When launching a campaign, you must be acutely aware of where your campaign spreads after the first exclusive goes live. Most campaigns that earn a top-tier pickup will spread through social networks, messaging systems, news sites, and blogs, allowing you to secure a cascade of links from your original placement.

If you’re not monitoring this spread and optimizing it for your clients’ benefit, you’ll end up missing out on establishing a more diverse, high-quality link portfolio that would require little additional work from your team. Here’s where you should start:

Link Reclamation – The process of finding natural syndications of your campaign and working with the editor to optimize the story for the biggest client impact.

Link reclamation should occur shortly after your first exclusive goes live, allowing you to leverage the recency effect.

Recency Effect – When people are asked to recall a list of items that are presented to them, they tend to be able to best recall those at the end of the list (the recency effect) and those at the beginning of the list (the primacy effect) better than those in the middle of the list.

Using this theory, you’ll want to reach out to writers shortly after they’ve published your campaign, so it’s fresh in their minds and ripe for updates; if you reach out several weeks after they’ve published, sometimes the story can be too stale for an update.

Below, I’ve outlined the important steps of link reclamation and the strategies that will have the biggest impact for your client.

I. How to Find Publishers Who Have Syndicated Your Campaign

At Fractl, we dedicate 30 minutes, or more, per day to link reclamation, depending on the initial reach of each campaign. For example, one campaign may garner 100 syndications, while another campaign may earn only 10 syndications.

You’ll want to dedicate the most time to the campaign that has the largest number of syndicators because that campaign will provide the most opportunities for reaching out and optimizing a writer’s story.

In order to change a story, the first thing you have to do is find the story. Here are our favorite tools for finding natural syndications.

Step 1: CognitiveSEO

CognitiveSEO offers an Instant Backlink Explorer, which allows you to find publishers who are linking back to one of your original pickups. Once you’ve searched an original, exclusive link via the “Explore Links” field, select the “Page” option on the subsequent page and perform independent searches for the placements that likely garnered the most syndication, such as:

• The client’s campaign landing page
• The URL of the exclusive pickup
• The URL of any top-tier pickup

This search will generate a comprehensive report analyzing the total number of referring domains, the total number of links, page authority, and domain authority.

Step 2: Google News

Google News allows you to search for any pickup that was a syndication of the original campaign but perhaps didn’t link to the original story. Using Google News, you may perform a broad keyword search for any term that might relate back to your campaign, including:

• Client name
• Campaign name
• Campaign landing page
• Exclusive placement headline
• Major placement(s) headline
• Anchor text
• First sentence of exclusive/major placements
• Combination of the above

Since not all publishers are included in the Google News results, you can expand this same search via the “Web” function. Using Google “Search Tools,” narrow your results by selecting “Custom Range” and then input the date of your exclusive launch and carry it to the current date. This will allow you to find any natural syndications that occurred after your exclusive went live.

Familiarize yourself with the Google Search operators to expand the queries used to find your campaigns.

Step 3: Reverse Image Search

Google’s Reverse Image Search and TinEye both allow you to find publishers who have syndicated a graphic from your campaign but might have left off the proper attribution that would otherwise help you locate their story. Simply drop the Imgur URL (or relevant image link) of your graphic into the image search box and you’ll find an array of pickups for your campaign.

In the browser Chrome, a reverse image search can be executed by simply right-clicking on an image and selecting “Search Google for this image.”

A word of caution: An image search will often pull a mix of placements and URLs with graphics that look similar to yours, so make sure you verify before including the pickup in your client report.

Step 4: BuzzSumo

Similar to CognitiveSEO, BuzzSumo offers a tool that allows you to look for publishers who have provided attribution to a specific campaign link. The benefit of BuzzSumo over CognitiveSEO is the added social metrics, which give you insight into the other pickups with high engagement that might have generated additional syndications as well.

Step 5: Google Alerts

Google Alerts provides an easy way for you to track client pickups directly in your inbox. Simply enter the client name, campaign title, or exclusive placement headline and you’ll receive an email anytime a new story is written with your keywords. While this tool is at the bottom of our checklist, it never hurts to add an additional source for tracking pickups.

Now that you know how to find the majority of your syndicators, how do you determine which links are worth changing?

II. How Link Type Determines the Changes With the Highest Impact

Not all publishers are created equal, nor are their link types. With link reclamation, there’s little value in changing a co-citation link to a “dofollow” link on a publisher with a domain authority under 20; however, there’s high value in hunting down top-tier pickups that provide no link at all.

First, how are different links defined?

• Nofollow: The publisher provides a link back to the client within its post. Right-click on the page to find the “Source Code” and then search the code for a “nofollow” condition. If “rel=nofollow” is present, the link is not passing value to your client.

• Dofollow: The publisher provides a link back to the client within their post. Perform the same search within the “Source Code” to see if a nofollow condition is present. If it is not present, then the link is passing value to your client.

