What a story pitch is, and the four questions every pitch must answer.
A pitch is a concise narrative proposal for a story you want to produce. It tells editors exactly what your story is about and why it matters. Think of it as your story's elevator pitch that answers key questions upfront. It's an argument for why this story needs to exist, why it matters to their audience, and why now.
What is the story? Not the topic, the story. Specific, grounded, story told through people. There's a critical difference between "mental health in conflict zones" and "how street football leagues are helping Yemenis cope with the psychological toll of war." Editors commission the latter.
Why does it matter to the audience? A reader in London, New York, or Berlin doesn't automatically share your local context. Your pitch has to cross that distance, connecting your story to something universal, or explaining the stakes in terms that land beyond your geography.
Why now? Is there an upcoming event, a global observance, or a major event this story speaks to? Timeliness isn't always essential, but when it's there, use it.
Why you? What access, proximity, or expertise do you have that another journalist doesn't? This is especially powerful for local journalists pitching to international outlets. You are often the only person who can get this story.
Two in 10 readers make it past a headline, and for a cold pitch, it's often the only line a busy editor reads before deciding yes or no. That means your pitch headline isn't decoration. A headline should carry a subject and verb, lead with your strongest specific fact, and signal the stakes to a non-local reader. Vague headlines, the kind that gesture at a topic rather than name a story, signal that the pitch itself may be underdeveloped.
If your pitch includes a sample lede or opening paragraph, treat it as seriously as the headline. For feature-style stories, a strong lede creates tension through contrast, a precise anecdotal detail, or a single image that contains the story's central contradiction.
Avoid generic scene-setting, sun-rising-over-camps openings, or ledes that resolve themselves before the reader has a reason to continue. The pitch lede is closer to a nutgraf than a full narrative opening: it should state what's new while signaling why it matters.
One firm rule: never open with a quote. Quotes delay the point and risk losing an editor's attention before you've made your case.
A pitch that works names a real story, makes the stakes legible to a foreign reader, arrives at the right moment, and demonstrates that you can deliver it. Everything else — the headline, the lede, the evidence — is in service of those four things. Get them right, and the yes becomes much easier to earn.
Pitch: "After the suicide of a sextortion victim, this online group is saving hundreds from the same destiny in Egypt"
After failing to convince a victim of sextortion that she should report the incident to police and learning about her suicide, Mohamed al-Yamani decided to create an online platform to help women against this growing phenomenon.
Since launching the Qawem (Resist in Arabic) group on Facebook and Telegram in August 2020, al-Yamani says they've been receiving hundreds of reports of sextortion incidents everyday. Qawem, which has over 200,000 followers on Facebook, says it resolves 200 cases every week.
Through a network of volunteers, the group relies on reversing the threat of defamation towards the culprit to force him to stop his actions, while empowering the victim by showing the culprit that she's not alone. The group ensures the victim's anonymity, making it a more appealing option to most victims compared to reporting the incident to the police, which usually takes a long time and requires women to come forward, revealing their identity.
Why it checks our boxes: This pitch hooks with the backstory for the solution. It includes strong evidence of the impact of the solution (200,000 followers and 200 weekly cases) and explains why and how their approach works. The journalist outlines how they will cover the story, citing specific sources: victims, founder of the initiative, legal expert, psychologist.
