Lessons

Lesson Info

How to Get Your Brand to Bloggers

So how is everyone doing so far? I know we have gone through a lot of different things and today's the last day so your heads must be spinning with information and things that you're going to implement but remember whatever you learn here today you're gonna have to take home or back to your office and really start implementing because that's where the change is really going to happen. So two more things I want to share with you today the first one we're going to talk about how to get bus from influential bloggers and our last session is going to be about even more ideas that you could get publicity and buzz for your products and your brand so let's talk about how to get out to bloggers and we talked a little bit before about why it's important, but I wanted to give you a couple of examples of how some other brands are using bloggers as well. So this is a web site that teaches people how to do crafty things and you'll see here I got that this is actually a testimonial on ah website call...

ed group hi dot com, which I'll be sharing with you later, but you're seeing that they're seeing a sixty percent increase in response rates as soon as they're reaching out to bloggers and aa lot of businesses are experiencing this as well and really bloggers some some of them have hundreds of thousands of readers every month that are dedicated readers, they love reading those blog's, and they love to buy the products or use the services that bloggers are recommending. So this is just one example, but another one is from chuck e cheese, and they're also reaching out to bloggers. I mean, every type of business is out there reaching out, trying to get in with bloggers. There is a ton of companies that are trying to help bloggers and entrepreneurs connect, and this is all of this next session is all about. How do you connect with those bloggers? How do you find them? How do you get them to write about your products and services? And lastly, even the harlem girl globetrotters are reaching out to bloggers and trying to grow their network and grow their influence through blogger. So, as you can see, we're going to be talking more about how products can use it, but a tine of businesses are doing this, and they're having a lot of success with bloggers as well. And every time I talk, someone who's working with bloggers there, can they only say good things about their experience and what it has done for their brand, and I totally couldn't relate to that we were talking about launching myself business, and the way I launched was actually with bloggers, I reached out to them offered to send them products for samples and to do giveaways and I had fifteen blog's or maybe sixteen who really loved my soaps and before I even launched they had my soaps already they had plans to write about them and it was a really great way to launch and get out there and cut out a lot of the work that I might have to do on my own in order to get to their audience so it's really really important as you're launching but also as you're growing your business is your business as well. So why bloggers? I know I mentioned that earlier today when they started but there really are hugely influential when it comes to recommending products and services I know aa lot of you're probably familiar with a block like dailycandy dot com they have hundreds of thousands of readers every month and it's sort of like if you're featured on there it's kind of like being featured in oprah magazine because the sales are going to come rolling in you get credibility, you get their endorsement and it's really a great way to just grow your business, get it out there and get your products in front of them and they have the huge readership now not every single block has the impact that someone like a daily candy might have but there are a ton of bloggers who do have that impact and even some smaller ones can still have a nim packed on your business as well as I've seen with my soap business and with my t shirt business and some other entrepreneurs that I have worked with the best part about working with bloggers is that they really are an expensive it's not the thirteen thousand dollars you might have to pay for a magazine ad and you don't have to pay for ads I know some websites charge for ads anywhere from maybe twenty dollars a month to ten thousand dollars a month depending on him a traffic they have but working with bloggers and doing a product review or give away with them it's really, really inexpensive all you have to pay for your onley investment is the cost of your product and the cost of shipping to send it out to them so you do have to keep in mind just like with celebrities and with magazines with bloggers you probably not going to get your products back so again budget for that as you're planning for for your year and as if you have that in your budget it's a lot easier to be able to give products away when you know that you've already accounted for those products but one of the huge differences between working with bloggers and working with magazine is that bloggers are really great for search engine optimization because in a magazine you're not going to get a link back to your website that sits online, there's a link back to your site and the article, but it's not the same as having that same link on a website, and I've talked about this a couple of times where google looks at how many other sites are linking to your site when they determine on what page of search results they should be putting your business once someone searching for your key words so the more of these links you have back to your site, the higher your your website is going to show up in the google search results. So it's really, really important, and I know people who do this just for a ceo purposes, and they don't necessarily care about how many people are signing up for their newsletter or buying um, they really care for that ceo stuff because the higher their search results are going to be, the more likely people are to come to their site. So they're getting in direct sales and in direct customers from all of the links that they're getting back to their site. So never underestimate the power of ceo even if it's a smaller blocks sometimes I know. People ask, well, should I only work with the big bloggers or the ones that have over five hundred thousand unique visitors, or is it ok to work with some smaller ones? And I do have a rule of over ten thousand at least. But if you're only trying to get links back to your site so you can increase your search engine results and maybe increase their social media following, which also happens as a result of being on blog's. This is a great way to do it in a super quick matter, because they don't have the three to six monthly time that print magazines have. And lastly, you're going to get more traffic, more sales and increase social media following. I know when I did my first blogged review form soaps to