• Co-Citation Link: Publisher A writes the exclusive on your campaign and then Publisher B writes a story about Publisher A’s original exclusive. Publisher B links to Publisher A but doesn’t link to your client. E.g., Original Story → Co-citation on Wired to PC World.

• Text Attribution: When a publisher credits your client by mentioning the client’s name in its post, but there is no link back to your client’s site.

• No Attribution: When a publisher writes about your campaign but provides neither a co-citation link nor a mention of your client.

When performing link recon, the links you want to focus on changing and to which links you should change them are as follows:

• Co-citation → Direct client attribution
• No Attribution → Dofollow
• Text Attribution → Dofollow
• Nofollow → Dofollow

So how do you go about making those changes?

III. How to Perform Link Attribution Requests

Reaching out to a publisher to change a link is a tactic that requires a very sensitive approach. If you’re too aggressive with your approach, most publishers will perceive you as one of the dozens of link spammers that flood their inbox daily, like the one I received yesterday:

It’s important that you set yourself apart with the following best practices.

1. Reach out to the original writer.

When you reach out to contact@domain.com or editors@domain.com, it’s easy for your request to get lost in the shuffle. It’s also easy for people to perceive you as a spammer when they don’t immediately recognize the story you’re referencing. When going for the recency effect, you’ll want to find the email address of the specific writer who wrote the story you’re seeking to change.

2. Open with a positive angle.

Mention how happy you are that the writer found this story worthy of covering. If the post performed well, highlight in which ways (i.e., engagement in the comments section) his or her audience found this content valuable and engaging. Find a way to connect with that writer on a personal level, to show you did your research and you’re not another bot. Taking these steps sets a positive tone before you make your request.

3. Explain why your client’s landing page is a value-add.

If a publisher syndicated your campaign, it might not be aware of your client or the additional landing pages for your campaign. Building landing pages that include additional findings incentivizes the publisher to link back to the client’s page as a value-add, rather than just offering a link to the client’s homepage which can be perceived as a more salesy approach.

Take the piece “Dying to be Barbie” as an example. By creating a research-focused landing page for our campaign (which elaborated on our study), we were able to secure two links for our client rather than one.

This landing page also enabled us to follow up with publishers who didn’t cite the client as a source and provide them with an asset that would add value to their stories if updated. More than 60 percent of publishers want to see something new or exclusive in a campaign, so be sure to highlight the new stats you’re hoping to include in their write-up.

4. Keep your email brief.

When it comes to pitching best practices, 45 percent of publishers want a pitch that is less than 100 words, and another 43 percent want you to keep it under 200 words. Since updating a story can be a pain for some writers, I suggest keeping your pitch as friendly and brief as possible.

5. Include the relevant links to make it easier to update.

When requesting an article update, you want to make it as easy as possible for the writer to remember and access the article you’re referencing. Be sure to include a link to the writer’s original story, in addition to the link for the correct client page and/or landing page. This makes for a quick plug-and-chug for the writer, which makes you less of an inconvenience and more of a help.

6. End by building a new relationship.

Since most of these writers picked up the story naturally, there’s an opportunity for you to establish a new relationship with a writer who has already published your content. Although your request ultimately serves one goal – to fix improper attribution – keep in mind that, like the link, the relationship with the writer or editor also has long-term value. Keep your approach personable and find opportunities to continue to build a relationship with that writer – whether you’re offering a new campaign that fits his or her beat or you’re continuing to engage with that person on social media.

In closing, here are a few of our link reclamation pitches that enabled us to secure a larger link portfolio for our clients.

Sample Pitch – Turning Co-Citation Into a Dofollow

Hi XX,

I’m contacting you in regards to your post XX. I’m part of the creative team at XX, and we’re responsible for creating the study in your article. I’m thrilled our infographic inspired you to “double the number of selfies” you’ve taken, and I hope your readers were inspired as well!

I noticed you provided attribution to XX for this study. While it was the first publisher to cover our campaign, there’s actually an additional page that provides even more insight into our research. For example, did you know XX or XX?

I thought you might find this interactive landing page to be a great value-add for your write-up, so I wanted to reach out in case you wanted to update your post. If you have any questions about the study or are looking for an exclusive quote from our client, let me know how I can help.

Sample Pitch – No Attribution

Hi XX,

Wow, your post on our study XX was so in-depth! Thanks for taking the time to write the article – I’m glad to see it gave you some engagement as well.

I was reaching out in hopes that you would update your story with proper attribution, giving credit to the team that created this in-depth research project. Here’s a link to the original write-up, which provides additional insights on our methodology and findings.

If you could let me know when proper attribution has been provided, I would greatly appreciate it.

Does your team practice link reclamation? If so, share your favorite tips in the comments below!

The post How To Earn More Links for Your Campaign with Link Reclamation appeared first on BuzzStream.

