Joining us on the podcast today is Christie Moffat, a reporter for S&P Global Market Intelligence. She covers the U.S. commercial real estate sector, focusing on real estate investment trusts as well as regional and national trends.

During the episode, Christie tells us about being a reporter during earnings season, her interpretation of an exclusive, the types of information that catch her attention, and more.

Click below to listen to the full conversation and read below for highlights from the interview:

Her Work Inbox

[00:02:43] BB: Okay, we like it. Now, of course, we talk about inboxes here. How crazy is yours? 

[00:02:50] CM: Well, it's corporate earnings season, so my inbox –

“The great thing about real estate is people want to talk to you. They want to talk about what they're working on. They want to talk about the industry.”

[00:02:53] BB: So it’s very crazy.

[00:02:54] CM: My inbox is basically a sea of analysts’ notes right now. During earnings season, I typically end up listening to anywhere between 30 and 40 calls and reading trend [inaudible 00:03:07]. My main area of focus is following the real estate investment trusts, and those are the big companies that have great big property portfolios across the country. Some of them are specializing in office or in industrial or retail. Some of them have parts of all of it. So a big part of my job is listening to those calls and tracking those companies and keeping an eye on what they're doing.

Her Thoughts on Subject Lines

[00:08:01] BB: I get it. There’s elements. I like to be inbox zero too myself. But I will do the like, “Oh, there's 27 emails I don't need. Delete, delete, delete.” I'm ruthless. So then I would imagine subject line isn't that important to you, or is it?

[00:08:21] CM: Correct.

[00:08:22] BB: Okay.

[00:08:22] CM: Subject line obviously helps to grab my attention. But generally speaking, I wouldn't say I really see any good ones anyway or like – 

[00:08:33] BB: Oh, really?

[00:08:34] CM: Most of the time, subject lines are really not that interesting or well-written or enough to grab my interest most of the time. That being said, I have seen one or two in the years that I've been doing this that have been interesting. But usually, they're not really that great. 

[00:08:57] BB: Do you by chance have a subject line that you're like, “Dang, that was great,” off the top of your head or just the elements of one because this is a very big deal for everyone listening?

“I do think email intros are probably the best way to get me. If you're pitching me or any other S&P Global Market Intelligence journalist, you really have to be thinking about what kind of audience we serve.”

[00:09:08] CM: I recently received a pitch that had nothing to do with my beat, but I still got a kick out of it. The email was titled your state has some of the plumpest male dogs. Naturally, as someone who earns a plump male dog, I was intrigued. Yeah. So in short, the findings were based on an online poll created by a brand of like pet care centers. I'm an animal person. So as soon as I saw that headline, my first thought was, “Well, I can't write about that.” My second thought was, “What are the states with the fattest male dogs?”

[00:09:50] BB: It moved you in.

[00:09:52] CM: That's an example of a pitch that had zero relevance but maximum grab for me.

Her Thoughts on Exclusives & Embargoes

[00:10:21] BB: Yeah, yeah. Okay. Just because, no, I’ve never heard the plump dog email subject line before. Okay, do you get any exclusive or embargo offers, Christine?

[00:10:36] CM: I'm still fairly new at S&P. I've been there a couple of months.

[00:10:38] BB: Okay, yes, a couple months. 

[00:10:40] CM: So I haven't really been offered proper exclusive since I started. I imagine being behind a paywall and being a specialty product might be part of that. Our average subscriber is more likely to be somebody on Wall Street or working in the finance sector who has a subscription. But that being said, we definitely do run exclusives on our platform. I have a little bit of experience with them in the past, and they can be tricky, depending on the caveats and what the terms are of that exclusive. So my policy is to approach with caution. But usually, it's a conversation where I would rope an editor in anyway. 

[00:11:22] BB: Got it. Okay. The past ones that you have done or even considered, do you have a hard and fast rule on what you consider an exclusive, Christie.

“My personal approach is, first of all, talk to everyone you work with. Find out who they've spoken to in the past.”

