Photo Credit: hotelslive via Compfight cc
By Kali Bean
The Hoffman Agency, Portland-Vancouver
When you work in PR, sometimes you start to feel like that annoying friend. You know the one. She always wants something. She’s frustrated when you don’t return her messages. She only likes to talk about herself. And she gets angry when you’re too busy to hang out with her. Sound familiar? I thought so …
As a good PR professional, you do your darndest to stay relevant and build stories worth covering. But do you still have that nagging feeling that you’re that person.
This post shares three ways you can give back to bloggers. And I’m not talking about showering them with gifts and free product to buy their love. Sure, there are bloggers who like to get free product or who build their credibility on testing the products they recommend or talk about. And sure, this can be a successful tactic. However, if your blogger outreach is limited to this and only this, you’re missing the point.
- Give bloggers some link love — Does your client have a blog? Link to a post of theirs on it. That link will not only lead new readers to them, but it will help build their SEO street cred.
- Host a blogger event, and don’t just talk about yourself — Bloggers view these events as opportunities to connect with other like-minded bloggers. Get to know them, let them get to know each other, and they just might want to come back again.
- Take part in guest posts — Lend an expert point of view to a blogger with a guest post on his or her blog. Then promote the heck out of that post. The more successful that post is, the more likely that blogger will want to work with you in the future.
Give a little this holiday season. You might just be surprised on what you get back.