So what should you do instead? Lichfield highlighted his idea of a winning outreach strategy:

• Really getting to know the journalists
  • What they’ve written before
  • What they’re experts in
  • Where they’ve lived
  • Things they believe in
  • Things they love
  • Things that make them mad

• Understanding the nuances of their news outlet
  • Who it writes for
  • How it frames its stories (people or issues, gossipy or wonky?)
  • How its readers find those stories

He admits “this high-touch strategy is extremely time-consuming.” But the mass-emailing approach that most traditional firms pursue? “I call it failure.”

With public relations professionals outnumbering editorial voices almost 5-to-1, Lichfield isn’t the first person to write about the failed strategy of mass-email-pitching, nor will he be the last.

So, how can you reverse the trend of publisher lament? You implement a high-touch outreach strategy – you network, you learn, you build mutually beneficial relationships.

Social media channels function to break down barriers, allowing you to build superficial relationships with anyone from a celebrity to a journalist. Your goal with social media is to get the conversation going and then leverage other channels to develop the communication into a meaningful relationship.

While platforms like Facebook are largely meant for close friends, places like Twitter, LinkedIn, and Quora can be used for connecting with people from all walks of life. Here you’ll find several practices for improving and leveraging your social media presence for influencer outreach.

I. Make a good impression

Positive first impressions are important in a world dominated by social media, where your profile image is often someone’s introduction to who you are. Within 100 milliseconds of viewing your picture, people form opinions about your personality.

In several scientific experiments, people were able to accurately judge an individual’s level of extraversion, emotional stability, openness, self-esteem, and religiosity based on a profile picture. The combined impression of physical characteristics, body posture, facial expression, and clothing choices allows observers to form these accurate assumptions of your personality.

In one specific study, researchers at the University of York in England analyzed people’s first impressions of 16 social traits in 1,000 facial images.

The study found that brief facial expressions can make a big difference for how we are received by strangers. So, how can you use these findings to put your best face forward? Based on the study, you should do the following in your profile picture:

• Select images with a front view instead of a side view.
• Smile wide – a broadly smiling face seem more approachable and trustworthy.
• Tilt your head.
• Make your eyes appear as large as possible.
• Avoid facial stubble unless you prefer to appear dominant.

PRO TIP: From LinkedIn to Twitter to Gmail, do your profile images match? If we connect on ABC channel, but you email me on XYZ channel with a different image, how quickly do I recognize you?

II. Leverage social expressivity and self-disclosure to produce intimacy and liking

Research shows that the act of self-disclosure is central to the development of close relationships and to the maintenance of psychological well-being. Through several ongoing studies, researchers have discovered:

• People who engage in intimate disclosures tend to be liked more than people who disclose at lower levels.
• People disclose more to those whom they initially like.
• People like others as a result of having disclosed to them.

But is online disclosure perceived as valuable as in-person disclosure? New research shows that online social expressivity and self-disclosure plays as important of a role in producing intimacy and liking as in-person experiences. In a study of online impressions, participants who were socially expressive and disclosed a lot about themselves, both on their webpages and in-person, were better liked than those who were less open. Areas that were analyzed include:

Self-disclosure:

How much one talks about himself or herself, as indicated by lists of personal interests, personal activities, personal attitudes, etc.  

• Number of personal interests revealed
• Number of television, book, and movie preferences revealed
• Number of favorite quotes displayed
• Number of creative applications displayed
• Number of personal activities revealed
• Number of Facebook groups endorsed

Social expressivity:

How much one displays sociable interactivity, such as through posting of photo albums and contacting others (“friends”).

• Number of pictures posted
• Number of wall postings
• Number of photo albums created
• Number of friends

This theory of self-disclosure to form relationships is also backed by the Northwestern Law study on anonymity and the identifiable other, which states:

Since outreach primarily takes place in a lean communication channel – email – the more conversations you can nurture outside of email, the stronger your connection will be. Your goal when networking with writers on social media is to have as many candid conversations as possible, learning both professional and personal information that will allow you to form a bond with your influencer.

III. Build authority signals in your social profile

When interfacing with influencers on social media, your authority signals serve as an outside endorsement and recommendation. Your goal should be to optimize every social profile so that your authority signals are one of the first things an influencer will see when they research your name.

1. Optimize your cover image

Both Twitter and LinkedIn offer “Cover Photos,” which are usually someone’s first impression when they land on your profile page. If possible, include the logos of places you’ve been published to show that you and your company are an authority on high-quality content creation, which could be of value to your influencers.

2. Write guest posts covering topics that influencers care about

If you want to be valuable to influencers, then you should be creating and sharing resources that the influencers will find valuable. The majority of influencers come in the form of high-authority publishers or individuals, most of whom create content that they want to be recognized for. Since most of your content creation objectives align with theirs, doing research in this field helps you both improve your content creation, gets you on their radar, and starts building a valuable mutually beneficial relationship.

