A Brief Note on A/B Testing…
July 19, 2025
3:43 pm
Do you practice A/B testing in any aspect of your business? A/B testing has been around for roughly a quarter of a century.
>> PR
SWMS ‘Sound Thinking’: Rafe Needleman’s AI Advice For AEs and SAEs
July 9, 2025
3:44 pm
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Marker Collective Bets on Software
November 11, 2024
5:05 am
SWMS tends not to cover the business initiatives of its subscribers, but the Marker Collective has embarked on something revealing. The parent org of Archetype,
SWMS Analysis: John Edwards, Informationweek
November 5, 2024
9:39 am
A veteran tech edit freelancer one told SWMS that freelancers are entrepreneurs like any other. Time is money. Profit beats all. Few PR pros pitch with this in mind — but they won’t be able to break through with John Edwards unless they do.
Test Your Pitch With AI
April 26, 2024
12:38 pm
Ever use AI to test pitches before sending them to reporters? Try it sometime. It’s a fun way to improve them. For the proper horsepower, you’ll need a paid subscription to a Gen AI service such as GPT-4 or Claude 3.
Deep Dive Part 1: When Gen AI Writes The Pitch
March 23, 2024
1:02 pm
Just for fun, try creating the story pitch after the story is written. We did that this week, using generative AI. We pasted an already-published story into each of three GenAI tools and asked it to write a compelling PR pitch based on that article.
Deep Dive Part 2: Your New Job? VP of Pitch Analytics
March 23, 2024
1:01 pm
It’s 2026. You’ve got a new job, earning $250K a year as “VP, Pitch Analytics.” You’ve got a modest budget to retain freelance tech reporters. You manage an intern.
SWMS Diagram: The Tier 1 Edit Process
January 12, 2024
4:35 am
Sometimes it’s easy to forget that when you’re pitching Tier 1 reporters, you are pitching their bosses at the same time. That’s why it’s helpful to understand the entire editorial process in the publications you’re pitching — not just the persuasion part.
The New TechNews, and a PR Pitch Model for 2023
April 18, 2023
9:51 am
Search platform TechNews last month introduced features that let users spot trends deep within tech editorial. Launched as IT Database in 2007, TechNews is widely used within tech PR to learn who is writing what.
SWMS Notes on Broadcast Pitching
October 5, 2022
4:58 pm
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YOUR ACCOUNT
FRIDGE NOTES
Xania Rockets Up the Charts
September 22, 2025
Can you imagine not needing to be a human being to be a superstar? You may remember Max Headroom. There’s plenty of examples of technology personas, but AI is a different world altogether. Is there a tech media angle to this item? Not really, but here she is — Xania.
BI, Wired Tricked By AI Freelance ‘Author’
August 21, 2025
This is a must-read article about both Business Insider and Wired being tricked by a phony freelance reporter writing phony stories. If BI and Wired can be fooled, everybody can be fooled.
SWMS ‘Sound Thinking’: David Strom on AI
July 21, 2025
Veteran tech journalist David Strom is working with a couple of AI developers to understand exactly the nature of his writing as it has unfolded over the years. In this edition of Sound Thinking, David shares his learnings and where everything might go.
Catch Up on SDxCentral
July 20, 2025
It’s been tough to keep track of SDxCentral this year, with the sale… management moves… Here’s a podcast and an article that will help you catch up.. thank you, Ben, for the assistance.
Layoffs at Informa Techtarget
July 18, 2025
Newly merged TechTarget and Informa this month laid off 10 percent of their employees. Check out the euphemism in the 8-K: “[the] net reduction [will be] up to approximately 10% of the Company’s current global colleague base.” That just beats all, doesn’t it?