I've been cold-shilling alerty to journalists at 9to5mac, macrumors, appleinsider, etc to no avail. 

Any pro tips around cold outreach and getting published?

𝓵𝓲𝓿𝓲𝓷𝓰 𝓽𝓱𝓮 𝓮𝓷𝓭𝓵𝓮𝓼𝓼 𝓼𝓾𝓶𝓶𝓮𝓻 • building @buoy 🛟 • @dawnpatrol • pfista.com

1, hook: why should they cover this now. Give a small pitch as to why your story is relevant, right now. 
2, timing: if it’s a time-sensitive thing, make sure you give them enough time to cover the story (usually one week in advance if it’s a timed release) 
3, not cold: honestly cold is really hard/unlikely

The only future is a decentralized one • Writer, creator, farmacopeian • Content for Liquid Collective at Alluvial • Formerly Bison Trails, Coinbase, Goldfinch 

For not cold, does this mean work through pr agency with connections? That’s what I’ve done in the past- or something else?

Cool, I think I have 1 and 2 down at least :)

But still worth trying… if your hook/timing is on point it can still work. But I’ve found that unless it is Truly Newsworthy it’s really unlikely without the agency.

Yeah, the true power of PR agencies is just that they have the connects with the journalists and the private coverage telegram groups and such. I’ve had such terrible luck with cold outreach as a marketer—even with the connect to journalists—it is just so, so much more successful from an agency.