Obama inauguration donors: Pitch to your local media

President-elect Barack Obama’s transition team is appealing to campaign donors and others to contribute to the Inauguation festivities, which will cost at least $40 million.

If you’ll be ponying up money to help, you could pitch the story to your local media. If you know the names of other individual donors or businesses in your area that are also contributing, let the media know that, too. Any time you can help the media by providing additional sources for stories, complete with contact information, you’re helping to build strong relationships that can pay off later.

A hat tip to Alan Abbey of Poynter.org’s blog. He suggested that the media access the entire list of inaugural donors and then do local stories about them. But why wait for the media to call? The slow end-of-year news cycle is the perfect time for you to pitch this story.