Spring PR Pitches: Media Pitch Angles We’re Working On Right Now for Spring 2022

April 29, 2022 | lora reuther

It’s a busy time of year for our clients and their publicists as we enter one of the biggest gift guide seasons (aside from the holiday gift guide season of course). We’re receiving emails from editors and bloggers almost daily looking for exciting new gifts to feature in their upcoming gift guides for Mother’s Day, Father’s Day, and graduation season. Those are excellent examples of what we call short-lead media opportunities – editors and writers who come to us with projects they need to turn around quickly for publication. These are some of the PR pitches we are working on during this time of the year.

Mother’s Day: 

Mother's day gift guide PR pitches from Orca Communications

Mother’s Day gift guides can include traditional mom gifts – like jewelry and flowers. A lot of editors also seem interested in covering food and treats for mom. The trend of self-care is still very popular, so products to pamper mom with are also hot items this year. Creative Mother’s Day gift guides that offer products moms love, but people might not automatically associate with the holiday are also trending this year.

We are still sending media pitch angles for Mother’s Day gift guides this week, but at this point the only new media requests we’re receiving are from bloggers and freelance writers putting finishing touches on last-minute guides.

Father’s Day:  

Father's Day gift guide PR pitches from Orca Communications

Father’s Day is another big gift guide holiday. Editors want to see variety in these gift guides. Barbecue and food products are always hot items. But they also like to feature more niche gift ideas for different kinds of dads; ie: gifts for the musician, gifts for the golfer, gifts for the gamer, etc. Self-care can also be masculine, so grooming gifts are popular this year.

With Father’s Day being in June, we still have time to pitch for many of these gift guides. At this point, editors have finished planning and should have a solid idea of what kinds of products they are looking to feature.

Graduation Gifts: 

Graduation gift idea PR pitches from Orca Communications

Graduation gift guides aren’t quite as common as those for Mother’s Day and Father’s Day. Parenting blogs and publications will almost always publish them, as do many of the major lifestyle media outlets. These will often include products that help prepare a teenager for their first adventure away from home. This is a rather broad category that allows us to get more creative with our product pitching and media pitch angles. For example, every college student needs basic tech accessories, but they may also really appreciate a monthly subscription box full of their favorite snacks, or a pillow shaped like their dog. This is a fun category to pitch!

Much like Mother’s Day, these gift guides usually come out in May, so we are focused on last minute opportunities for this category. The good news is that graduation gift guides can easily blend into the back-to-school season, so it is still a great time of year for companies with these types of products to launch a PR campaign.

This also may seem unusual, but it isn’t too early to start pitching the winter holiday season either. Read more about “Giving You a Lead on Lead Times.” 

Seasonal Press: 

In addition to gift guides, this is the peak time to pitch anything related to spring and summer. We are crafting multiple group media pitch angles related to gardening, outdoor products, fitness, home improvement, home organizational, and spring cleaning. Editors like our group pitches because it gives them several possibilities at once and takes away a lot of the grunt work involved with finding new products to review and feature.

We also create unique media pitch angles for our clients in the spring and summer categories. We look at how each brand we work with relates to the season and use that to catch the attention of editors and writers who need fresh content.

An example would be how SkyPots creates a vertical gardening oasis for apartment dwellers who don’t have green space of their own to garden in.

 

Or how the Plankpad Interactive Full Body Trainer works your core so that you not only look your best for the spring & summer, but also strengthens key stabilizer muscles to get you better prepared for outdoor adventures.

Trending Topics: 

We also want our clients to be part of trending conversations happening in their industries. There are some obvious ones happening right now surrounding food. For example, food writers like to hear about sustainability practices, creative problem-solving, and ways brands are using technology to pioneer food trends for the next generation. There are thought leadership and product placement opportunities like this for just about every genre of product and our publicists creatively come up with ways to make sure our clients’ voices are heard.

While I’ve outlined some of the more obvious things we’re working on at the moment, this is only a tiny glimpse into our publicity team’s daily activities. Public relations is all about storytelling. It is our job to listen to the stories our clients bring to us and share those with the press in a way that generates awareness and creates the sort of brand awareness, authority, and authenticity our clients want.