Who to email, and when
How to pick the right contact at a brand and time the pitch to something actually happening.
Who
Generic inboxes are where pitches go to be ignored. info@, hello@ and press@ are handled by whoever has time, and creator partnerships are nobody's job there. Aim for the person whose targets your content affects.
- Best: influencer, creator or partnerships manager.
- Good: social media manager, brand marketing manager, growth marketer.
- Only if nothing else exists: a general marketing address, and expect a lower hit rate.
- Avoid: founders at large companies, PR agencies you have no relationship with, and role inboxes.
Scout24's Brand Directory surfaces named contacts with titles, newest first, and flags how recently each one was added. A contact added last week is worth more than a perfect-looking one from two years ago.
When
Timing is the single biggest multiplier on a cold pitch, because it changes the answer to “why now” from nothing to something. Pitch against a live reason:
- A product launch or restock in the next few weeks.
- A campaign brief that is actually open, not one that closed months ago.
- A funding round, market entry or new retail listing.
- Seasonal windows: brands brief holiday content months earlier than creators expect.
Pitching into a closed campaign tells the recipient you didn't check. Scout24 filters closed and expired opportunities out of the default feed for exactly this reason.
How many
Pick a weekly number you can sustain and hold it. Consistency beats a burst: twenty well-targeted pitches a week for a month will outperform two hundred in one afternoon, because the follow-ups on the burst never happen.