live by. I got fifty, followers on facebook of right away as soon as that post one up because he was from a lot of blogger that had a much larger audience. Then I had at the time, so it was a quick way to get some facebook likes I didn't get any sales from it, but a lot of times you'll see that when you're working with bloggers, the sales are more indirect as opposed to when you're working with magazine so it's a little bit more of a waiting game a little bit of a different strategy, you're going to have to do a little more work to engage with those followers, get them on your list and provide value to them before they're going to buy from you. But if you have the patients this khun definitely translate into sales as well. So who is this actually really good for it's good for it's perfect for entrepreneurs that have a product line actually, so if you have a peril or baby products or soaps like idea or bath and beauty products, handbags, even food and any other kind of consumer product bloggers love it and there's bloggers that right about products for moms or bloggers that on lee right about makeup or they only write about things that are green, right? I mean, you couldn't really think outside of the box here if you have a product there's going to be a blogger who's writing about the kind of product that you have it's also really great for aps because just like with a product where you couldn't send it to a blogger to test it you could send them, you're apt to try out, and then they couldn't share their experience with you. I had a client who launched a nap for pregnant woman, and she shared it with a a blogger was writing to moms, and she got to try her app to wrote a review about it, and before she knew what she had a whole bunch of new clients for her app that she hadn't had before. So it's a really great way if you have a nap to get your app out there, but on ly fits to a relevant blogger it's also really good for book, so if you're an author and if you have a physical book or maybe an e book it's a great way to send them a copy of your book and have them write about it or possibly even better interview you on their blogged about your book. I know a kind of authors who do this, and they sort of a lot of times which the traditional method where they go around the country and the book tours and book signings and the on ly start out with bloggers and reach out to huge bloggers, and they don't have tio. Do the expensive travel and take time away and book all of these multi city tours when they could just work with the blogger, so it definitely helps of books as well, but also with painful products. And I know on my own blawg, but a lot of times, if someone has a product for example, instagram, I don't teach people how to use instagram, but I know my audience is using instagram to market their brand. So I'll review a product who talked that talks about how to use instagram for your business because, again, it's relevant to my audience, they want to know how to use it if they can get it from me, I'm going to help them to get it from someone else. So that's, why this is really great, so don't only think about it from a consumer product, but it's really great as well, if you have and and for product or videos like you might, you'd like you have so now that you've seen if your product fits in there and I think a lot of the almost everyone, everyone here actually confed into that category, but some people who might be in the audience if this is something that you want to pursue. Here are my nine steps to getting more buzz by working with bloggers and you're going to see a lot of these are really similar to what we were talking about this morning on dh that's because you're still reaching out to bloggers by your approach could be a little bit different, and some of the work is a little bit different here as well. But once you determine your goals, whether that's too, increase your sales to increase your likes or as my goal was to really increase social media following, I wanted to launch my business and have a facebook page that had more than five people that were following me and who are my friends and my family. So for me, using bloggers to increase my social media following that was my main goal. I was now looking for sales, even though those those were great, but that was not my goal. It was strictly to get more facebook likes, and what I did to do that is that as soon as a bloc would go live, I would make sure that every time someone came to my to my so page, a little box popped up that asked him to like me on facebook because that was my main goal if I wanted them to subscribe to my newsletter. I probably would have had a box popping up asking them to sign up for my newsletter or I would have had it front and center on my website if you hate those pop ups I know some people of them some people hate them I have mixed feelings about them I know that they really work and I got a ton of facebook likes because I gave people the option to like me on facebook as soon as they came to my website as a result of that, I also got more newsletter subscribers so after people like me on facebook they looked a little bit through my side and I also ended up running a giveaway to give away a year's worth of soap to anyone who signed up for my newsletter so after they saw the light box they had the option teo sign up for my email newsletter so they couldn't win a year's worth of soap. So this is how you could get people tio really do what he want them to do whether you want to sell them a bar of soap or your product or you want them to sign up for your newsletter or your social media following but make it obvious for them as to why they're there other than obviously being there to find out more about your products and also you can use bloggers to launch a new product whether you're launching a new book or a new app or another consumer product. This is a great way to get out there quick and fast without having to wait for the three to six month lead times that magazines often require you to d'oh. And lastly, this is sort of a side effect that it might not seem important, but it really is important to get feedback on your product and to get your products reviewed. And, for example, one of the things that I learned when I did one of my first giveaways with a blogger is that it was a blogged that was really into equal friendly and organic products and sustainable living, and she loved my selves because they were equal, friendly and organic and sustainable. And I sent her the soaps, and she wrote a really nice review, but then she e mailed me and she said, hey, I love yourselves, but we're all about equal friendly, and I noticed your soaps worshipped in ah, bubble wrap, you know, that's, not that equal friendly. Can you are you going to do something about that? What are you going to do with that? So at that point, I hadn't thought about it at all, because I thought, well, the so pissed, equal, friendly and the bubble wrap is