If you’re really confident about your piece, send a friendly email to your influencer with your post and offer it as a valuable read. Ask for recommendations on areas they would like to explore further and offer to collaborate on a future study.

3. Get endorsements for your work

The best way to secure more LinkedIn endorsements is to offer endorsements. I’d say 60-70% of the time that I offer an endorsement to someone I know, that person will then endorse me.

On Twitter, your endorsement largely comes in the form of your follower count. While there are dozens of high-quality posts teaching you how to increase your follower count, the next best tip is to aim to improve the following:followers ratio in your favor. By sharing useful and interesting content, engaging with your audience, and hashtagging appropriately to get new users, you can slowly grow your number of followers.

PRO TIP: Avoid following fake Twitter accounts. Most spam-bots have a following:follower ratio that is almost equal.

4. Show off your portfolio of work

LinkedIn allows you to embed a portfolio of work under your summary and your individual job description. To get users to my authority signals faster, I feature my portfolio at the top of my LinkedIn page in my summary section:

Although Twitter doesn’t offer a portfolio section, you can easily share your recent campaigns through a regular tweet.

PRO TIP:  Although Twitter doesn’t offer a portfolio feature (yet), you can use your images as a place to curate your own portfolio.

IV. Use advanced search functions to curate influencer lists

Twitter sees an average of 5,700 tweets per second. Unless you’ve curated a list of journalists who you want to actively engage with, it’s easy for your networking attempts to get lost in the noise.

When aggressively doing outreach for clients, I set a daily calendar reminder to spend 30–60 minutes engaging with my “Top-Tier Publisher” Twitter list. This is a private list I curate with all of the top-tier publishers I wanted to eventually pitch.

I highly recommend creating individual lists based on the client verticals your agency serves (e.g., cooking versus health). Use the Twitter Advanced Search to quickly curate a list of anyone with the words like “writer, journalist, blogger, columnist” in his or her bio, and narrow it down by your vertical keywords.

From there, cherry-pick the people you want to include in your private Twitter List. When your networking reminder goes off, check your curated stream for tweets that you can easily connect with.

PRO TIP: Use BuzzSumo Influencer Search and sort by Page Authority to discover columnists who write for high-authority sites. If you sort by Domain Authority, it will refine a list of mostly WordPress subdomains.

V. Leverage your six degrees of separation and social influence.

Nielsen’s 2013 Consumer Trust in Advertising report found that the No. 1 trusted form of advertising came in the form of “recommendations from people I know,” which was up 6 percent since 2007. As a form of advertising, influencer marketing can also benefit from personal recommendations.

Did you know you’re just six introductions away from any other person on the planet? After checking 30 billion electronic conversations among 180 million people in various countries, Microsoft researchers proved the theory of Six Degrees of Separation. Seven years later, Conspire was born.

Conspire is a powerful tool that analyzes email data to find the strongest path of connections in your extended network to any person or company you’re interested in. Conspire’s tagline “find the best path to any person without ever sending a connection request” allows you to avoid the emotional and psychological dynamics of interacting with a stranger, and go straight for a personal introduction.

Through its internal analysis, Conspire creates relationship scores to determine the difference between a close colleague and someone you met at a conference for five minutes. With this data, Conspire can then tell you exactly how to get the best introduction to whoever you want to meet.

The icing on the cake? Conspire’s email report card offers insights on your message volume by day, number of contacts you’re in touch with, top contacts, response time, response rate, and who you’re losing touch with.

PRO TIP: Grow your authority and your six degrees of connection by cross-pollinating your social accounts. Publisher covers your exclusive? Add him as a LinkedIn connection. Writer follows you on Twitter? Add her as a LinkedIn connection. Not only does this allow you to build more opportunities to create stronger connections, but it also keeps you in the front of mind when you post future updates.

VI. Go where the conversation is happening

Want to shoot fish in a barrel? Twitter, LinkedIn, and Quora all provide places where like-minded individuals gather to have meaningful, thought-provoking, and educational discussions.

1. Twitter Chats  

Throughout the week my Twitter feed becomes peppered with various industry Twitter chats. These events are hosted by one individual who poses questions to the crowd, meant to discuss trends, tips, and more. These Twitter chats serve as a playground for industry peers to network and learn. You can join the chat by @ replying the question asker and/or appending the assigned hashtag. To keep track of the conversation, simply follow the search for the chat’s hashtag.

What better place for you to get your feet wet with the influencers you hope to reach? Below I’ve curated several chats designed for journalists to talk about the tools and tricks of the trade.

Hashtag: #journchat

When: Mondays at 8pm EST

What: Started in November 2008 by PR maven Sarah Evans, #journchat is one of the first and largest journalism-related chats to crop up on Twitter. According to the blog, the mission of #journchat is “to keep an ongoing, open dialogue between journalists, bloggers, and public relations professionals.”

Hashtag: #wjchat

When: Wednesday at 8pm EST

What: #wjchat is focused on the conversation surrounding Web journalism.

