this entry was a blow to your ego. Got a grudge against Mashable?
I thought the post was interesting. It'll be very useful to some people. It's amazing how inept, unprofessional, or disrespectful some people can be, even when it comes to their own sites/companies. The top blogs like this obviously get an impressive amount of requests. Though, letting people do what they'll do (i.e. not follow simple guidelines) really helps to filter out the nonsense more easily.
sindhu
· 1 year ago
hahaha that was funny.
Jason
· 1 year ago
You pitch these facts life masabel matters. get over yourself will yer.
Mark
· 1 year ago
What a bunch of arrogant self important fucktards. If I had a idea to pitch id like crapable to give me 12 reasons why i should pitch it to your turd pile little blog.
Mike Baccarat
· 1 year ago
It makes sense to want info about a launch before it happens, not after its out on the net and tons of other blogs have already reported on the event.
Nice list.
andre
· 1 year ago
[viddler_video=1f2aa208]
SocialSplash
· 1 year ago
I have emailed mashable couple times and never got a reply. I want to send in my startup again but i dont know if you guys are just ignoring it or what.
dizi izle
· 1 year ago
I have emailed mashable couple times and never got a reply. I want to send in my startup again but i dont know if you guys are just ignoring it or what. ?
Emily
· 1 year ago
Who are these people getting all irate?! First of all, this post is funny. Clearly these 12 things are real pointers of things you should avoid, but the tone is humorous. At no point did I read it as arrogance. I also find it HUGELY unprofessional to write an e-mail without a name or with a misspelled name - maybe the Mashable writers aren't rockstars, but shouldn't we as start-ups trying to get publicity take five extra seconds to proofread?
I agree that a response of some kind, even a "thanks but no thanks" would be really nice and would boost Mashable's reputation even among companies who've been turned down. Guys, any chance of making that company policy? Maybe just for those who e-mail you more than once?
friarminor
· 1 year ago
Reminds me of filters... Too small sieve stops even the the diamonds from getting through.
But I guess it's really a mess dealing with PR and pitches. Each should just shine and cut the diamond in their hands and let the brilliance radiate for people to notice.
All Comments
We feel so bad for you, you get so many news tips you don’t know what to do with them. Stop complaining. You’re blog isn’t that great to begin with. I wouldn’t try to piss off your readers by adding a bitchy post to your blog roll. Find a way to sort through your tips, like everybody else, and leave us out of it. We don’t care.
I guess I picked the wrong day to start because this 12 step guideline is a truly disgusting read. Misspelling your names? Holy crap get over yourselves...
And then when I thought it couldn't get any worse, Sean, you actually post comments drawing more attention to your name/self.
I'm actually sitting here contemplating how much money I'd part with to give you a bonafide super bowl winning punt directly in your gonads.
Now please feel free to judge my grammar and sentence structure and whatever else that apparently adds value to your grotesque, infantile perception of the world.
Whatever possible positive perception I might have had for Mashable has been crushed by this ignorant blather. You shouldn't be allowed to represent your company if you're going to represent them in such a profoundly asinine fashion.
Get over yourselves, you pathetic tools. You'll take suggestions however you're given them, and if you don't feature the next Facebook on your precious little web site, you'll be the ones losing out on the precious publicity, attracting the precious advertisers, that pay your precious salaries.
I'm cutting myself now. I blame you.
Woohoo! I'm on vacation AND I got my first cold call today for Mashable editorial coverage! That was golden. Not only that, but my phone number is also entirely private -- I have no idea how they even got it.
One more thing to note, guys: contact AT mashable DOT com is NOT for editorial inquiries. It's for site problems and concerns. Please use NEWS @ mashable DOT com only!
Make certain your pitch is in the form of a top "xx reasons why you need to know about my company" formatted message.
Stop patronizing them.
Be thankful.
You both need each other.
Who are you to criticize others - look in the mirror first.
Get the best stories REGARDLESS of how they send it to you.
Your only obligation is to your readers to give them the best possible information
First of all, taking this article so personally that you scream at Mashable for taking things personally makes me so dizzy I need to huff into a paper bag and stick my head into a bucket of ice water.
Second, these are useful tips. Anyone reading this post that wonders why they weren't accepted for Mashable coverage, probably had their question answered.
And last...do any of you commenters know what it is like to comb through submissions? Anyone here work at a record company? A newspaper? Has anyone here ever hired staff before?
I run a music company (website launch coming soon, Mashable. ha) and while my inbox in no way rivals that of the big dogs, I can tell you that providing guidelines for communication is not only considerate, it's mandatory.
After the millionth email I received where the format was "yOu sHouLd LiSteN tO mY bAnD cAuSe wE roCk," I wanted to strangle puppies for the rest of the afternoon.
I think that if you all did your research, you'd find that Mashable isn't the only site/resource/company/etc. that provides guidelines for submission or contact. PR/Media representatives are used to tailoring their pitches for their target contact at any given outlet.