not that important, but then I started tio experiment with maybe with sending out a different type of packaging so people could get it, and I'm still working on that because I found bubble wrap to still be the most effective where they get their products without being damaged, but it was really great feedback to get that from her because I never would have even I thought about exploring my packaging because I thought my product was equal, friendly, but there's a lot of different things that you might not be thinking about with your products that you couldn't get inside on from reading one of these reviews and again, such a great side effect, and I really think feedback is so important, the more feed like you could have, the better you can make your products and the more appealing they're going to be to your audience that you're trying to attract. So want to determine whether you want traffic or you want subscribers or you want social media followers. You have to decide your format, so they're a couple of different formats you couldn't do a product review, and that simply were you send them a piece of a product or sample of your product they tried out, they tested, they take a couple of photos of it, and then they write their honest review about the product. Now, sometimes this review could be positive, which most of the time it is sometimes it's gonna have some things that you might not want to hear. But again, you do want that feedback because that's, how you could make it products and services better. In addition to a product review, you can also do a giveaway, and I give always basically where they don't necessarily reveal your product, but sometimes it does go hand in hand with it where they want to do both at the same time, so they'll run a product review, and at the end of the review, they'll offer their readers the chance to win that product so and their call to action they'll say something like if you love what he read anyone a win, a year's worth of soap, leave a comment below and let me know why which soap was your favorite or something like that. The whole structure it differently, but doing a giveaway is another option, and you don't always have to send them products to review the on ly product you have to send is to the person who actually wins it, so but a lot of times they do like to pair them and do both at the same time, because it's a way for them to get more engagement from their readers. Because they're encouraging them to leave comments and aa lot of times they'll ask their readers to like the company on facebook and sign up for the newsletter in order to get more entries into the give away. So another great way if you want to increase your newsletter subscribers or your social media following doing of the giveaway is super quick to do that because you couldn't requires that as part of the give away people have to like you on facebook and there you have a lot more people liken you on facebook and, um ok and lastly, you could also do a coupon or a special offer so I know sometimes with my t shirts they were a little more on the pricey side and sometimes it was really difficult to send out so many t shirts that were so costly to so many bloggers, so at that point I decided to offer them a coupon or a special offer for their readers and they wouldn't get a product to review they wouldn't give give do we give away? But they would write a block post about my products using the information that I had on my website and then ask part of the call to action they would say something like, click here you'll get thirty percent off for forty percent off on this product if you buy it within the next week or so so you don't have to send out product a lot of times they might request product. So again, you have to see do you wantto offer free product and give it this count? Do you only want to do with this count again? Look at your budget, look at what you're comfortable with, and obviously, if you have a really expensive product, your strategy is going to be different from someone who has a less expensive product. So once you do that again, do your research just like the magazines, just like the guest blogging. You have to do your research, so you have to find relevant blog's in your niche that do product reviews or giveaways. There could be a lot of blocks that right about the same topic that your audience is interested in, but if you see that none of them ever do a giveaway or a product review that's probably not going to be a good fit for you because that's just not a kind of content that they cover, maybe it's, a block where the blogger owner is sharing her experience and not promoting any other products. But you want to look at their site, read their content just to make sure that it's a good fit before you approach them with, ah. Product review or give away and this is also another way of knowing if let's say you see a blogger that on lee does giveaways and she never offers coupons are never this product reviews, then when you're going to approach her, you're probably only going to offer a giveaway and not a product review or a coupon so some ways you confined who those bloggers are, um, these are some things you can search for in a search engine. So aa lot of times the term pr friendly blawg or pr friendly means that they're willing to take product, review them and sort of act like a publicist where they'll write about your products and a lot of blog's start out with the purpose of reviewing other products and it's more like a product review blawg as opposed to someone's personal block. So these are some things you can search for if you are let's say, have a product that has to do with the wellness industry, you probably would be searching for pr friendly wellness blogged or pr friendly fashion blogger or jewelry blogger or wedding blawg, depending on on what it is that you do and the other thing you can search for is the hashtag pr friendly, and you can search for that on facebook on twitter on instagram and you're going to get a lot of bloggers there as well and here are a couple of companies that have made it really easy for you to find bloggers that are actually doing product reviews and give away so I've worked with some of these some of them have approached me tio tell me about their product and I haven't personally worked with them but I have checked out all of checked all of these out and they all do a great job off connecting businesses and entrepreneurs with bloggers that are looking to review products and the reason this is so great is because you don't have to do all of that work searching things and google making the list literally you can sign up for these and some you have to pay for some are free but you sign up with them and you can go ahead and look and see what bloggers they're working with and what products those bloggers are looking for and this is something that we were talking about yesterday with you dan, where you were saying I wish there was a place that would just