Blogger outreach: securing the right re­la­tion­ships

Over the last few years, blogger outreach has become immensely important in many in­dus­tries. Suc­cess­ful bloggers usually have a loyal read­er­ship, which forms a valuable and in­ter­est­ing target group for many companies and brands. If you’re suc­cess­ful in building long-term positive re­la­tion­ships with bloggers, they will make ideal brand am­bas­sad­ors for your product or service.

But getting bloggers on board to help your company isn’t easy. No credible and integral writer is going to be won over by a few gifts and kind words. The blogger business has become a highly pro­fes­sion­al field, so taking the time and effort to build and maintain re­la­tion­ships with bloggers can prove quite the challenge for many companies.

Those that have made a name for them­selves in the blo­go­sphere can be in­cred­ibly in­ter­est­ing and valuable contacts for busi­nesses and brands. But why should companies rely on private writers when they have more-than-capable staff in their editorial de­part­ment?

The reason is simple: suc­cess­ful bloggers possess something that corporate company blogs often lack: au­then­ti­city and reach.

Au­then­ti­city: bloggers are mostly all for authentic, credible, and trans­par­ent reporting. Readers trust this type of content more than other marketing and ad­vert­ising measures. If a blogger writes about a product, their opinion is sincere, whereas if a corporate blog writes about one, it’s usually quite obvious that it’s for self-promotion.

Reach: well-known and suc­cess­ful bloggers are mainly char­ac­ter­ised by a loyal read­er­ship and their cor­res­pond­ing reach. A company can use this for their own gain, as well as the suc­cess­ful social media presence that bloggers have built up. Bloggers are also usually well connected and are sometimes even quoted in the media, so their reach is con­tinu­ously expanding.

Blogs are an ideal marketing tool thanks to their repu­ta­tion, au­then­ti­city, and reach on specific topics. Blogger relations help busi­nesses in more ways than one: in addition to linking the brand with their own social media and content pub­lic­a­tions, companies can gain valuable access to the blogger's read­er­ship.

Bloggers are highly sought after as brand am­bas­sad­ors and in­flu­en­cers due to the above­men­tioned reasons, giving way to many companies wanting to add blog col­lab­or­a­tions into their com­mu­nic­a­tion strategy. But con­tact­ing and building up a rapport with bloggers isn’t that easy, since com­mu­nic­at­ing with them doesn’t follow the usual PR guidelines. We have gathered 5 helpful tips to bear in mind when carrying out the task of blogger outreach:

Press releases, in­form­a­tion­al material, brochures – these are some of the classic tools that many PR de­part­ments rely on. While this unloading of (business) in­form­a­tion might create brand awareness e.g. via a press mailing list, it can appear one-sided and doesn’t have much to do with blogger outreach. This is because bloggers aren’t journ­al­ists: they don’t have to wait for the next press release. Writers of suc­cess­ful blogs are in­de­pend­ent, opin­ion­ated, and have entire free rein when it comes to their choice of topics and who they col­lab­or­ate with. They write pas­sion­ately about their favourite topics, meaning they want their col­lab­or­at­ors to un­der­stand and share their passion. So if you want to work with bloggers, you have to convince them of your case and win them over

Companies want to target the more pro­fes­sion­al and wide-reaching blogs, which are usually more than just hobby projects. These bloggers work on their websites full-time, meaning that they often aren’t in­ter­ested in sharing press releases or testing products – es­pe­cially not for free. It takes a lot of time and resources for a blog to develop from a simple hobby to a full-time job. From technical im­ple­ment­a­tion to creating content to main­tain­ing social media: if you partner up with a blogger, you get the whole package! Still, many busi­nesses don’t think that they actually have to pay bloggers. The bigger the reach the better: as a result, it’s not uncommon for bloggers to have rates between £150 and £400 per post.

A suc­cess­ful blogger will receive more than one request per day. If the reach and the target group fit, busi­nesses are lining up to contact bloggers in the hopes of starting a blog co­oper­a­tion. But with so many partners to choose from, this also means that bloggers can afford to be picky - sometimes even turning down large companies. So if you are acting as a business, you have to stand out from the crowd.

This is best achieved by winning the blogger over with your content. Through extensive texts and new, creative content ideas, you can emphasise your expert status and show them you’re on the same level. If the first e-mail you send to the blogger is cus­tom­ised to them and adapted to what they’re offering, you have a higher chance of a suc­cess­ful co­oper­a­tion. Instead of offering press releases, you should be offering bloggers exclusive content and in­form­a­tion that offer value to the readers.

To be able to customise your blogger contact approach, you need to carry out thorough research. Ideally, you want to identify blogs where the content fits perfectly with what your company offers. Finding topic-related blogs is only half the battle; it’s also important to offer the right fit of content. You should remember that blogs aren’t ad­vert­ising platforms, so avoid obvious ad­vert­ising tactics and PR messages in the proposed topics. Bloggers weren’t born yesterday: they will notice such marketing attempts and turn them down so as to preserve their au­then­ti­city.

But which subject areas are best for blogger outreach? Ideally, you should deliver topics that highlight com­pet­ences in certain areas without overdoing it. If your aim is to strengthen your brand po­s­i­tion­ing, pub­lish­ing high-quality content with bloggers is the ideal way to show you’re an expert in what you do. Trans­par­ency and cred­ib­il­ity play an equally important role for brands: being able to openly handle criticism is crucial. Bloggers are free to express them­selves on their platform, which includes relaying criticism when men­tion­ing products or services.

Busi­nesses can get a lot out of blog col­lab­or­a­tions when they have the right strategy and choose suitable partners. At the same time, companies should also be aware that reaching out to bloggers and main­tain­ing re­la­tion­ships is a time-consuming and chal­len­ging task. It requires a lot of en­gage­ment from both sides, but once you’ve managed to overcome the first hurdle, both parties can enjoy a lucrative, long-term part­ner­ship. Blogger col­lab­or­a­tions can prove chal­len­ging, but they are an integral part of a company’s in­flu­en­cer strategy and shouldn’t be neglected.