Here’s a strategy to add to your public relations toolbox.
Promise yourself that you will add bloggers to the list of people who you will contact about events you’re sponsoring.
May be some of you have bosses who don’t care about bloggers or what they write. All your boss cares about is front-page coverage in your local daily newspaper, that’s right?
It’s time to tell the boss. Tell him/her that media coverage is great if you can get it. But not everybody who will want to know about your service, product, cause or issue reads newspapers, and circulation within the entire newspaper industry continues to erode year after year. As for that TV talk show, even if you get your 15 minutes of fame on “news,” the publicity is here today and gone tomorrow.
So, Why blogs are so powerful for publicity?
Here are the reasons why pitching to influential bloggers can bring you far more publicity than traditional media:
Bloggers usually writing about niche topics. So if you’re sponsoring an event for, women accountants, you can pitch it to bloggers who blog about accounting and those who blog about women in the workplace. Targeting your message like a laser light saves you a lot of time.
Unlike websites, blogs are updated frequently, unlike websites. For that reason, the search engines love blogs and often give them a high position in the list of items you see when you search on a particular topic. This is called the organic search list.
9 out of 20 journalists say they read blogs when looking for researching or find story ideas for their articles. In fact, many journalists are starting their own blogs.
Bloggers, unlike journalists, frequently link to each others’ postings. So if one influential blogger writes about your product, other bloggers might link to it, thus creating viral publicity and hitting audiences you never knew existed.
So, Where to start your blog research?
You can start researching bloggers by using Technorati, a search engine for blogs or others when you’re ready to publicize your event. Just type a topic into the search box, press Enter, and Technorati will return to you a list of blogs that include information about that topic.
Or, you can use Google search engine and search for “job blogs” or “secretary blogs”or whatever the topic happens to be.
Once you’ve found a blog that looks like what you want for your pitch, spend some time reading it so you get a good feel for the kinds of content the blogger writes about. Pay particular attention to whether the blogger refers to people who have emailed them to let them know about something. That’s a good indication the blogger is open to receiving a pitch.
One of the very best ways to get a blogger’s attention before you pitch is to post a comment about a topic they discuss at their blog.I’ll sometimes post three or four comments within a week or two at a particular blog before pitching that blogger with my idea. Why? Because I want the blogger to recognize me when I pitch.
I have my own blog, and I pay close attention to everyone who posts comments there. It shows me they’re willing to become involved in the conversation, not just contact me when they want something.
What not to say to bloggers
It’s best not to pitch information about your product or service as part of a comment or it will look too self-promotional. It’s better to email the blogger, catch their attention and hope they write about the event.
Don’t say things like ”It would be nice if you mentioned this in your blog “or”. Perhaps you might want to blog about this. “Just tell them about whatever you want them to know, and let them decide if they want to include it as a blog item.