tell me what they were looking for and a lot of these sites do just that they'll say this is the owner of the blogged this is their email address this is the kind of product they prefer to have this is how much they charge or they don't charge so this is where you can get all of that information about bloggers now they only work with blog's and not with magazines, so you can't use this as a way to get contact information for magazines. It really is on ly strictly for blog's, so another way to find blog's if you decide not to go with any of those services, is to check out a block directory like technorati or block catalog. And the reason I love these block directories is because they make it super easy by categorizing every single block that's, or almost every single block that's out there, or blocks that submit themselves to their sites. So if you write, if you have a product for animals, you could find animal related blog's. If you have a product for guys, you couldn't find blocks that are on ly specifically for guys, and they make it so easy you couldn't cut out all of the noise that's going on on google and just go to these block catalogs and get all a list of all your blog's right there without having to the too much extra work. And the other great way that you can find bloggers is to join a blogger community, and these are great because almost every industry has a blogger community where bloggers can go, they can hang out, they can sure tips and learned from each other, and they don't feel like they're being pitched to or or or yeah, basically pitch to where other companies air going in and saying review my block this is a community for them to connect, so I recommend if you do go in these communities it's more to do your research and find bloggers rather than to picture products this wood totally not be the appropriate forum for you to be pitching your products I know of one of my favorites for business is bush sugar that calm and you couldn't see a tine of business bloggers on there, so if you have a product that would be great for a business blogger water better way to get it than to see who's on their who's contributing and get their contact information as well but definitely don't pitch them through through this community it's definitely not meant for that. So now that you know how to find them what's the next step so the next step is to determine how much money you actually want to spend on this. I said it was an expensive but you still have to pay for samples to get there. You have to pay for shipping and sometimes bloggers will ask you to pay for the actual review because they feel like if they're taking the time to write about your product, they want to get paid for it because they're kind of doing you a favor and yes, you're providing them with content ideas for their blogged but it's still thus take a while for them to get the product, do all of the email back and forth with you, has the product product out, take photos of it, a lot of them will take photos of their kids using your product or themselves using the product, and that takes a lot of time. It probably takes them at least an hour or two to put each block post and product review together, so some of them will want to get compensated. I've personally never done a block review where I had to pay for it, even though some bloggers that I approached asked me to pay, I decided that for me, that was not in my budget, and I didn't. I only wanted to do product reviews for bloggers that would do it for free in exchange for my actual product, but I know entrepreneurs, especially if you're working with a huge blogger that has, you know, a million followers on pinterest, and they're going to be sharing your photos on their pinterest account and reaching a ton of really huge audience, they're probably going to ask you to pay for it, so in that case, be prepared, is that worth it to you and what's their feet in comparison to what they're following is like, and what can you what sort of results can you expect so do expect to be asked to pay for a review and even a giveaway but you can choose though I want to do paid reviews or do I only wanted to reviews were actually I don't have to pay for it so after you decide your budget again, you're gonna have to make sure that it's going to be a good fit for you and what I mean by that really similar to what we were talking about this morning is would your ideal customer be reading this blogged? Can you imagine your target market hanging out there leaving comments there, taking notes following them on facebook and on social free media and if you can and you have a yes there that's probably going to be a good fit but that's not enough do they have enough traffic? Do they have people coming to their site that they haven't engaged audience? Where again are they leaving comments at the end of the block posts are are they just reading and does it do they not ever write anything and it's more like a ghost town even though there is content on there but you see their facebook page hasn't been updated, their comments are nearly non existent and that's probably not going to be a good block for you to be pitching gone because again you're going to send your product for free and you're not going to get much in return so you do want to expose your products with a blogger that has unengaged audience where they're always leaving comments they up update all of their block post on social media they shared with their readers and they really get their community engage so that way they could engage with your website and with your products as well and lastly do the other products that they review reflect your brand and this is a really, really important and it might seem really exciting to have a huge blogger approach you or you approach them and they say I love your products can I review them? But if you look through their past post and you see that some of the other products that they're reviewing are totally not in line with what you're trying to d'oh you can definitely say no and I've actually had this with my soap business where it was a mom blogger who had so much traffic I loved her sight and her community was totally engaged and then I started reading through the block posed and all of the other products that she was reviewing were great for her audience but I would never use those products personally I would never want my audience to use them and now that there were bad products it's just my goal is to get product or to get people to use equal friendly prada that's the main reason I launched the blogged so when a blogger is writing about product, is that have a ton of toxics and chemicals in it, it's not going to be a good fit for me, and the audience loves it, it's totally fine, but for me, it was not a good fit, so I had to say no, because I felt like it wouldn't reflect my brand, and it just wouldn't look right on their pages to have my products there would really stand out and not in a good way to me at