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What a Beef Stroganoff Recipe Teaches About Bad Blogger Outreach

One of the problems with having a blog about content marketing is that people want to constantly post guest articles on my website. And just like the spam connections I get on LinkedIn, these all follow a certain formula.

Dear NAME,

I enjoyed reading your blog post at URL, and thought you might be interested in an article about TOPIC.

We just wrote an article about SIMILAR TOPIC and thought you might want to post it on your blog.

And don’t forget to include the backlink that will boost our skeezy client’s Google search ranking and possibly help affiliate sales. [I’m paraphrasing that last part a bit. — Erik]

And no, I’m not exaggerating. I get two or three of these messages per month. They all follow the same formula, they all want to publish something that is sort of tangentially related to what I write about (content marketing and writing), and they all praise an article they never actually read.

But I got an email last week that may qualify as Worst Email Ever. I could tell that not only was the entire process automated, the author hadn’t actually read any of the information he purports to have read. This is what I got.

Dear Editor, [My name is literally all over my website. —Erik]

My name is [J—] and I’m the Editor at [Unnamed Website]. I was doing research on beef stroganoff recipes and just finished reading your wonderful blog post: https://problogservice.com/tag/content-marketing/

In that article, I noticed that you cited a solid post that I’ve read in the past: http://beefandboards.com/

We just published a delicious beef stroganoff recipe complete with step-by-step pictures and detailed instructions. You can find it here:  [URL that I will not dignify with a backlink]

If you like the recipe we’d be humbled if you cited us in your article. Of course, we will also share your article with our 50k newsletter subscribers and followers across our social platforms.

Besides, my mom made the best beef stroganoff!

Four issues told me that J— hadn’t read anything.

  1. The “article” he supposedly read is a Tags link on my blog. You can click a tag on any blog and read all the articles that have been tagged with that keyword. So it’s not an article, it’s a whole list of articles. He would know that if he had even briefly skimmed that page.
  2. The “solid post” he’s read in the past? It’s a URL for Beef & Boards Dinner Theater. Beef & Boards used to be a national chain of dinner theaters that closed down. The only one left is in Indianapolis, Indiana. The URL is to an entire website, not a single blog post.
  3. The article he wanted me to link to was about how to make beef stroganoff. And why? Because I wrote an article about a place called Beef & Boards. Again, if he had read my blog, he would see there are no recipes; if he had read the actual article I wrote, he would have seen there’s no mention of food.
  4. This was the first and only article I ever wrote on this blog where I mentioned Beef & Boards, and it was based on an interview I did with an actor in a show at that theater. I was a travel writer for several years, and I wrote about Beef & Boards shows on other blogs, but I never did a theater review on my work blog. J— would have known that if he had read other articles; he clearly didn’t.

So I wrote back to J— and said that while I was not interested in publishing a beef stroganoff recipe on a blog about writing and content marketing, I would make sure his request appeared on my blog rather soon.

And now it has.

A Plea to All PR Flacks and Content Marketers

To those of you doing blogger outreach, please please PLEASE write individual letters to your contacts, not form email.

Don’t find a way to automate this so you can do more faster. This is not something where you want to pump out hundreds and thousands of emails every week. If you’re only going to get a 1% success rate, the trick is not to send out more spam, it’s to give your efforts a more personalized touch. Reduce the number of people you contact, and don’t waste the energy and effort on contacting people who aren’t a good fit for what you do.

Look, you already have a job where you sit down all day and the only things you move are your fingers. Don’t find a way to be more lazy about it.

Instead, just try these simple steps:

  • If you say you read an article, make sure you actually read it. Quote something from it. And not just the opening sentence. Talk about why that article is important to you.
  • If you’re going to send any links, copy and paste them into your browser and then test them. Make sure you grabbed the right link, and that it actually works.
  • Tell the other person why you think your article would make a good fit on their blog. It shows that you read more than one, which means you’re actually interested in them. They’re more likely to accept your request that way.

