Jessica
Brands Successfully Reach Bloggers at BlogHer
by Jessica Turner on August 11, 2010 | 1 comment
in Branding, Marketing, blogs
Last week, I took a few days off of work to attend BlogHer in New York City. BlogHer is the nation’s largest blogging conference for women. It draws more than 2,500 attendees from across the country, as well as some of the world’s largest brands.
Before, during and after BlogHer, many brands have off-site, private events to cultivate relationships with bloggers. I had the opportunity to attend many of these events and was very impressed by the brands’ presentations and creativity. Here is a list of my top five favorite events and why they worked.
Hallmark’s Christmas in August Party: Hallmark held a Christmas party in a hotel penthouse suite that was totally transformed to look like a home decorated for the holidays. It had a Christmas tree, the mantle was decorated, a Santa, gifts, Hallmark cards and ornaments and more. Prior to the event, Hallmark sent its guests purple Christmas hats to bring and wear to the party. The relaxed, homey atmosphere caused many bloggers to stay at the party for an extended period of time, which was a fantastic opportunity for the brand representatives to interact with the guests.
At the event, Hallmark promised to send a package of the brand’s Christmas line. This was well-received because so much swag is given during BlogHer that much is left for the housekeeping staff. This ensured that everyone received the Hallmark products that the company wants to introduce to the bloggers.
Unilever’s Penthouse Party: Like Hallmark, Unilever transformed a penthouse suite to create an experience for the bloggers. The penthouse it reserved was multiple rooms, and every room created a brand experience for the bloggers. One room was like a dressing room and featured a celebrity stylist doing hair using Suave products. Another room was a relaxation suite where bloggers could decorate sandals, have water flavored like dove deodorant scents and receive reflexology and massages. Yet another room was like a large kitchen and dining room, with areas set up to showcase Ragu, Wishbone and PF Changs.
The party was spectacular because of the attention given to each brand. Attending the event truly was an experience – and experiences are what bloggers love and write about. After checking out each room (and getting a “passport” stamped in each), bloggers received a large swag bag filled with Unilever products.
Getting Gorgeous by Audrey McClelland and Vera Sweeney: Audrey and Vera are two popular fashion/entertainment bloggers who came together to create an experience for bloggers to interact with multiple brands. They transformed two hotel suites into two rooms filled with beauty, fashion and lifestyle brands. Remington had celebrity stylists doing hair, Hanes shared about its new bras, Tide demonstrated its new wrinkle release product, MiracleBody gave away jeans to every guest and more.
The event was fabulous because of the opportunity to interact with many brands on an intimate level and because the gifts guests received were items that would be used and talked about. Earrings, jeans, curling irons, etc. – not small items that would be tossed. I wore my jeans on day two of the conference – and talked about them to many people. I was also photographed in them and linked them on my blog. This is what brands want.
ShopAtHome.com Shopping Spree: ShopAtAHome.com is an online shopping portal featuring free catalogs, Free Coupons, Printable Grocery Coupons, Local Store Coupons and Cash Back shopping incentives at more than 3,000 leading online retailers. Prior to the conference, they gave bloggers the opportunity to enter a contest to win a shopping spree in the garment district in New York. 38 bloggers were selected and given $150 each to buy clothes at wholesale prices – a perfect tie-in to the types of deals people receive using ShopAtHome.com. In addition to the shopping spree, the ShopAtHome.com representatives gave each attendee a $25 gift certificate to use on their site. This was a smart way to motivate the bloggers to visit ShopAtHome.com after the conference. The experience was organized, fun, different than a party and well-planned.
The Today Show with Today’s Moms: The Today Show invited about 25 bloggers to come experience a morning at Today on the Thursday before the conference began. The bloggers were invited on the plaza and included in a shot, met several of the hosts, got lots of pictures, were taken in studio and filmed during a segment, saw the control room and had time to get to know one another. This event worked because it was not too big and because Today created a memorable experience for the bloggers.
