Roman Reign
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Welcome to the start of the relationship series, where I talk about social media and relationships. I've been studying relationships from attraction, mating, infidelity, and dissolution as a function of hormones for over a decade, so the posts in this series will have an endocrinological-neurological-biological-sociological bent sprinkled here and there. I'll be starting each of the posts in this series with this introduction, and they will be cross posted on DrOxytocin.com, Misohungrynow.com, and ChenergyConsulting.com. Let's jump into the first one. Talking to Bloggers. How to approach blogger can be a scary job for a business. Bloggers can be unpredictable. They have a voice in your target community. And most scary of all, they might not like your product. Let me put some of those fears to rest. Bloggers for the most part (at least the ones I know) are normal people. They form relationships just like any other person. You can and should approach them like a person. They are not a business (even though some might make a living off their blog), and they are not robots. Bloggers are people. And here's my perspective. "Hi! I'm Misohungry. I like to eat. And I like to keep a log of what I've eaten and things I've created. I post it on the internet so that others can use the information too." There I am in a nutshell. I post information online because I find it fun to share. I don't sell advertising on my site, and I have no interests covering events for the sake of covering events on my food blog. My other blogs are different story. Since I don't make any money directly off my blogs, I have little to no deadlines, and my writing priorities are ranked by how much I like the experience, product, organization, or event. If I don't have time to write, I don't have time to write. Over the last six months or so, I've been getting a large number of press releases that are sometimes accompanied by demands. Sometimes the demands are subtle, like "I hope to see your blog post about us soon." Sometimes the demands are not so subtle, like "I want you to write by this particular date and send out tweets using our hashtags." Sometimes the press releases are just downright annoying. I've gotten press releases where the sender expects me to write about an event, pay money to attend the event, and then write up a blog post about how much fun I had at the event. So I'm being asked to give free publicity, give my money to the event, and then give them more free publicity? Something does not look right. I don't mean to sound rude, but I do have a life outside of my food blog. I also have a day job, academic research, dogs to train & show, several other blogs to maintain, and relationships to maintain with my friends and family. There are tons of non-profit causes and events in Austin all the time. I have a budget of time and funds to donate to my chosen non-profits, and telling me that "it is a good cause" is not a good way to guilt trip me into giving your event any of said funds. It makes me feel like an organizations is being disrespectful of my personal finances and priorities. I put myself through grad school with a mortgage and bills. I'm not a non-profit funding foundation. Even Bill and Melinda Gates must pick and choose to which organizations they donate. They can't donate to everyone who asks. Additionally, asking for blog posts is in way more annoying than asking for cash donations. Blog posts can take anywhere from an hour to months to write. When people ask me to write a blog post about a topic that doesn't interest me, it is like asking a math student to write a 50 page research paper on the evolution of economic structures during the years 1955-1974 in the United States. I'll find it boring, time consuming, and much like pulling teeth. I've also been "offered to privilege to beta test a smart phone application" in exchange for a blog post about the application. Seeing how I have access to several applications in beta mode at any given time, I'm not dying to spend my time testing other applications. In addition to not wanting to waste my time working on someone else's application, I really don't want to spend time writing how I worked on someone else's application for free. If none of your friends care enough about your application to test it for you, hire someone on craigslist to do it for $20. Also, find new friends.
So how do you get someone like me to write about you? That's easy. You build a relationship with me. You'll notice that the very first question I ask is "Do I know you?" That's right. I place relationship with the sender as the number one priority when deciding what to do with email I receive. You might want to think about forming a relationship with said blogger first before you ever send a press release. To me, that relationship takes precedence over the content of the email. For some PR firms, I don't care what is in the email, I'm just happy to hear from a friend. If I forget to write about them immediately, I'll ask them to remind me. Yep. I ask them to nag me until I get it done. I am getting older. I tend to forget if not reminded. For other PR firms, they may be sending me an invite to the hottest event of the year, but if I don't like the sender, I'll roll my eyes a bit and throw up in my mouth prior to responding to the email. Please take note on which factors affect my willingness to write. While my willingness starts with a relationship, there are many other factors that affect if writing actually happens. I need to be interested in the topic. I need to like your product. I need to feel that it adds value to my blog. It needs to fit into my financial budget and my time budget. Please keep those factors in mind before bombing bloggers with your press release and excessive demands. So how do you start a relationship with a person? That's coming up in a future blog post. |
