The Get Featured 'Best of 2025'
These are the pitching tips readers found most useful this year
First off, some quick housekeeping: This is the last Get Featured newsletter of 2025. I’ll be taking one week off next week (December 29th) for Christmas and then we will be back with a bang on January 5th with a freshly updated Press Deadlines Guide (last year’s is here) - giving you ALL the behind-the-scenes info you need on the best times to pitch to every UK national newspaper.
In the meantime, I wanted to say a huge THANK YOU to every single one of you for your support. Last Christmas, I wasn’t sure whether to keep going with this newsletter as fewer than 50 people read it, so it is mind-blowing that this year’s Christmas post is going out to nearly 1,400 of you. Please do keep liking and sharing these posts to keep supporting the newsletter going forward - I hugely appreciate it.
As I put on my festive “out of office”, I wanted to share all the things that Get Featured readers have found most useful this year - and what I think you’ll find most helpful with your pitches in 2026.
Here is the Get Featured ‘Best of’ featuring the most-read and popular posts of 2025:
The Best… Editor Insights
One of my favourite parts of writing this newsletter is when I get to hear insights from other journalists and editors who are actively commissioning stories right now.
This year, some of the most popular advice came from the Telegraph’s health editor Laura Donnelly, who shared how to pitch a news story to her and why journalists need flexibility on timing with stories more now than ever before.
You also loved hearing from The Sun’s consumer editor Tara Evans - who gets more emails than any other editor I’ve ever met - about what cuts through in her inbox; from ITV Meridian’s Siri Hampapur about how to adjust your pitch for TV news; and from Ben Spencer, science editor of The Sunday Times, about what he looks for in a news or features idea pitch.
The Best… Practical Advice
I always aim for this newsletter to share helpful advice without being patronising - it’s not an easy balance to strike (and inevitably I get it wrong sometimes), so it’s so lovely to get feedback from you when you’ve found something particularly useful or it’s helped you get coverage.
These were some of the most popular practical tips posts this year:
The best times to pitch: You wanted to know the best time to press “send” on an email and thousands of people consulted the Get Featured 2025 Press Deadlines Guide, which lists the news schedules of the UK’s biggest publications. (Hit subscribe to make sure you don’t miss the 2026 guide, coming soon!)
Hacks to upgrade your pitch: You were keen to learn some simple editing tricks to improve your pitch and ways to elevate your “good” pitch into a “great” one.
Email etiquette: You read about what makes me open a pitch email, why it’s worth trying this technique for making sure your media lists target the right journalists and - the perennial issue for all of us who pitch by email - how to follow-up without being annoying.
The Best… Relationship-Building Tips
It is no easy task trying to build relationships with journalists in today’s media climate. So it’s no surprise that you wanted to know how best to pitch to journalists you’d never met or spoken to before and what you can do to make journalists want to work with you.
And in a world where it is difficult to get us journalists away from our desks, you were also keen to find out how to get journalists to cover your event.
The Best… Controversial Opinions
If I’ve learnt anything about spending the last year talking about journalist/PR relations, it’s that there are some topics on which everyone disagrees.
I’d also argue there are some issues on which everyone secretly agrees but we’re all too polite/afraid to admit. The latter certainly applies to the most-read post on Get Featured this year: No, it’s not just you…
In it, I admitted about how much harder pitching has got for everyone, including for me as an experienced freelance journalist. Thanks to all of you who shared this post and messaged me privately about it - none of us are alone in finding things a struggle sometimes.
It’s also impossible to talk about AI without causing a stir and this post on when it’s OK to use AI and when it’s not when you’re pitching ruffled some feathers on LinkedIn… As did this post on why I think more PRs should be using FOI data to generate story ideas.
The Best… Ways to Feel Inspired
We all love a good nose at what our rivals have been pitching and writing about - especially if we can copy be inspired by their techniques. So you were intrigued to read these examples of the best pitches I’ve received this year.
You loved hearing the wisdom behind the late Guardian science editor Tim Radford’s “one spaghetti strand” pitching theory - and you were curious to find out new ways of generating story ideas for the national media.
…And Finally
An unexpected bonus for me as a journalist this year has been to receive so many excellent pitches from Get Featured readers. I’m always happy to be pitched relevant stories (and yes, you can send a follow-up if I don’t get round to replying!).
You can find out exactly what kind of stories I’m looking for here.
That’s all folks. Happy pitching - see you in 2026.
Want your pitches to land in 2026?
The media pitching landscape has changed dramatically in the past 18 months. But that doesn’t mean you can’t still get great national coverage.
Find out what’s changed, why and how to adjust your pitching strategy to maximise your success in 2026 in my webinar: What’s New in Media Pitching in 2026?
1-2pm GMT, Wednesday 14 January 2026. (Recording available for all ticket holders who cannot make the live event).
Tickets available now - £22.99 (discounts available for paid subscribers and groups).
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