Blogger outreach is tough because you’re writing to people who aren’t likely to write you back. But that doesn’t mean you should take shortcuts or automate the process to make it easier. I’d be willing to wager that you’d get a better response if you wrote 10 individual emails per day than sent out 100 automated messages.

Photo credit: JeffreyW (Flickr, Creative Commons 2.0)

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Six Steps to Get Started with Influencer Marketing?

Occasionally, I’ll publish blog posts from guest writers, usually young writers who want to build up their portfolio. Erica Badino is a newer writer in the marketing world, and I thought I would give her a shot. Especially after she was so patient with me getting to this in the first p

The idea behind influencer marketing is nothing new. People have always looked to trusted friends and acquaintances for recommendations. In the digital world, the concept of asking a close comrade for a suggestion has morphed into the idea of turning to a favorite blogger. However, the broad online landscape now gives you the platform to connect directly with the influential individuals who are making the recommendations. Getting these people to share and vouch for your content or product can be extremely valuable.

But the question is still the same, how do you actually do that? How do you get those influencers to pay attention to you and share your stuff? Here are six steps to get you started.

Determine your budget & KPIs

  • What is your budget? There are ways to make influencer marketing work with budget size.
  • What are your real target KPIs? Are you planning or aiming for brand awareness? App installs? Social conversations? While being metrics-driven is essential, remember that influencer marketing creates long-term value beyond the immediate metrics (e.g. consumer trust and viral exposure).
  • What does success look like? Create a plan with 3 hypothetical outcomes: failure, success, and home run.

Craft your influencer strategy: The second step is to create a well-thought-out strategy. At first glance, influencer marketing seems very simple. Get popular posters to talk about your product and you’ll instantly gain a larger audience, right? To truly succeed, we need to approach it the right way, just like any other campaign. Ask yourself the following questions:

  • Who am I trying to reach?
  • What is the desired outcome?
  • What services or products do I want people to learn about?

Target top influencers: A strong campaign will typically have between 5 – 20 influencers on it. To target the best influencers for your industry, we need to dive in and surf the web like the target customer would. Get to know your audience intimately. Build a detailed profile for the types of people that you want to reach based on. . .

  • Where they shop
  • The blogs they read
  • The magazines they subscribe to
  • The books they buy
  • How they engage with brands and influencers (Do they comment often? Are they keen “likers?” Do they browse posts quickly?)
  • They hobbies they’re interested in
  • The television shows they watch
  • The restaurants, bars, or entertainment venues they frequent

All these elements come together to help you define which influencer your key audience is likely to listen to. The best influencers have great engagement levels with your audience. They usually get a lot of positive comments and likes.

Make Initial Contact: Reach out and begin making contact with the top influencers on your list. Don’t start with a product pitch or a request for a guest post. Start slowly, and engage by following them, commenting on their posts, and sharing their blogs.

Keep in Touch: Keep in contact with your influencers for several weeks before approaching them with your campaign. Successful influencer recruiting is all about building professional relationships. There are many ways that you can collaborate with them. These may include guest posts on blogs, reviews from the influencers, or product giveaways featuring your goods on their site.

Explore Outsourcing: This type of marketing can introduce your brand to a broad new community of followers when it’s done right.

Like all good things, social influencer marketing will change and evolve over time as it adapts to the latest trends and technology. Make it a priority to learn emerging influencer marketing strategies so you can follow them successfully. Savvy marketers are already capitalizing on the opportunity to grow their brand with the voice of their potential customers, consumers, and fans etc.

If you recruit passionate and dedicated influencers to participate in your marketing campaigns, you will improve profits, reach new customers through your influencers’ well-established networks, and increase brand trust.

After helping launch several successful blogs, Erica Badino is on a quest to share her knowledge and experiences with bloggers both new and old. She is a regular contributor for SEO Services USA.