Hashtag: #DFMchat

When: Wednesdays at noon EST

What: Topics for the weekly Digital First Media chat include open newsrooms, crowdsourcing, and user-generated content.

Hashtag: #APstylechat

When: Monthly at 2:30 pm EST

What: Style experts at the Associated Press host monthly sessions in which journalists can pose questions on tricky grammar choices, receive writing tips, or just brush up on the rules. For a schedule of upcoming chats, click here.

For more Twitter chat schedules, check the following resources:

• Twitter Chats Google Spreadsheet
• Tweet Reports
• Chat Salad

2. LinkedIn Groups

LinkedIn operates the world’s largest professional network on the Internet with more than 347 million members in more than 200 countries and territories.

Where do all of these members congregate? LinkedIn groups. Unlike Twitter chats, LinkedIn groups provide an in-depth and intellectual conversation, with many groups posting multiple questions per day.

Since LinkedIn limits the number of groups you can join to 50, you have to be strategic in the groups and discussions you participate in. While some groups should speak to your general interests, others should give you the opportunity to connect with the influencers you hope to pitch.

For example:

• Broad Groups
  • LinkedIn for Journalists
  • Society of Professional Journalists
  • Authors, Writers, Publishers, Editors, & Writing Professionals
  • Online Reports and Editors
• Niche Groups
  • Women in New Media
  • Sports Journalism
  • The Freelance Writer
  • Freelance Editing Network
• Publisher Groups (regional, national, news, etc.)
  • Hearst
  • Cox Media
  • USA Today
  • The Telegraph
  • The Huffington Post

You don’t need to be a publisher to contribute meaningfully to a discussion. Most threads offer topics ranging from “your favorite journalist” to “your favorite resource,” all of which you can answer with a quick Google search.

PRO TIP: Perform an Advanced LinkedIn Search for the influencers you want to reach out to. Scroll to the bottom of their profiles to find which LinkedIn groups they participate in and which influencers they find inspirational. Use this as a point of connection in your future pitch.

VII. Leverage LinkedIn ads

LinkedIn ads can be an amazing way to show off content you have already created to very targeted sets of journalists and tastemakers. This can work especially well if your content has already been published and is gaining traction on a high-authority site.

The best part of LinkedIn ads its the granularity they provide in their targeting, including location, company name, job title, school, degree, field of study, skills, groups, gender, and age. With these fields, you can target all the way down to a small sample of highly targeted individuals.

For example, if your piece has been picked up by Harvard Business Review, you could leverage the authority signals that this sort of pickup provides, and promote the HBR post to targeted groups of journalists and editors at competing sites, blogs, and newspapers. For publishers, marketers, and influencers alike, there is almost nothing better than having pre-proven social traction to incentivize them to cover your story.

What best practices do you use to leverage your social media presence for outreach? Share your tips in the comments below! 

The post The Advanced Guide to Improving Your Social Media Presence for Outreach appeared first on BuzzStream.

 But how should you begin to understand the nuances between the verticals? BuzzStream and Fractl have helped you get started with the new Guide to Publisher Personas. Using recent articles, LinkedIn and Google+ profiles, and bios from personal and publication pages, we outlined the personas you’re likely to meet in 11 different verticals: automotive, business, education, entertainment, finance, food, health, lifestyle, news, tech, and travel.

 Five Traits to Learn

 Based on our research, we found that five traits factor heavily in determining the type of editor you’ll most often find yourself working with.

64% of publishers agree that you should learn about them via their social media or published posts and reach out to establish a personal connection before you pitch. Your background research should yield more than a shared love of cats or support of a sports team, however. You can use social media (especially LinkedIn, Twitter, and Google+) and publication bio pages to discover how much they may already know about your topic, the audience they want to connect with, the assets they typically prefer, and – most importantly – the tone and scope of their beat.

 While knowing a fun personal detail may earn you an appreciative smile when an editor reads your pitch, having a deeper understanding of who they are, how they work, and what they want will earn something much more valuable: their consideration for a placement.

Knowledge is (Pitching) Power

Doing individual research on the individual publisher you’re pitching will give you the best information for tailoring your pitch. Your best bet is to gather as much professional information as you can alongside a few personal details, then create a profile of who your prospective contact is and how to pitch them.

 As examples, take a look at four of the verticals we researched. Based on dozens of articles, profiles, and bios, we created broad personas that can help guide your research and pitching approaches.

1. Tech Editors

The tech sector is the third-most-frequently pitched vertical in publishing; top-tier editors may be receiving upwards of 300 pitches per day. In order to get your pitch opened in such highly competitive inboxes it is imperative that you know exactly what your potential contact covers and how they like to talk about it, otherwise your pitch will be quickly passed over or deleted. Be sure to note their brand or tech loyalties, their level of analysis (do they cover broad trends or specific devices?), and any other nuances that set them apart in the crowd. 

