Pitching Workflow

Read time 10 min Level Intermediate Prerequisites A Story with an approved release; familiarity with Campaign Builder

In a nutshell: The pitch is a tight loop. Get the release approved in Campaign Builder, build the recipient list, email through Email Pitching, follow up by phone in Telephone Pitching, log declines in the Exclusion Register, book and log coverage in Bookings & Coverage, and review in Story Performance and NewsWire Analytics. Email pitching captures opens and downloads -- the two signals that feed ProofScore -- while logged declines keep the next wave clean.

What you will learn

The shape of a pitch: approve, list, email, phone, log, book, review.
Which page handles which job, with the menu names exactly as they appear.
What Email Pitching captures.
How phone follow-ups, callbacks and the Exclusion Register fit together.

The mental model: one release, two channels, one record

A pitch is a tight loop -- release approved, list built, emails out, phone follow-up, declines logged, interviews booked, coverage logged, then review. Email pitching and telephone pitching are two channels onto the same Story, and every action lands back on the Story's record so the activity trail stays unified. Acme PR Corp runs the Globex Wellbeing Index 2026 through this exact loop in Q2.

"Story" and "campaign" are the same object across the product. The pages you will touch: Campaign Builder, Email Pitching, Telephone Pitching, Bookings & Coverage, Exclusion Register, Story Performance, NewsWire Analytics. The per-Story activity log lives on the ACTIVITY tab inside Campaign Builder.

Step 1 -- Approve the release (Campaign Builder)

In Campaign Builder, on the MEDIA RELEASES tab, draft the release in the inline editor -- the AI Assistant and the release-angle tabs are there when you want them -- then Approve. Approve directly from the inline editor's button, or Assign to a reviewer who approves in the Editing Suite. Approval publishes: the approved release is what every downstream surface pulls.

Step 2 -- Build the pitch list

Decide who gets the release. Two practical routes:

A saved Contact Group built in the CRM ahead of time -- your media list for this kind of Story.
Inside Email Pitching on the SEARCH & SEND step, pick a contact source: Contact Group, Search (filter by media type, tier and region), or Smart Match (AI ranks journalists from your pool by topic fit and engagement). An Additional Exclusions panel lets you subtract a whole Contact Group from the selection in one move.

Step 3 -- Email the release (Email Pitching)

Open Email Pitching for the Story. The page walks left to right through six steps: ACTIVITY, RELEASE, NEWSWIRE, PITCH LIST, CONTENT, SEARCH & SEND. Pick the release, compose the covering email with merge-field pills (first name, intro, body, bullets, NewsWire link, file list, spokesperson, PR signature), choose recipients, and queue the send. The mail queue gives you a beat to catch mistakes -- reschedule or cancel from the Mail Dashboard before delivery.

What it captures: opens (via the tracking pixel) and downloads from the NewsWire link (placements). Both feed ProofScore-style attribution -- the data points that map outreach back to outcomes.

[Screenshot placeholder -- Email Pitching: the step strip (ACTIVITY / RELEASE / NEWSWIRE / PITCH LIST / CONTENT / SEARCH & SEND) and the Review & Send action]

Email Pitching: pick the release, compose, choose contacts (Contact Group / Search / Smart Match), then Review & Send.

Step 4 -- Follow up by phone (Telephone Pitching)

Open Telephone Pitching for the Story. The call list carries the journalists you emailed (and anyone else you added). Work through the list, logging the outcome of each call: Interested, Left Message, Not Interested, Unavailable. Left Message and Unavailable open a callback prompt -- scheduled callbacks surface on the Callbacks Due dashboard so nothing slips. A Board view groups contacts as To Call / Left Message / Interested / Not Interested if you prefer to drag cards along.

Step 5 -- Record the declines (Exclusion Register)

When a journalist says "not for me", record it. Logging Not Interested in Telephone Pitching feeds the Exclusion Register -- your running record of who has declined, with reason categories that surface patterns over time. Two outcomes from this discipline: the team avoids re-pitching someone who has already said no, and your Story stats show an honest picture of how the release is landing.

Step 6 -- Book and log coverage (Bookings & Coverage)

When someone bites, open Bookings & Coverage. ACTIVITY for context, BOOKINGS for the interview schedule (with the TALENT & ACCESS sub-tab for the spokesperson portal), MANAGE COVERAGE for logging results (Add Coverage for manual entries, NewsWire Leads for pickups Buzzscribed detected on the NewsWire page), and MELTWATER COVERAGE for triaged monitored mentions on tenants with Meltwater connected.

Where the craft sits inside the loop

The mechanics covered above (Email Pitching wizard, Telephone Pitching outcomes, Exclusion Register, Bookings & Coverage) handle the platform side. The craft layer that wraps around those steps -- subject lines, hook-value-ask body, follow-up cadence, embargo etiquette, launch-day timing -- lives in its own article: Pitch Craft: Writing Emails That Get Opened (Course 2). Read it once and your house style is set; the platform pages above then put that craft to work without the article repeating it.

Two craft points that matter for the loop above: log every Not Interested in Telephone Pitching so the Exclusion Register protects the relationship on the next wave, and never let an embargoed launch slip on a channel that is not the release (the NewsWire page, social posts and spokesperson LinkedIn all need to honour the same embargo or the agency's standing across the list takes the hit).

Step 7 -- Review and report

Story Performance -- the per-Story analytics: total coverage, coverage by type, downloads, plus a coverage breakdown. This is where you check the Story against the OUTCOMES KPIs you set in Campaign Builder, and read the Success Score as it builds.
NewsWire Analytics -- the cross-campaign view. Use it when the question spans your portfolio rather than one Story.

The pages, at a glance

Email Pitching: Compose and send the release by email; captures opens and downloads.
Telephone Pitching: Phone follow-ups; call outcomes Interested / Left Message / Not Interested / Unavailable, with scheduled callbacks.
Bookings & Coverage: Book interviews and log coverage.
Exclusion Register: Running record of who declined, with reason categories.
Story Performance: Per-Story coverage and KPI view.
NewsWire Analytics: Cross-campaign analytics.

Try this: Take a Story with an approved release. Open Email Pitching, go to SEARCH & SEND, and try all three contact sources in turn -- a saved Contact Group, a tier-and-region Search, then Smart Match. Notice how each route gives you a different shape of list. Pick the one that fits the angle, send a self-test, then queue the batch and watch it land on the Mail Dashboard.

Quick reference

The loop: approve release (Campaign Builder) → build list (Contact Group / Search / Smart Match) → Email Pitching → Telephone Pitching → Exclusion Register → Bookings & Coverage → Story Performance / NewsWire Analytics.
Email Pitching captures opens and downloads -- the ProofScore signals.
Phone outcomes: Interested, Left Message, Not Interested, Unavailable. Left Message and Unavailable can schedule callbacks (Callbacks Due).
Not Interested feeds the Exclusion Register so the next wave stays clean.
Per-Story analytics = Story Performance; cross-campaign = NewsWire Analytics; the in-flight activity log lives on Campaign Builder > ACTIVITY.

Key takeaways

A pitch is a tight loop: approve, list, email, phone, log, book, review.
Email Pitching tells you who opened and who downloaded; the phone is where you read interest and book the work.
Logged declines in the Exclusion Register keep the team and the numbers honest.