I get dozens of PR pitches a day. 

It stinks, but I simply don't have enough time to respond to all of them between all the writing, editing, and gadget testing I do all day.

One way to guarantee I won't respond to you is to get my name wrong. In the past, I've been called everything from Sam to Stephanie.

But what's even worse than screwing up my name is screwing up the publication I work for. 

Today a company called Xsync sent a pitch to the entire SAI team titled, "Walt Mossberg likes us. What about Techcrunch?" (It looks like the sender forgot to change the subject line. The body of the email says Business Insider.)

I'm not sure what Xsync is. But based on a brief skim of Mossberg's review, it has something to do with QR codes, a pointless and dead tech trend, so I probably don't care. However, Mossberg does, so you can read about whatever Xsync is here.

My lesson to PR people: Take a few extra seconds before sending a pitch and Google the writer you're pitching.

Then ask yourself a few simple questions:

  1. Is this something the writer normally covers? If not, which one of his or her colleagues would cover it? (If you can't answer either of these questions, don't send the pitch.)
  2. Am I spelling the writer's name correctly?
  3. Do I have the correct publication name?
Simple, right?

You'll save yourself a ton of time in the future. More importantly, you won't annoy a writer you might actually have a story he or she will be interested in down the road.

And yes, I realize I'm drawing attention Xsync simply by writing about its lazy pitch. But it's Friday. (I'm going to stick with that excuse.)

Here's the e-mail Xsync sent SAI, along with my super witty reply.

bad pitchScreenshot