Here are a few additional brands worth mentioning:
Liberty Mutual’s Responsibility Project: Liberty Mutual invited a group of about 40 bloggers to experience Ellis Island and the Statue of Liberty. During the bus ride to Ellis Island, the representatives showed a video about the Responsibility Project and shared its vision. Nothing over-the-top, but very thoughtful, well-planned and memorable.
Ebay Fashion: Ebay Fashion’s booth at the conference included samples of the great clothes and accessories you can find on the site. Their stylists helped guests try on some items and then a photographer did a mini fashion shoot. Very fun.
Tide: Tide invited bloggers to one of several small dinners they hosted at a fabulous New York restaurant. These dinners had less than 20 people at each and allowed Tide’s representatives to really cultivate relationships with the invited bloggers. Very impressive and unusual.
Use Your E-Newsletter Analytics
by Jessica Turner on July 13, 2010 | no comments
in Marketing, Measurement, Newsletters and E-Newsletters
Many companies have email newsletters down pat. They know that communicating through email on a regular basis is a cost-effective way to connect with their target audience.
However, few companies take email newsletters to the next level by analyzing the open and click-through rates.
Recently, I was impressed by this email I received from Red Envelope.
Every Thursday the company does a special, one-day sale.
An item that was on sale interested me and I clicked through, but opt-ed not to purchase the item.
The next day I received this email.
Clearly, they had taken the email addresses of the people who had opened the email, cross-referenced it against the accounts that had purchased from the site and sent out an appropriate follow-up.
Brilliant.
Next time your company sends an email blast, look at the analytics with a fresh perspective.
Who clicked on the links? What does this say about them? What are they interested in? How can you better target these people?
The answers may lead to new leads and bigger sales.
What can you company do to better maximize your email newsletter data?
Want an easy way to gain new customers?
by Jessica Turner on June 8, 2010 | 1 comment
in Advertising, Marketing, Newsletters and E-Newsletters
Try Groupon, a website that offers city-specific deals daily.
Businesses pay no up-front cost to Groupon – instead Groupon takes a percentage (usually 50%) of the deal. And with tens of thousands of people receiving emails from Groupon every day, the exposure is huge! (Nashville’s Groupon has more than 80,000 subscribers).
Last week we put Groupon to the test for our client, Matt McGee, DDS, PC and it was a huge success.
He offered a $99 teeth-whitening deal, regularly priced at $300 and almost 250 people purchased the deal.
That means:
250 people will come to Dr. McGee’s office for the whitening treatment.
250 people will experience Dr. McGee’s friendly and experienced staff.
250 people will likely become ambassadors for professional teeth whitening and Dr. McGee.
And many of those 250 people may consider having Dr. McGee become their regular dentist.
While Dr. McGee is doing the whitening treatment for a one-time steep discount, the long-term financial gain could be huge.
To help promote Dr. McGee’s Groupon, we utilized:
- Facebook – Dr. McGee’s fan page as well as personal pages
- Blogs – Four popular local bloggers blogged about the deal
Dr. McGee also staffed his office to handle the influx of calls about the deal and to book appointments.
The initiative was a huge success.
If your business has a product or service to offer, and you are looking to gain new customers, check out Groupon. It may be just the deal you have been looking for.
Advertising in the Dominican Republic
by Jessica Turner on May 12, 2010 | no comments
in Advertising, Marketing
Last week I had the opportunity to travel to the Dominican Republic with World Vision (a humanitarian organization) and blog about my experiences daily.
During the week, we traveled in a three hour radius around the capitol city of Santo Domingo. Throughout the country, I was struck by all the political advertising. Posters were everywhere – even in what appeared to be the middle of nowhere.
People’s homes were papered with posters.
Cars were covered with advertising.
Almost all billboards were for political leaders.
I have never seen anything like it, and as a marketing professional, I had to learn more.
