A quick guide to online publicity
I found this some time ago – it was a guest post on one of the finance blogs I follow – and I meant to write about it, but somehow forgot. So, here it is, better late than never.
The author provides a great list of Do’s and Don’ts when trying to cultivate online press contacts and woo the blogosphere into covering your product/service/show/album/whatever.
It is specifically written for people who work in PR & publicity, but I think Lindsay outlines some great principles that independent artists can adapt and apply in cases where the PR/pub duties fall to us.
My favorite tips are these two:
2. Pick Eight Blogs
While the rest of the publicists in her company were sending out mass emails to everyone, hoping to get bites from Perez Hilton, Gawker, HuffPo, or wherever, this publicist focused on a lower traffic tier with the (correct) understanding that these days, content filters up as much as it filters down, and often the smaller sites, with their ability to dig deeper into the internet and be more nimble, act as farm teams for the larger ones. A site can be enormously influential without having crazy eyeballs, because all eyeballs are not equal.
4. A Monkey Can Send a Mass Email: Build Relationships and Understand What Your Real Job Is
I don’t know why one of the oldest truisms of publicity, marketing, salesmanship, and basically every other field is ignored by online publicists: it’s about relationships! I can find my own content without the help of any publicist — any blogger worth his or her job can. I just get annoyed that my time has been wasted. If a publicist shows that they know what they’re doing, the resulting surprise on behalf of the blogger/reporter/editor will lead to more attention paid to that publicists offerings. Duh.
Amen sister! The original post is a really quick read and if you are dealing with online publicity, I suggest you check it out.
Tags: educational_resources, good-advice, public-relations, publicity