least. So think about the other products that they write about, and are they a good fit for you? Or is that something you would never want to see your products next to? Yes. Would you think that if you're sort of pitching to a blawg to get a review, that you're sort of taking a chance, that maybe that blawg will not give you a positive review? I could even see if they're asking for money that's a bit of a conflict of interest? If are you paying them for a good review, as opposed to trying to be a guest blogger where you're giving the information that you're writing to them and getting some good say, I guess that is a chance, right? That that is definitely a chance you're taking, and I'll be talking about that, teo but yeah, what they're going to say about your product is not guaranteed because you're sending it to them for their review and their opinion and sometimes you'll see bad reviews but I think most of the time if they decide to test the product and do a review about it, they're only going to do that if they like it and if it's something that they would you so aa lot of times they're not going to take the time to write about something that they really hate so you might see things like I love this but I have ah, you know, I'm a little wary of this other aspect of the business, but usually over all the reviews are pretty positive it can be cases where not everything they say is great and I'll share with you how to deal with that later but he had that totally couldn't could happen yes don't be an experience with a blogger was a woman contacted me and asked me to center one of my rainbow flowers what I did, I looked at her blood and I really couldn't get the gist of what she was blogging about and then she gave me sort of a trashed review because she said that she uh depended on her person brought it to her children's preschool and all the twenty kids came over and started mauling it and it didn't hold up a cz well is the other flower that she might, but I didn't know that that was what she was going to review it for, right? I could have told her no, it's not you know, yeah, and and I'm glad you brought that up because that's so true and you had you brought up two good points the first one if you go to the blogged and you've really have no idea what it's about and you're confused, chances are that their audience is confused as well. So I think that's a good sign that it's not a good fit, but yeah, I agreed they, you know, I had declined my pitch to a blogged and it was a no accessory or like, accessory for luggage, and she couldn't open it, but she hadn't read the instructions on howto open it, so she gave a really bad review for a product that was really easy to open if you only read the instruction. So sometimes you really have no control as to how they're going to react and how they're going to use your your floor because, yeah, I can tell that's not meant for twenty kids to be, you know, playing around with so totally you don't know your it's sort of taking a shot, but if you look at some of their other reviews, a lot of times you can get a good idea of are they mostly positive that they tend to complain a lot? Do they focus on the good things or on lee on the bad things, so reading their block would give you a good idea? But if you go to their blogged and you're confused, I think that's a sure sign that it's probably not not a good fit, and sometimes I think, tio, you know, I don't want to throw bloggers under the bus, because sometimes when we start out, we really are confused, and we don't know what our block is going to evolve into, and we might start fighting about this thing and then realize that, you know, I don't really want to go in that direction with my block, so I'm going to try this other thing. So sometimes I think, if it's a blogger that's just starting out, you're gonna have some time where they need a little bit of time to settle into their blogged figure out what it's about before they can conveyed to that audience, but you can decide you want to work with a newer blogger or on older blogger, I know when I first started my block, I was on ly appealing to entrepreneurs that we're starting a t shirt line because that's what I knew about and that's what I wanted to block about so at first, people who are selling jewelry or food would come to my block and they would say, this is not for me because I don't have a t shirt company. But then as I realized that, you know, I do want to share information with people other than t shirt entrepreneurs, then I would start blogging about other kinds of products and other different things, but it took me a while to get there, you know? I wasn't always there on dh had someone come to me with a t shirt thing, it probably would have been a good fit if it was a jewelry thing or a product to review, I probably would have turned it down because that's not what I was covering at the time, but yes, oh, definitely get prepared to get some of that as well on in that case, you can I'll share with you what to do about that, but you can politely ask them, do you know why they did that or what was their opinion? Or did they really use it the way it was intended to? And it still didn't work and it's just more feedback that you could get back from from them yes. Can you ask in advance? You know, I'm happy to provide you with some product. Um is there a certain you know how we will be reviewing this or is there waited tio inquire about it. So you know it's what it's being tested for if it's being tested or being just reviewed as many flower, you know what I mean? Yeah, you know, I think in that case, if you see maybe it's a mom blogger who that's a lot of reviews four kids products, maybe you consider just to her, you know, and say I previously worked with another blogger who took it to her kids kindergarten and the kids destroyed it, so if you're intending tio have it for kids that's not what it's meant for so if you do review what well the please use it yourself and not have other kids review it or other kids use it, but sometimes you'll get a good idea of that. If you just look through their through their previous post and you'll see where were they were, they tend to go in terms of reviews, but you can't really ask and say, I'm on lee going to send you this if you give me a good review because they don't really know if they're going to look like you do you know, for example, my selves they smell really good, but this the scent is really strong, but that's because that's part of my brand it's something that if you put it in your room, it's going to smell and it's going to make your room smells really good, but some people might be really sensitive to that. So if I get a blogger who has a lot of allergies or the really sensitive to it, and they like the sun, but he was too strong for them and they're going to write about that, you know that maybe in some ways, it's not exactly what I wanted to hear, but maybe it will give me an idea to make a soap that's uncensored