The mythical art of pitching bloggers

If you work in PR, you probably hear this over and over: You can't pitch a blogger the same way you would a traditional journalist.

What exactly does that mean? Most PR people don't know how to pitch to the traditional media, either. So, it's funny to hear these same self-anointed social media experts pontificating about the new rules of engaging the new media, when they never really mastered the ropes of pitching traditional media.

Look, the rules haven't changed. Very little blog content is original. The vast majority of bloggers -- even the well-known ones -- just regurgitate what's on the websites of traditional media outlets (e.g. the New York Times, trade magazines, broadcast stations). So, if you get noticed by the traditional media that's going to trickle down to the social media.

-Professor Mark Grabowski