Blog Promotions
We have found ourselves very busy with blog promotions lately and they have had a lot of success for our clients. I wanted to share some of the lessons we have learned over the years about using blogs to gain influence and to market products and services.
1. Know the bloggers
We spend a lot of time getting to know the bloggers we work with regularly. It isn’t just about their UVs or social media followers, but also about their content creation process, their family demographics, what kinds of products and services they like to write about, and the time they have to do a post. If you just pull a bunch of bloggers from a list based on the fact that they are a mom blogger in the northeast and have 25K UVs then you are missing a big piece of the process and the results of your campaign will affected.
2. Incorporate social media in your blogger promotion
Don’t just run a blog promotion in a silo- incorporate the branding and messaging in your social media, on your website, in your blog, and in your emails. You will get a much broader reach and have a consistent message for your target audience. They will also be more compelled to engage in your promotion if they have seen it in multiple places. Also ask your bloggers to Tweet, post, pin, create video, Instagram pics, and more. They will do it and love to do it so be sure to ask!
3. Use bloggers that have readers that trust them
One of the main reasons we use bloggers is to create the expert advisor that is sharing great information with their “friends” via an online blog. Women are especially influenced by people they trust and their opinions. They consider their favorite blogger to be their friends and advisors. Some blogs are strictly used for promotional purposes- lots of giveaways, coupons, and freebies. These are about as good as any coupon listing site- they don’t have any real relationship with their readers and will put anything out that pays them. Don’t bother!
4. Let your bloggers craft the message
Of course you want to give them talking points and messaging that they must include along with some great visual images, but them put their voice in the post. They want to tell their readers why they would use this product or why their kids went nuts when the sample arrived. Encourage them to tell their story and share their pictures. It is much more authentic than a canned and controlled message written by the brand.
5. Expect to compensate the bloggers
You will not get a great write up and social media coverage with any traction for free. Consider this a valuable advertising expense and be sure to budget accordingly. We work with our clients to get the most reach and high engagement for a reasonable price. It all takes time- it is not something you should expect to happen by just blasting a press release around to bloggers.
Here are some examples of some stellar blog posts from promotions we have recently done!
For more information about custom blog promotions from MtoM, please email Tracey at
tracey@mtomconsulting.com.