A presentation for the CIPR on influencer outreach with a focus on blogger outreach and an introduction to Inkybee.

1. CIPR Scotland 18 April 2013
Are you speaking to Bloggers?
Influencer Outreach for PR Pro’s
Hugh Anderson
Forth Metrics
Thursday, 2 May 13

2. Outline
• Context
• Why Blogs?
• The Benefits
• The Process
• Measurement
• Example
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3. The changing world:
from this ...
• Traditional “paid” media
• Media relations
• Journalists
• Press clippings
• Control of the message and who
distributes it
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4. The changing world:
to this ...
• Digital media
• Social media
• Mobile
• Bloggers, influencers
• NO control of the message and who
distributes it
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5. The changing
world:
consumer
consumption
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6. The changing world:
new media models
Source: previewnetworks.com
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7. Marketing has changed
• Outbound marketing
• Inbound marketing
• Content marketing
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8. Lord Leverhulme
Founder of Unilever
“I know that half of my advertising budget
is wasted, but I’m not sure which half”
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9. • Cold calling
• Direct mail (press releases)
• Email ‘blasts’
• Print ads
• Radio and TV
Outbound marketing
Trying to find your audience using;
Interruption
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10. • Through search
• Through social media
• Through blogging
Inbound marketing
Being found by your audience
Permission
Be visible to your audience using content
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11. • Be visible to your audience and attract
them with content
• Think like a publisher
• Don’t be dull
• Educate, entertain - and be relevant
Content marketing
Teach, don’t sell
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12. Why blogs matter: stats
• 78% of internet users conduct product research online.
• Greater than 70% of consumers state that blogs affected their
purchasing decisions.
• Trust in online customer opinions of 70%, vastly outstrips
traditional media.
• Sources used to begin a search on branded products: 57%
search engine.
• The average budget spent on company blogs & social media
has nearly tripled in three years.
• There are more than 180 million blogs globally
Sources: Hubspot, Econsultancy, eMarketer, Nielsen
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13. Why blogs matter
• Earned media = Trust
• Consumer point of research
• Engine that drives ideas on the Internet
• The realm of experts
• Panda/Penguin updates
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14. Benefits of blogger
outreach
• Precise: rifle-shot target audience
• Create loyal communities & brand
advocates
• Reliable
• SEO performance
• Measurable: campaign & business
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16. Important points
• It's about developing relationships
• You need to be creating compelling content
• It's a two way process
• You have to have a lead capture strategy
• It requires an investment of time & energy
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17. Preparation
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18. Objectives
• Know your business objectives (how much
money do you want in the bank by what date)
• How many physical conversions does this
translate into (total money needed / unit cost
price = conversions required)
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19. Example:
• Business Objective is to generate £4K of sales
for ‘Our Well Received Debut Album’ by the
end of July 2013.
• Campaign Objective is to get 571 people to
download ‘Our Well Received Debut Album’ by
the end of July 2013.
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20. Customers
• Know your target customers
• Who are the people who are going to deliver
the business objectives by actually spending
their cash?
• Where do these people ‘hang out’ on the
Internet?
• Have some sort of a clue about why this
audience is going to care about your offer
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21. Lead capture
• Every campaign requires a lead capture
strategy.
• People don’t buy when you want them to buy.
They buy when they’re ready to buy.
• Capture the leads and follow up with them
• Use a landing page
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23. Process
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24. Find the influencers
• Find the influential bloggers that your customers
follow
• Estimate the visibility they might achieve for you
• Use this to estimate conversion rates based on
reach. Are the numbers high enough to achieve
the objectives?
• Big does not equal best; find the “magic middle”
• Assess engagement and other factors
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28. Reaching out
• Be sane and be normal
• Follow on Twitter
• Read their blog (really)
• Retweet occasionally
• Get to understand them
• Comment sensibly once in a while
• Behave like a friend
• Keep a record of your level of interaction with
them
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30. The content offer
• Devise and create a compelling content
offering that will appeal in the strongest terms
to your audience (customers and influencers)
• Teach, don’t sell
• Educate, entertain, and be relevant
• Think about the expertise you have and how it
will help your target audience.
• Prepare a content strategy that includes
anticipation
• No spammy emails or press releases!
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31. Types of content
• Videos
• Infographics
• Ebooks
• Interviews
• Surveys
• Event invitations
• Samples
• Etc.
But, make it really genuinely useful.
And make it compelling.
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32. Putting it all together
• Get your influencer friends to review content
• Even get them to contribute to it
• Then, plan a content release strategy
• Build up some anticipation
• Set a launch date
• Get you influencers lined up to talk about it
• Release, and watch the sales or leads come in
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33. But, to re-emphasise, success is based on
developing relationships and putting effort
into making really useful content
Neither of these is too hard to achieve
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34. Measurement
• Weekly meeting (not sit down!)
• Visibility achieved?
• Engagement achieved with the offer?
• Conversions to leads?
• Are the numbers going up?
• Discuss ideas to increase conversion
• Assign actions to improve now before next
week
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35. Example
• ‘The Best Practice
Guide for Effective
Blogger Outreach’
eBook
• Released July 2012
• 12 main influencers
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40. In Conclusion
• Don’t be put off by nomenclature;
• Embrace digital outreach - it’s here to stay;
• Think strategic goals, not tactical gains;
• Compelling content/story is key;
• Be human - it’s about relationships;
• Demonstrate value.
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41. blog.forthmetrics.com
Hugh Anderson
hugh@forthmetrics.com
@hughforth
Thank You!
www.inkybee.com
https://www.facebook.com/inkybee.outreach
Thursday, 2 May 13