id for people that do have allergies or sensitivities to sign, so you really could get a lot back from their feedback, but you can't quite steer them in which we want to go, although that would be super nice, right? Then you'd have a really great reviewed, guaranteed and a lot more sales. If you have a positive review, then you have a negative one, but that was a good question, and yeah, I could definitely happen. I've actually seen it done where if there is a negative review and we might get into this also, but sort of communicating publicly, like making a comment underneath that review of yours, you know, and being apologetic and very honest and offering to if it is a product to give them another one system case, it was s faulty being very honest with all the readers that arena reading that block post. I know I'm big on reviews, and if I see that the founder or the inventor is apologetic and really genuine, then am I might not be as negative against that company. Yeah, and that's so true to and I've actually personally than that with the review where she was talking about my packaging, that being equal, friendly, and she mentioned that on her blogged, so I went to her block and I said, yes, that's totally true, we are working on ways tio make our packaging more equal friendly, so I addressed it, everyone was happy gave me tons of good insight, and she was able to express her opinion as to how she really felt about my brand. So in a way, everybody wins. So, yeah, but I would say if it's something negative, it helps a lot. If you go in there and interact with their comments and say, you're either trying to work on that or it it was not intended for that purpose or whatever the ruby was was related to, yeah, great questions, you guys all right. So now let's talk about the six step, which is to become familiar with their content, which is something bad we talked about with being a guest blogger on other blocks, but you really do have to know who you're pitching know who you're connecting with, just like you do with magazines. So in terms of blog's, what can you do? Well, the easiest thing that you can do is to read their latest post and look at the style that they're using. Look at other product reviews that they have and how do you feel when you read them? Do you feel great? Do you feel like I would love to have my products on there, or do you feel like I'm not really sure if this is going to be a good fit and trust your intuition and know you're going to know if it's a good fit for you? As soon as you get there? Sometimes if you're not sure if it's a good fit to me, that's a sign that it's not a good fit because sometimes you know right away, if it's going to be a good fit for you and then browse through their social media feeds, do they engage with customers do they share the content that they have on their blogged? How many followers do they have? Are they telling you that they have twenty thousand monthly visitors and their facebook page only has fifty fifty likes, but again check their twitter or other accounts to make sure, but check to see if there's any disconnect between what do you think they're traffic is and whether social media following is to see if if it's ah good fit for you, but also mostly it's important to look at that to see how their community is engaging with them? Because you want tio have a review on a product or in a site where people are really engaged with what the bloggers saying so going through their social media is a sure way to know right away if that audiences engaged or not, and the lastly, go ahead and read their about. Paige, we talked a lot about the about pages, and this is a place where it really does come in handy if you're trying to determine if this is going to be a good block for you or not to be pitching your product two self if you couldn't relate to the founder story, maybe when you're pitching to them. You could say I was just on your about paige and I love I love your story I love how you started this business and here's a product that I think would be a great fit for your readers so you're going to get a lot of insight about who the blogger is and how they work and whether style is simply from being on there about paige and sometimes I also recommend subscribing to their email newsletter I think sometimes that's such a great way to see are they you know is this a serious business where they are they do care about their subscribers and they're emailing them on a regular basis and they're sharing other posts and doing product reviews so sometimes signing up for the email newsletter is another great way to really get to know who that blogger is to see if it's going to be a good fit for your particular products so next let's talk about engaging with them we I know I mentioned this earlier today where if you do find the block that you would love to be featured on what are some of the things that you can actually dio to start engaging and the first one is to leave a thoughtful comment again the key word here is thoughtful on their latest blocked both sometimes something like this is great or great post or thank you for this that's not going to get you anywhere tell them why it was great did you love their approach to a specific topic? Do you have you used the product that they're reviewing before, the more specific you can get the easier it's going to be free to actually engage with them and the more likely they are to actually remember you? Because people remember other people that were thoughtful and people who took the time to get to know their content, the feedback and engage with them so it's really important to leave comments again, make sure you mean it don't just say something because you think it's something that they want to hear or to get to get on their good side or to make sure that they notice you if you say it mean it on, and if you don't mean it, then I would just move on to another block or you actually do mean what you're goingto be saying and the kind of comments that you're leaving other than that you can also interact with them in social media. So go to their facebook page, share some of their post leave a comment again a thoughtful comment in their social media or retweet some of the things that they're sharing and you're going to be able to get on their radar a lot quicker and when they see or email, they're more likely to remember you and they're more likely to open it and then also shared their content with your audience. I talked a lot about this before where if I see something for launch grow droid that I think some of my audience would benefit from that on another site, I'll go ahead and share it. I've shared stuff from robin sight and from other sites as well and the same with my soap business there's ah blogged that talk all about organic food and switching your family to organic food and that's who my audiences. So I'm going to share their post on my facebook page because I think it's relevant to my audience and it's something