Blog Outreach aka Blogs as a marketing medium

What is Blog Outreach?

This might be a lesser talked about article but I’m sure all of us are aware of it, experienced it and involved in it in one way or the other.

Blog outreach is the derived new channel in the New Media, which is the process of targeting and connecting to specified audiences through the medium of bloggers and blogs that are specific authorities to particular categories of a large market.

Well, simply put, a marketer using the power of a blogger to sell his product is basically blog out reach.

For example, a cell phone company using the power of a technology blog like TechCrunch to sell/advertise/get the buzz on it’s new product is a form of blog outreach.

Blog outreach is a much more sophisticated form of media channel these days. Where it would have been an easy guess that a technology review blog would be the best medium to reach out to tech savvy online users, these days more and more products and services are getting online and the necessity for more specified blogging authority channels are required.
Of course technology is the best and most common channel on the internet. And there are more technology/review blogs than anything else.

Problems with the Traditional online marketing.

But think about it when a detergent powder company like Ariel or Surf comes online and wants to make a buzz about it. As the traditional methods suggest, Ariel or Surf can go for banner ads, paid ads on Google and “assume” that they have the visibility covered.

The problems are less obvious and transparent but clear from the results.

- A blind strategy like banner ads can get you traffic but it is necessarily not the best target. If it was all of the should order a packet of detergent powder online. That rarely happens.
- A CPC ad campaign on Google can get you ‘X’ number of visitors for ‘Y’ number of ads shown for ‘Z’ amount of money blown away. But apart from numbers how much value would it bring to you? And if you are in a competitive market, just to make sure you are on the right spot, you’d have to pay more than your competitor even if your budget didn’t allow it.
- The failure in connecting dots
Online marketing is different from other forms of marketing that there is no room for error or you’ll burn your hands. In traditional marketing, if you have the luxury of putting up billboards on the road, where everyone passes by, here in online marketing you can only put up a billboard at places where your audience exists. And that’s a utopian concept.

In blog outreach, you have precise information on who your audience are, what is they behavior and in what number would your product would be sold. This is extremely vital for marketer. In fact, that’s what he needs.

What is the scope of Blog outreach?

Incredible. People are moving more online (almost done isn’t it?) and the scope of delivering content to them is almost humongous. It’s like the cable TV industry. Remember the confusion and excitement that came along when it came first ?

Examples of Blog outreach

There have been numerous examples of blog outreach. You might have been involved in it knowingly or unknowingly like the Proto.in free pass thingy discussed here.
TNX have been buying bloggers to write about them.
Nokia have been gifting bloggers with mobile phones to get the buzz.
Online companies give all sorts of promotional items to bloggers to write about them.

How can bloggers make sure they are a part of the whole phenomena?

- Have a blog
Well, that’s the basic step. Have a blog and write your thoughts there. The world is a platform for everyone today, everyone have their own piece of audience. So start blogging today.

- Be an authority
Whatever you blog, be the best in it or join the league of the best. When someone wants to select you as their partner for selling products, wouldn’t they want you to be the best guy? So be an authority. Only an authority will have a following, and he will be a credible guy.

- Find niches
You can’t be an authority in everything. You can’t be the best in everything. So choose a smaller area, which you are comfortable of. If you are good in reviewing movies be a movie reviewer and if possible find a specification in it as well. This helps to remain focussed.

- Be honest and write for your readers first
Once you have a lot of readers, learn to respect them and write for them rather than for the guy who is paying you to write a review. The internet audience is very sensitive and has a bad temper, so take no chances and don’t fake. Right from the start, be honest in your reviews and attitude. If you fake it, everyone can easily make it out and won’t value you.

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