Blogging Perks - Marketing With Free Gifts To Bloggers
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My first blog was more focused on personal finance topics like budgeting, investing and saving money. Since that site is 18 months old now, even though I’ve pretty much abandoned it, it still gets search
engine traffic for these topics.
Blogging Perks - Marketing With Free Gifts
This leads me to tonight’s topic. A shiny new copy [hardcover] of The Single Best Investment [aff] just arrived at my door today and I realized that it happens fairly often…people sending me free this and that. Here’s a typical email:
Hi,
I’m doing marketing for a great dividend-based investment book by Lowell Miller and judging by your blog I think you’d appreciate his viewpoint and strategies. Can I send you a complimentary copy? If you like it and think it’s worthwhile you can blog about it but there are no strings attached.
Let me know,
<marketing person>
In the past year, I’ve received several books and quite a few pieces of useful software, just for having a site that comes up in a search for certain topics.
Freebies are one of the unexpected and not often talked about perks of blogging.
Marketing Via Blogs
On the flip side, it is clear from these perks the blog marketing is increasing in popularity. This particular email I really liked because they clearly said “no strings attached.” Being pushy, having strings or demanding a review can backfire, so don’t do it…give it as a gift, if you’ve targeted the person properly, they will likely want to write about it.
A couple targeted bloggers writing about your product can be the start of a very effective word of mouth advertising campaign. Watch for ways of leveraging the blogosphere in ways like this to continue to grow [stuff like this too].
Take aways
1.) Start a blog about something you enjoy so you can become important in your niche and get free stuff.
2.) Create relationships and give freebies to strategically placed bloggers to generate buzz and spread the word about your product.
Hey, I missed your “Getting free stuff so you don’t have to.” Oh, wait, we do want free stuff
PS. I laugh at my own jokes. It’s either quirky or annoying, your choice.
I laugh at my own jokes too…often I’m the only one
re: Start a blog about something you enjoy so you can become important in your niche and get free stuff.
you don’t want to get free stuff, because you neither want it nor need it. you want to get paid and buy the stuff that you want and need.
re: Create relationships and give freebies to strategically placed bloggers to generate buzz and spread the word about your product.
that’s a good one
stas, in this case the marketer asked me if I wanted the book, and it just happened to fit with some investing that I was planning to tackle, so it was really a good fit.
In general though I agree…schwag it generally a waste…you should see how many Microsoft shirts I have in my drawer…I just don’t work on my car that often
lol