that they would be interested in hearing about. So now that you've done that, I have two more steps that I want to share with you. So the first time is again to read their requirements a lot of times, if it's a pr friendly blogger or they do a lot of product reviews and giveaways and coupons and things like that, they have a system in place because they've done this enough times where people that are trying to get their products reviewed are constantly e mailing them question. So to save them time and to save you time, they've put together a list of faa cues that you can read when you're submitting your products and sometimes you might have to dig around a little bit for it because it's not always there or on the home page but you can google it or you can ask him for it but look at the type of reviews that they offered do they offer free reviews? Do they only do paid reviews and which one do you want to be a part of and then next is do they require sample to be sent now the answer to this question is almost always yes, I would say ninety nine point nine percent of the time the answer is going to be yes because they feel like if they're taking the time to reveal your product we write about it take photos posted up on their blogged they want to be compensated for that and their compensation is your product especially if it's a product that they would use on a daily basis. So make sure that if you have expensive products I know I've worked with some designer's jewelry designers or ah handbag designers who have a two hundred dollars handbag and do they really want to be doing a product review and sending out time two hundred dollars handbags to ten different blogger so look at where your price point it is and see if it's going to be a good fit for what the blogger is requiring but keep in mind ninety nine percent of the time they will want your product and they'll want to keep it and not return it so that brings me to my next point is a returnable or non returnable? This is a little bit different from the magazines because if you ask a magazine to return your product aa lot of times they will return it if you ask a blogger to return your product, they're probably ninety nine percent of the time not gonna want to return it. So do you want your product return? Do you not want to return if you don't, then maybe blogging on doing product reviews with bloggers shouldn't be a part of your marketing strategy unless it's something like daily candy that has, you know, half a million readers every month and your audience is exactly who their audiences as well. So in that case you could look at it more as an investment where you know it's going to pay off because you know any time a brand is featured on their site, they get a lot of things that come from that so it's definitely a good investment even though your handbag is two hundred dollars so think about the risks and benefits here and make sure it's a good fit for your brand the other thing you might want to look out for is do you have to provide a press release so sometimes they want you to do the work for them and they don't want to have to go digging through your site and looking at here about paige and they want everything right there to make it easy for them to write the article so sometimes they ask for a press release and this is another one of those examples where press releases are really great because you have everything about your company, everything about your product in one page or sometimes maybe a page and a half that you can send to someone quickly they couldn't read through it to get to know everything about your company, so sometimes they will have or they'll required to write a press release or to have a press release sometimes they won't it really depend some on the blogger I know one time I pitched my soaps tio a magazine in canada and they have both a french speaking audience and an english speaking audience. So she said, I'd love to feature your products. Can you send me a press release in french? So you know, that was I didn't have a press release in french I thought about hiring someone to translate in french, but she had a super tight deadline, so the timing just didn't work out, but now I know and next time I reach out to them, I need to be prepared with a press release that's in french, so you're going to see some of that a little bit, depending on who you're pitching. And then the other thing that you might wantto check out on their paid there frequently asked pages, do you need to reach out to them via email or just send a sample for so a lot of bloggers sometimes will say, if you have a product that you want to send me, I'll review it, but send me the product first, don't contact me by email as soon as your review is up, I'll go ahead and posted on election. Oh, so in that case, you have no contact whatsoever with the blogger. You're on ly sending them your product sample at the address that they're specifying on their website. So I've seen that too. Sometimes I've sent out samples because I thought it was a good food. Sometimes I feel like I want to talk to the blogger first a little bit before I send them a product, so again, see what makes you comfortable, what you prefer to do, and if it sits with you, do it if not, move on to another blogger, and lastly, go ahead and pitcher products and this is the ninth step, it's actually, I know the step that you want to get to right away, but you do have to go through all of those eight steps before you actually go ahead and do this because you want to be prepared one you're pitching, so when you're pitching, I'm going to give you an actual example of something that I've done, but when you're pitching, make sure that your email has an interesting subject line and that you personalize it and buy personalise ing it. I mean, start out with high in their name and then tell them something about themselves or their blogged that you really enjoy or that you find relevant to you and keep it short. We talked about this yesterday with three to four paragraphs off three or four sentences each. Anything else more than that it's probably going to get your email deleted, so keep it short get right to the point and then as you're writing your email, keep answering the question what's in it for them and what's in it for their readers. So now I want to give you an example of an email that I've actually used for my soaps, and I've tried a couple of different subject lines I thought with this one, I'm asking them a question, I'm getting them engaged, I'm using the word you right away and I only really wanted blog's who we're looking for products that were kind of cute and sort of a little whimsical and not necessarily ah product or block those covering fashion or maybe more mainstream products so I was very deliberate when I put that subject line because I really only wanted bloggers who can totally relate to that to answer to me so I did get a lot of responses from that and this was my next email or my