I don't believe that any negative feedback posted on this thread came from an actual PR powerplayer. Most of these comments seem to have been posted by readers of Mashable...which....this post didn't really apply to you, did it?
So get off Mashable's back and put your self in their shoes for a day.
Better yet, post your email address, and I'll forward you the hundreds of daily asinine and grammatically nauseating "pitches" that I get. Then we'll see where we stand.
Listen, I'm not sure the source of all this hostility, but we do get a lot of pitches. A LOT of pitches. At least a few hundred a day.
We sort through them as best we can, but there are some things that are done that simply cross the line, and not only decrease the chances that we'll cover, but decrease the chances I'll ever cover anything from you again.
For instance, there's been a particular PR person that I won't name by name that is so insistent that I cover one of her clients that she literally calls my house 21 times a day. I've tried blocking the number and declining the chance to talk further (since I've already covered her client once before, and it wasn't that great of a story), but she still persists in literally harassing me until I cover the story.
I know this sounds arrogant, but when you're blogging for a site of a certain size, some folks will stop at quite literally nothing for coverage. Adam's post is a polite way for us to set some guidelines to get covered. If I had written the post and had my druthers, I would have posted a podcast containing 43 irritating voicemails from the same PR person I have in my GrandCentral account right now and called that the coverage for her client's company.
Your ony obligation it to get the best for your readers!!!!!
Yes you have to work your ass off - but that is the reason you are in the top 10 in Technorati in such a short time.
The harder you work the better your position will be against the giants who are ahead of you
Get the absolute best and get it as quickly as you can!
If you have to hire more good people -do so
Just thank God you are in the position that thousands of bloggers dream about - really dream about. You are now apart of Web 2.0 history
You will just have to work harder, get advanced technology or get more people - is that so hard to understand? But what ever you do. don't let any gems slip by
Covering every single story isn't our responsibility. The goodness of the story is not related to the number of times they call me while I'm sleeping.
Don't get me wrong - I love my job here, and I love having all these readers, and i AM committed to getting the best story possible.
There's a difference between what we do and straight newspaper journalism, though. We do a lot of work with startups looking to get noticed. When we're hunting down a journalistic style story to get it right though, info is info, doesn't matter where it is.
When you're coming to me with your company, and you want us to cover you, and you can't, for instance, actually send us an email, and you do the #1 thing on the no no list and just send us an invite from your app? We're not going to cover that. It looks like spam. It blends in with the hundreds of other pieces of bacn-looking emails we get from a million different services in a given day.
We're not doing this to say we're so much better than everyone else, so kiss our butts. We're posting lists like this to say - hey, if you want to work with us and really get your great story covered, these will increase your chances.
Look at it this way - like it or not, appearance matters. If you're Einstein, Bill Gates or Kevin Rose, but you look like you walked out of a BumFights video, it doesn't matter how great you are, you're not going to impress people.
Think of these guidelines as a way to put on a tie and dress yourself up, so you stand out against all the other applicants applying for the job of being featured on the site.
Yesterday's headline, "Are Chartiable Tie-Ins the Key to FB App Success? Dank Apps Thinks So", at http://mashable.com/2008/04/17/dankapps/, has what should be "Charitable" spelled as "Chartiable".
Mashable should work harder to have proper spelling, proper grammar, complete sentences, and correct word choice.
Frankly, it's all clear and understandable that you deal with huge amounts of information and requests.
We at BlogUpp! have met most of the points mentioned in all these directions.
Nevertheless, it's SO FRUSTRATING that after sending several kind requests, asking for JUST A WORD on what was wrong with the submitted startup - there is no single reply (no doubt the messages were read).
The quality of the submissions you are receiving WILL get better if your team would consider showing just little respect and common sense, by replying with just a line describing a reason, so that to know what needs to be improved.
That habit of yours works pretty negative towards your overall image.
Makes you all seem like a bunch of arrogant fuckheads.
Mashable just went down in my estimation.
"There's a difference between what we do and straight newspaper journalism, though. "
LOL, straight up there is. You are bloggers, you are not journalists.
Now get over it and get a different job if you don't like it.
You set up your turd pile to attract the flies, and guess what, that's your job.
That's what I call respect before anything else. Even if you receive ten thousand emails a day.
Nils Van Brabant
http://credit1.info
hopefully i'll get to use them soon
I thought the post was interesting. It'll be very useful to some people. It's amazing how inept, unprofessional, or disrespectful some people can be, even when it comes to their own sites/companies. The top blogs like this obviously get an impressive amount of requests. Though, letting people do what they'll do (i.e. not follow simple guidelines) really helps to filter out the nonsense more easily.
Nice list.
I agree that a response of some kind, even a "thanks but no thanks" would be really nice and would boost Mashable's reputation even among companies who've been turned down. Guys, any chance of making that company policy? Maybe just for those who e-mail you more than once?
But I guess it's really a mess dealing with PR and pitches. Each should just shine and cut the diamond in their hands and let the brilliance radiate for people to notice.
Bet.
alain
www.mor.ph