2. Food Editors

Trade crunching numbers for high-quality images of crunchy granola when pitching editors in the food vertical. Because the majority of their social traction comes from Pinterest, food editors value visualizations more than most. Your research on these contacts should include any regional, technique, or creative specialities they may employ in their content.

3. Education Editors

The goal of an educator is to make a concept more easily understood. Help your education contacts achieve this goal and you’ll earn more placements for your content. To do this, you’ll need to look closely at their profiles and past work to learn whether they cover complex issues or everyday concepts, then pitch to the appropriate end of the spectrum. Pro Tip: Videos and lists typically receive the most shares in this vertical, so keep your eye on whether your contact uses these types of assets and offer them if you can.

4. Automotive Editors

Like tech editors, automotive folks are passionate about brands and innovations. Unlike the tech vertical, older models and brands carry a certain sense of prestige and authority in the world of vehicles. Pitches that make comparisons or draw new (or even controversial) conclusions are likely to fare better in this sector, but be sure to do your homework to learn about the preferences and affiliations of the writer you’re pitching.

See pitching profiles for seven more personas (finance, travel, health, business, entertainment, news, and lifestyle) when you download the free Guide to Publisher Personas.

The post 11 Influencer Marketing Personas You’re Likely to Meet appeared first on BuzzStream.

1. Lifestyle, Entertainment and Technology writers take the brunt of your pitches 

In our study, we found Lifestyle, Entertainment and Technology writers account for 60% of the verticals getting pitched over 300x/day. Knowing that these verticals suffer the most news release fatigue, you should trim down your pitches to the preferred 100-200 word count. In comparison, there is significantly less competition in verticals such as Jobs, Animals, and Climate, each of which receive an average of 10 pitches/day.

2. Editors receive 68% of your pitches

PR professionals often debate about whether you should pitch editors, staff writers, or contributors; however, our research tells us that editors receive 68% of your pitches. If you want to stand out where there is less noise, try pitching staff writers with a highly targeted pitch based on that individual’s beat and previous coverage.

3. 75% of publishers prefer subject lines under 10 words

Keep your subject line as short and to the point as possible. 55% of respondents indicated that they prefer subject lines to be 6-10 words long, and the next highest requested length was 0-5 words. Anything longer and you’ll lose the attention of most editors, or you’ll risk getting your subject line cut off in an inbox.

4. 99% of publishers are against “clickbait” subject lines

More than 50% of respondents said your subject lines should be specific, descriptive, and tailored to their beat. Less than 20% want catchy, personalized, or humorous subject lines. Only 1% said subject lines should look like clickbait.

5. 70% of publishers don’t want to see CAPS, emojis, or exclamation points

Save your friendly and enthusiastic messages for when you text your friends. Publishers want you to keep your pitches professional, and avoid the phony friendliness.

6. 66% of publishers want you to indicate a standing relationship in your subject line 

If you have worked with a particular writer in the past, it can be advantageous to mention that in the email subject line. 66% of publishers indicated they would be at least somewhat more likely to open your email if you reference your past relationship in the subject line.

7. Highlight your key findings

80% of writers said they would like to see your content title, a key statistic from your study, or a clearly defined pitch in the subject. Content with raw data or original research is highly desirable, with more than 85% saying they would like to see that information in your pitch.

8. 85% want raw data with your pitch

In the past two years we’ve noticed a significant uptick in publishers rejecting campaigns if the sources are not authoritative, recent, and verified. This is likely the reason that 85% of publishers want your raw data with your pitch, so they can quickly verify your information. By providing the publisher with your raw data, you also allow them to cover your campaign under the angle they are most interested in featuring, rather than a pre-formatted graphic.

9. Less than 15% of publishers are “very open” to syndications

Having the right syndication strategy in place can make or break your campaign’s success, especially when you consider that only 15% of publishers are “very open” to syndications. However, it’s important to note that the majority of these responses came from the highest authority publishers, while the mid-to-low-tier publishers are more open to covering a campaign even if they’re not the first to write about it.

10. 87% of publishers don’t want you to exceed 1-2 follow up pitches

There are many reasons a person could have missed or forgotten to respond to your original pitch, but there are very few reasons why someone would miss more than two emails from you. This is why one follow up is the standard best practice, and any more than two is perceived as spam.

11. 53% of publishers have blacklisted at least one person this month due to a bad pitch

The stakes are high when someone blacklists your email, because you’re ultimately putting your entire team at risk for having your company’s domain blocked from future pitches. That said, it’s imperative that you stay in touch with the latest pitching best practices and outreach training resources to make sure your team is ahead of the curve.

Want to learn more about the collaborative study by BuzzStream and Fractl? Read our white paper to discover 21 tips for pitching publishers!

The post Research: How To Write Subject Lines that Drive Open Rates appeared first on BuzzStream.