next paragraph or two paragraphs so there you go. I used her name, I asked her how she wass I told her that I love her blawg and I've really going to her block and I loved everything she had on it, so I was honest there and I told her how I used her products or her recipe so again, I'm showing interest in her eye I'm saying I've actually done what you've shared, which everyone wants to know that you take action on what they're actually doing and then I said, you know anyway, I know that's a little informal, but when I write e mails I like to be a little more informal if you don't don't feel like you have to be in for much is because I say so do whatever feels comes still to you so there's there's what I said next I told her a little bit about the soaps but again, you could see I'm saying if you're looking for a product if so will you consider not I just launch the product and I'm super excited about it please write about it it was more can you do this or would you be willing to do this and next? I told her a little bit about this was my third paragraph I think I told her a little bit about why I think my readers are going to love her soaps and again I said you and we um oh are your readers a lot? So I think that goes a long way because you're already putting or you're already getting them to think about how their readers might be using your products as well, and I gave her three reasons why I think her readers would like it sometimes I'll do two reasons sometimes I'll do three usually I like to do about three or so and not anything longer than that if you come up with a list of ten things why your products are awesome that's going to make for a super long email and it's going to be overwhelming and they're probably not going to read it and then my last paragraph I offered to give her a sample of myself so I said would you like a few samples and we'd also have to do a giveaway if that works for you because I wanted to to the both with her, and then I gave her my website told her to choose whatever she wanted. Sometimes I've seen sometimes I've done this with my t shirt business, where I was warning really low on some shirts, and I couldn't give those away because I was saving them for my customers. So in that case, I would say something like if you're interested either in the today matters shirt or in the choose happiness shirt, let me know which one you'd like and what size and also be more than happy to send it to you. So if you're ever in a situation where you have more of a product that you're trying to give away, you could mention that in your email and so have I have this or this available, which one would you like? Or you can give her the op ocean to choose any product that she wants from your website again totally depends on what it is that you have and your price points. And then lastly, I thanked her and signed off, gave her my website again and, you know, hoping that she would write back and they did right back, I use this email template for a lot of my pitches. And a lot of them roll back but only those that I thought were a good fit because again my subject line was so specific where on lee the people that were really looking for cute products would actually be be interested in responding back so if you get a yes here's what you need to do you need to make sure that you send them what they need right away if they say I love the idea I'd love to do a review can you hear is my mailing address and me the's two bars and I'm looking forward to it you don't want to wait a week before you're going to be sending her your two bars of soap you wanna wait maybe a day at most or sometimes if you have a handmade products that takes a little bit longer to dio I would say two days the most but if you consented that day or within the next day they're going to be or you're going to be fresh in their minds you're not going to be wasting any time and you're there going to be happy because they took the time to respond you have to be timely and make sure that you're respecting those things that they're looking for and if you do get a yes and you send them your product you also have to follow up so again a week later just like you would with celebrities or magazines email them and say, hey, I wanted to check in to see if you receive my product do you need any other photos? Do you need high resolution images? You need any more samples or a press release or anything else that could that I can help you with and sometimes they'll be like no, I'm good thanks so much I'll let you know when the review is up sometimes they'll say yes, I would love some high resolute photos in which case you're going to need to have your high resolution photos ready and believe it or not bloggers even though it's an online web site and all of their photos are low resolution aa lot of times they'll still request a high rest photo for them tio to put on their site even though they might turn it into alert malodorous photo but I always want to have if you reaching out to the press high rest photos at all times now if you get a no don't take it personally write it doesn't mean you're not a good person, it doesn't mean your business is terrible it just means that it was not a good fit for that particular blogger so no reason to take any of this personally and if you want tio go ahead and contact them with another pitch idea in a few months maybe your product was not a good fit for their mothers they round up but maybe it's a great thing for their back to school block post so if you want to pitch them again, go ahead and pitch them but again for a different topic or when you're launching a new product that's something new and you line maybe a new color or something else where it's different from what you've pitched them before it's totally fine to go ahead and pitch that again now if you don't get any response, don't take it personally again it's not about you it's just was not a good fit on dh they decided to the lead your email and create less work for them and less work for you by not replying back and you having to reply back and creating this whole other email conversation so don't take it personally, but I would recommend following up a week later with the same pitch and you can say in your subject line following up hey wanted to check in to see if you got my email that I sent last week here's what it was about and then you khun basically copy and paste your previous email to them. And again, as I've said for most of my success of publicity has been from this follow up email that I sent a second time a week later, so keep that in mind don't take it personally don't assume that a no response means that they were completely not interested. It could mean that they didn't get to your email right away. Or it could mean that they're not interested by you won't know that until you follow up again and again, if you don't get a response and you still want to work with that bloc, pitch another idea. A few months later and that's totally fine to do.