[00:11:41] CM: Well, I know the word exclusive has sort of loose meanings these days, where someone might be exclusive and offer it to 100 other outlets. For me, if I'm going to run something as an exclusive, it has to be an actual exclusive, where there are no other outlets running this particular interview or breaking a particular story. I think that is what word exclusive should mean.

[00:12:06] BB: Agreed. People seem to be confused though, so the debate continues. I'm glad we're demystifying that though here. Okay. Christie, especially since you're new at your beat, I would imagine, oh, meeting new people or like getting new sources, having those be fresh is maybe somewhat important. Do you have any advice on how you build relationships or will be building relationships? 

[00:12:31] CM: Right. So I do have experience building source lists from nothing in the middle of a pandemic. My last role, I also started at a time where I was new to real estate. My personal approach is, first of all, talk to everyone you work with. Find out who they've spoken to in the past. For example, in past roles, the editors have been knowledgeable of the sort of folks that we would typically talk to. Make sure that you have an understanding of who your publication has spoken to in the past and where any existing relationships are. Then look at where the gaps are. Look at, okay, well, we've never spoken to anyone about this before. Or we really don't have many sources in this particular area and then go out looking for them.

I know on this beat in particular, I've been making a real effort to connect with analysts, financial analysts [inaudible 00:13:30] these companies because they have some wonderful insight into the office sector, the multifamily sector. They can talk a lot about what these companies are doing, and they have historical context. So analysts have been a big part of my personal strategy. Also, trying to talk to executives, which can be trickier, but they are often less accessible. So it helps to have a good relationship with PR people.

How She Writes Stories

00:15:57] BB: One story you did just from last year, I know you just had got there, but you were looking at this green CEO was saying. You're talking about Q3 leasing activity, demand for the office. Then you just mentioned getting a hold of an executive is difficult. For this particular story, this goes back to kind of pitching, but it made me think about it when you're talking about PR people. How did this story come to be? Do you know which one I'm talking about, the one in October?

[00:16:24] CM: That would have been probably when I started at the very earliest time.

[00:16:36] CM: So I do remember writing that story. That was the one about green building standards, if I’m not mistaken. 

[00:16:42] BB: Yes.

[00:16:44] CM: ESG is such a hot topic right now, and green building standards are one way of showing that your company is serious about embracing ESG. When I did this story, this was I think, yeah, my very first story that was a proprietary story at S&P, so it was one with multiple sources and data and graphics and all that sort of thing. I really wanted to talk to someone like an analyst who specializes in ESG. So I found someone who fit the bill on that, and it's great to have people like that because they offer the historical context. They can tell you what friends are because they watch these companies. They watch what they're doing in the ESG space.

“​​S&P Global Market Intelligence is basically one of several divisions within S&P Global. We specialize in providing financial and industry data and research, news, and analytics.”

I wanted to make sure I had an analyst, and then I spoke to an ESG expert at Narate, which is kind of the industry organization. They're sort of lobbyists but they also do a lot of research. So I reached out to Narate, and they have that great 10,000 foot exposure.  So I spoke to the [person] about it. Basically, I went to people who watch this stuff closely, and I tried to put together some data along with it. It was interesting because I have written about ESG before, not for this publication. 

At S&P, there is a lot of data focus. So that's what I was really trying to do, just sort of pull in S&P data and some external data. I spoke to Sustainalytics. The analyst I spoke to was with Sustainalytics, which is part of Morningstar. [inaudible 00:18:30]. Again, for my audience and for the platform, we really like data.

[00:18:38] BB: Got it. Let's underline that, really like data. Excellent.

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Christie’s coverage rarely includes cold pitches and instead, she prefers introductions that can lead to rich conversations. While subject lines don’t make or break your chances they are helpful if they’re clear and explain what you’re pitch is about.

Learn more about previous guests on Coffee with a Journalist and their pitching preferences, relationship building tips, and more in our journalist spotlight videos.

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