When I asked our trip leader why so many political posters decorated the communities she said, “because the people here believe so strongly that the political leaders will help them and better their communities. So they put the posters up, but really, change never happens.”
Her candidness about the situation really saddened me.
In the United States we have cars and trucks that advertise messages. We have billboards. People put out lawn signs in front of their homes.
But there is diversity in the messaging.
Not seeing that diversity was shocking.
Have you ever traveled to another country and noticed a difference in the advertising? How were things different than in the United States?
To read more about my trip to the Dominican Republic, click here.
How to Successfully Pitch Bloggers
by Jessica Turner on April 15, 2010 | no comments
in Media Relations, Social Media, blogs
As a very active mommy-blogger with a somewhat large audience, I receive pitches from PR practitioners every single day.
As a PR practitioner myself, I find myself often evaluating these pitches with that hat on.
I am shocked by how many bad pitches are sent!
Many times the PR person has a great product, but most bloggers probably don’t even read the pitch because it doesn’t appear to be relevant to them.
If you or your company has a product that would be of interest to bloggers, when you send them a pitch, DO NOT:
- Use the same form pitch letter: It is important that your pitch letter be relevant to the blogger and their blog’s content. That doesn’t mean you have to craft a new pitch every time, but at least tweak the intro copy. For instance, I have received many pitches for princess books and toys. I have a 2-year-old boy. If the PR person had spent two minutes on my blog, she would have seen this and know to not send me that pitch.
- Use an image only press release: It will not show up in many people’s emails, is not customized (see above) and is tacky.
- Have no call to action: Oftentimes I will receive a press release for a product that is interesting to me, but the press release is not accompanied by a letter or a request for product review. Always ask yourself, why would the blogger be interested in this product – and answer that question in the email you send.
- Ask the blogger to go to your website for more details: Many bloggers receive dozens of pitches a week and they don’t have time to fish for information about every product that is introduced to them. Do your best to put all compelling information in your initial pitch.
By following this advice, you will surely have more success pitching within the blogosphere.
Brand Wins Big at Blog Conferences
by Jessica Turner on February 16, 2010 | no comments
in Advertising, Branding, Marketing, Social Media, Twitter
Companies continue to take a creative approach to reach out to bloggers as a way to market products. This was seen in action at Blissdom 2010, one of the nation’s premier women’s blogging conferences, held at the Opryland Hotel February 5-6.
We worked with our client, Soles4Souls, to reach out to this influential group of bloggers at the conference.
Soles4Souls, the shoe charity, sponsored a booth and encouraged attendees ahead of time to bring shoes to the conference to donate to Haitian relief efforts. By leveraging Twitter, blogs, the Blissdom website and its e-newsletter, word spread quickly for attendees to bring shoes to donate at Blissdom.
And did they ever!
More than 1,000 pairs of shoes were donated at the conference. Attendees who donated shoes were entered to win a pair of shoes signed by Rascal Flatts; that contest enabled Soles4Souls to capture the bloggers’ contact information. Soles4Souls also had the opportunity to personally interact with bloggers when they donated shoes and generated several positive leads for future blog partnerships. The organization also included information in the conference swag bags about how bloggers could partner with Soles4Souls on their blogs.
Soles4Souls successfully maximized its sponsorship to reach out to an influential audience, demonstrating the importance of including blogs and bloggers in marketing strategies.
FTC Guidelines Include Affiliate Links
by Jessica Turner on January 7, 2010 | 11 comments
in Corporate Blogs, Social Media, Website
In October, Robin highlighted the key points of the new Federal Trade Commission (FTC) guidelines for disclosure for bloggers. The new guidelines went into effect December 1. As an avid blogger and blog reader, I have seen bloggers in blog posts when they are financially compensated and/or given free product for reviews, saying things like: This is a compensated review by BlogHer and HP. I have also seen a shift in disclosure policies- bloggers adding more details about affiliate links, financially compensated reviews, free products, etc.