Let’s use #selfies as an example. While self-taken photographs have existed since the 1800s, Google trends reveals that the term “selfie” went mainstream in late 2012:

Seeing the infamous hockey stick (exponential growth factor), the Fractl creative team jumped on the opportunity to develop “Which Celebrities Take the Most Selfies?” for launch in August 2013.

This campaign totaled 120+ pickups, with featured placements on Mashable, Fast Company, Today, Huffington Post, Newsweek, The Chive, Hollywood, Stylecaster, Social Media Today, Daily Dot, and more.

Which promotions factors helped boost the success of this campaign? In this post, you’ll learn:

• How to identify trending stories around your campaign topic
• How to craft your pitch language to highlight the timeliness of your campaign
• How to increase campaign syndications once the exclusive goes

I. Identifying Trending Stories Related To Your Campaign

One of the most important aspects of pitching is casting a wide net: You need to identify as many topics as possible that relate to your campaign. The best way to do this is to perform a broad keyword search for the main topic(s) of your campaign, with the goal of turning up as many unique trending stories as possible. Since you’re looking for current trending stories it’s imperative that you limit your search to the last three months, but preferably the last week to one month.

For the campaign above, we targeted the following broad keywords:

• Selfie
• Selfies
• Celebrity Selfies
• Celebrity Selfie

There are multiple tools that allow you to perform this search, though Buzzsumo provides the most comprehensive results. If you don’t have access to Buzzsumo, the following search methods will deliver similar results:

• Google Trends – Select major “News Headlines”
• Google Search – Use “Search Tools” → “Custom Range” → Last three months
• Google News – Find what’s trending now
• Google Images – See if your competitors have placed similar content
• Search Strings –  Use the top 10 search modifiers

By the time we were done list building for our campaign, we had identified several unique trending stories that we could go after:

• Selfie named word of the year for 2013
• American Psychiatric Associations Makes It Official: ‘Selfie’ a mental disorder
• Kim Kardashian’s Post-Baby Swimsuit Selfie
• Kendall Jenner Mermaid Selfie
• Miley Cyrus Rocks A Swimsuit On An October Day In L.A.
• Funeral Selfies Are The Latest Evidence Apocalypse Can’t Come Soon Enough

Once you’ve pulled your trending stories, then you want to discover all of the places that each of those story angles were syndicated to so you can amplify your pitch list.

II. Crafting Your Pitch To Emphasize Timeliness

With timely campaigns, you have a small window of opportunity to leverage the current news coverage. However, you also have an advantage: The publishers want to maximize their coverage on trending stories, too.

Editors don’t have time to research the timeliness of every campaign pitch, so neatly package the importance of your pitch by by highlighting the following:

• How your campaign is relevant to the publisher’s coverage
• How the topic you’re presenting is trending in the news
• What new information you’re bringing to the table

Here was my exclusive pitch to Huffington Post:

Long time no chat! I noticed the uptick in Huffington Post’s coverage on Selfies, so I thought you might be interested in this exclusive.

My team conducted research on the explosion of selfies in 2013, with a focus on the celebrities and countries who are fueling the trend. For example, Miley Cyrus leads the way with 121 Twitter selfies, but Kylie Jenner takes the cake with 451 Instagram selfies. You can check out our exclusive findings here, and we have additional information in our parallax.

Given Miley’s current coverage in the news, and the increasing media attention towards selfies, I thought this might be a really timely piece for you. Is this an exclusive you would be interested in?

In this pitch, I highlighted:

• Huffington Post’s archives to demonstrate their increasing coverage on the topic
• Google Trends graph to demonstrate the increasing national coverage on the topic
• New statistics from our research to show how we’re breaking new data on the trending story

The exclusive went to Huffington Post, but unfortunately the writer’s headline, “A Brief History Of The Selfie,” didn’t do the campaign justice. The post resulted in a lackluster 567 social engagements. Fortunately, we were able to syndicate immediately to Mashable, where the natural syndications ultimately took off.

While your exclusive should always go to a top-tier publisher to expand your campaign reach, not all publisher engagement is created equal:

III. Increasing Campaign Syndications Using Pitch Angles

Even though a publisher may regularly see high engagement metrics, sometimes factors like a headline flub can make or break your natural syndications. This is why it’s imperative that you have a syndication strategy in place before your exclusive goes live.

• Exclusive – The first publisher to write about your campaign. The exclusive is highly prized amongst top-tier publishers, most of whom will only write about your campaign if they’re the first one to cover it.
• Natural Syndication – When a publisher writes about your campaign after seeing it published on another site.
• Syndication Strategy – Queue of pitches developed to send after the exclusive goes live. These pitches target high, low, and mid-tier sites that are relevant to your campaign topic.

The syndication strategy is also important because most campaigns will go stale within the first month of being published, driving fewer and fewer pickups for each week that goes by. Typically, the prime time to secure press occurs within 1-2 weeks after the exclusive goes live, when the campaign is still fairly new to most of the Internet. Your goal is to queue up and send as many targeted pitches as possible during this timeframe.

