As winter approaches, people are starting to think about the upcoming holidays.  Here at Bailey Gardiner, though, our creative public relations team has had the holidays on our mind since May, when we first started strategizing our holiday gift guide pitching efforts for our client, Electra Bicycles.  For most consumer products, one of the holy grails of media coverage is the holiday gift guide. It is important that companies be top-of-mind when consumers stampede the malls and begin the holiday shopping frenzy. Because the holiday gift guide placements are so coveted, they are also very competitive.  Here are a few simple tips for pitching gift guides:

Start pitching gift guides earlier than you think.

Long-lead publications often start planning their gift guides as early as June.  Even dailies will often start planning in August. Think ahead and start your pitching early. Like I mentioned, we started pitching for Electra in May.

Offer editors something new.

Most editors are looking for new items for the gift guide.  Whether it’s a new product entirely, a new model, or a new color, your best bet to scoring gift guide ink is by offering something they have not seen before.

Find out how the gift guide will be divided and structured.

Often times the gift guide is divided into different sections, whether they are by recipient, trend, price or category.  Ask the editor what types of products they are looking for and see where your client fits.  For Electra, we pitched the bicycles for a wide range of gift guide categories like men’s, women’s, luxury, children’s, eco-friendly, celebrity favorites and more.

Be prepared to send samples and images.

Editors will often need samples and images months in advance. Make sure you are prepared and, more importantly, make sure your client is aware of the gift-guide pitching schedule so they have ample time to provide you with whatever you need.

Do you have any other tips to score holiday gift guide coverage?