The one thing that I haven’t seen is disclosure in blog posts when affiliate links are used. Affiliate marketing rewards people who are associated with a product, service or company for leads or clicks that they generate. The reward can be cash or product. Yes, most bloggers do have a statement in their disclosure policies that says their blog uses affiliate links. However, I have never seen a specific blog post say “compensated affiliate ” or something to that effect.
Since we have a client who is considering launching an affiliate program, we wanted to be sure we were clear on the law, so we did a little investigating. Our understanding of the law was that the disclosure was necessary, but since we didn’t see anyone doing it. Were we missing something?
After a bit of research, we found a webinar with Jim Edwards and Rich Cleland, Assistant Deputy at the FTC talking specifically about affiliates and the law. In the webinar Mr. Edwards asks, if a blogger uses the phrase: Disclosure: Compensated Affiliate on every post with affiliates, is the blogger in compliance with the law? Here was Mr. Cleland’s answer, which he emailed to Mr. Edwards: “The disclosure must be sufficient to alert the consumer that of the connection between the endorser. In this case it is an affiliate marketer. Your disclosure would appear to meet this requirement. The most important aspect of this kind of disclosure will be whether it is clear and conspicuous. Consumers must be able to see the disclosure when they are viewing the endorsement and at the point of the link to the seller’s website.” (Emphasis mine.)
This statement makes it clear that a blogger stating that they use affiliate links in their disclosure page is not enough. According to the FTC, a blogger must disclose within the post when they are endorsing something.
To gain further clarification, I called Mr. Cleland and asked him about affiliate links and when disclosure is necessary. He was kind enough to spend a few minutes talking with me about the matter. He said that a disclosure must be made when a blogger is recommending something and using an affiliate link. He went on to say that “the recommendation triggers the disclosure requirement.” He added that some affiliate marketing is clearly advertising and in that case a disclosure statement is not necessary. It is, however, necessary when the post includes an implied or overt recommendation.
It will be interesting to see how bloggers continue to apply these new guidelines to their blogs. What do you think about the guidelines as they apply to affiliate marketing?
The Makings of a Successful Blog
by Jessica Turner on December 22, 2009 | no comments
in Corporate Blogs, Marketing, Social Media
Unfortunately, there is no magic bullet for creating a popular blog. As someone who blogs professionally and personally, as well as counsels many clients on the process, here are a few tactics that are effective in helping build a successful blog.
Select a Theme: Lovell Links topics are all marketing and public relations based. What is the theme or “brand” of your blog? If you don’t know, sit down and create a mission statement for your blog. This will help create focus.
Engage Your Readers and Join in the Conversation: I usually do this by asking a question at the end of a post. It is a great way to encourage comments.
It is also important to be present in the comments. Some blogs have threaded comments where readers and the writers can respond directly to comments made.
Leverage Other Social Media Tools: Having a presence on Facebook, Twitter, etc. will help drive traffic to your site.
Include an Image: Blog posts with images are more likely to be read. If you don’t have an image of your own, use a stock photo.
Use a Clean Design: Blogs that are filled with many ads, blinkies, etc. are a turn-off for many people who come to the site. Be sure you blog design is clean and represents your brand well.
Proof Your Work: Sloppy writing and editing is not acceptable. Just because it is not printed does not lessen its value. You are promoting yourself and/or your company with each post you write. Check out Ashley’s great post of common writing errors.
Invest Time: Starting and maintaining a blog takes a large time commitment. If you are not ready to commit to blogging several times a week, you should not blog.
Read Other Blogs: One of the best ways to learn how to become a better blogger is to read a lot of blogs. Read blogs that have a similar topic to what you write about – as well as those that are popular. The combination will teach you a lot. (A great way to manage reading a lot of blogs is by using a reader like Netvibes or Google Reader.)
Track Your Traffic and Understand Your Audience: Where are your readers coming from? How long are they staying on your blog? How frequently do they visit? By understanding your readers habits, you can help build loyal followers.
What other tips do you have for growing a personal or professional blog?