While I never encourage templated pitches for exclusives, sometimes you can get away with a more formatted pitch during the mid-to-low-tier syndication phase. The best approach to scale your syndication pitches is to go after publishers who are all covering the same story angle. Typically you’ll see 1-3 variations of a trending story, so you want to have 1-3 variations of your syndication pitch to speak to each segment of writers.

Let’s take “Kim’s post-baby swimsuit selfies” and “funeral selfies” as two examples of how you can approach mass syndication:

1. Kim Kardashian’s Post-Baby Swimsuit Selfie

Sample One: Positive, supporting message

I’m not surprised to see Kim Kardashian flaunting her post-baby body so much – she did a great job of losing that weight! She is, of course, getting a lot of negative attention about it, but I think it’s safe to say she’s used to that by now.

I work on the creative team for eBay Deals, and we recently conducted an exclusive study on the explosion of selfies in 2013. One discovery we made was that Kylie, Kendall and Kim Kardashian make up 3 of the top 5 celebrities who have posted the most selfies on Instagram. Kourtney, Kris, and Khloe round out the top 25. You can check out our exclusive findings here, and we have additional information in our parallax.

Given your interest in celebrities and selfies, I thought you might be interested in this exclusive research for a story. When you have a moment, I’d love to get any feedback you may have. If you have any questions, please let me know.

Sample Two: Humorous, negative message

Good for Kim for losing that baby weight, but I’m not sure her daughter will appreciate these selfies once she is old enough to see them. I’m not even sure that I’m old enough to see them.

I work on the creative team for eBay Deals, and we recently conducted an exclusive study on the explosion of selfies in 2013, with a focus on the celebrities who fueled the trend. One discovery we made was that Kylie, Kendall and Kim Kardashian make up 3 of the top 5 celebrities who have posted the most selfies on Instagram. You can check out our exclusive findings here, and we have additional information in our parallax.

Given your interest in celebrities and selfies, I thought you might be interested in this exclusive research for a story. When you have a moment, I’d love to get any feedback you may have. If you have any questions, please let me know.

Sample Three:  Humorous, neutral message

Sometimes I admittedly feel bad for Kim Kardashian and all of the negative attention she gets. Then she goes and posts a selfie in her white swimsuit and I remember that’s probably what she wants – any press is good press!

I work on the creative team for eBay Deals, and we recently conducted an exclusive study on the explosion of selfies in 2013. One discovery we made was that Kylie, Kendall and Kim Kardashian make up 3 of the top 5 celebrities who have posted the most selfies on Instagram. Miley Cyrus (can’t forget about her!) clocked in at #1 for most selfies on Twitter. You can check out our exclusive findings here, and we have additional information in our parallax.

Given your interest in celebrities and selfies, I thought you might be interested in this exclusive research for a story. When you have a moment, I’d love to get any feedback you may have. If you have any questions, please let me know.

2. Funeral Selfies Are The Latest Evidence Apocalypse Can’t Come Soon Enough

Sample One: In Support

My initial reaction to the “Selfies at Funerals” Tumblr was admittedly shocked and judgmental – however, maybe this is just another way of dealing with the emotions surrounding death? If someone has too much to drink at a wake, we brush it off as “their way of dealing with things.” Maybe this is the millennial generation’s coping mechanism, since technology provides them with a way to connect with their friends for support.

My team recently conducted an exclusive study on the explosion of selfies in 2013. With prime ministers and figures such as the Pope taking selfies, it does not look like a trend that will be vanishing any time soon. Celebrities such as Kylie Jenner have as many as 450+ selfies to date. You can check out our exclusive findings here, and we have additional information in our parallax.

Given your recent post on selfies, I thought you might be interested in this exclusive research for a story. When you have a moment, I’d love to get any feedback you may have.

Sample Two: In Opposition  

I have to agree with you in that taking selfies at a funeral seems somewhat narcissistic. While I don’t think taking a photo to capture a memory should be frowned upon, it somehow seems less genuine when shared with 500 followers and captioned with “#likeforlike.”

Perhaps these kids have just fallen victim to another tech phenomenon. My team recently conducted an exclusive study on the explosion of selfies in 2013, which shows even figures such as the Pope take selfies at inopportune moments. Celebrities such as Kylie Jenner have as many as 450+ selfies to date! You can check out our exclusive findings here, and we have additional information in our parallax.

Given your recent post on selfies, I thought you might be interested in this exclusive research for a story. When you have a moment, I’d love to get any feedback you may have.

By going with a semi-personalized yet formatted pitch, you enable your team to syndicate your campaign to larger number of publishers in a shorter amount of time.

What other tips do you have for using trend stories to get major placements? Share your favorites in the comments below!

The post Newsjacking for Outreach: How to Use Trending Stories to Get Major Press appeared first on BuzzStream.