About 3 weeks ago, I had an awesome opportunity to see a demo of a new product called Yoostar. I’m not going to talk about the product (although, you should definitely check Yoostar out, it’s awesome!). Instead, I’m going to tell you why I would count the Yoostar outreach campaign an amazing success.
Yoostar’s marketing decided to outreach to bloggers and invite them to see a presentation on the product they’re releasing. So since I’ve already recommended that sometimes emailing bloggers is a great idea, let’s look at what Yoostar did right.
The Initial Outreach
The first thing Yoostar marketing did, that jumped out at me, is that they pitched me really early. They gave me almost a month lead time, to make sure I was free.
I think many brands forget that people have lives, and bloggers won’t drop everything for you; be courteous to them.
Secondly, the email was written as if it came from a friend, and they had definitely read my articles. Not only had they read my blog, but also my guest posts on Mashable and Techipedia.
Another interesting thing that they did, was that they offered priority dates to bloggers. Yoostar gave us the first say at what times are best for us. This really excited me, because it showed how they understood a blogger’s ego.
Finally, they didn’t make the email all about them. They realized coming to a presentation may not seem fun (even though their product is awesome!). To give us a reason to be in the area, the email suggested I make a day in NYC, which is exactly what I did.
The Presentation
When my girlfriend I arrived to the demonstration, we were greeted and treated like royalty. The actual Yoostar product is exciting, but the presenter’s passion really sold the product.
A key take away for product launchers is, bloggers are emotional beings. If you get really excited, we feed off that energy and get excited too.
After seeing Yoostar in action, I was given a press packet as a USB thumb drive. They made it easy to have all the information we would need to write a detailed article.
The Follow Up
Our interaction didn’t end there though. My contact from Yoostar continued to follow up with me, asking if I needed any information, and even offered to try to get me a Yoostar product!
Most importantly though, from these follow up emails, I never felt pressured to write something about the product. In fact, more often than not, it felt like talking to a group of friends, that were passionate about their product.
Even if I hadn’t written about the experience, they would’ve won. I know I’m going to buy their product, and have already convinced a number of my friends to get one too!
Why It Worked
Their outreach program worked because they took the time to explore new verticals and truly understood what I write about.
They made me feel like a rock star the whole time, and went out of their way to cater to me.
The relationship didn’t end, and I got all the information I could need.
Finally, they had an exciting product and a group of passionate employees. These two things are key to any social media success.
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{ 8 comments read them below or add one }
Did their friendly reception color your opinion of the product at all? I really have a difficult time seeing how YooStar is not one of the dumbest ideas ever to reach store shelves. The technology itself might be interesting or even impressive, but how many people want to pay money for the ability to do this?
Their friendly reception probably did have an impact on how I felt about the product, but I won’t lie the thing is pretty awesome. I know I would rather pay for this than get two or three board games.
Thanks Yasmin! I’ll start writing something for sure.
Go head, write a best practices blogger outreach post! I will happily share it. Btw, blogged about your blog cos it was so great! http://www.techaffect.com/2009/06/18/reaching-out-to-bloggers-remember-these-tips/
YB
Wow, It certainly worked. You were obviously impressed by the way they conducted their work. I’m sure they are aiming to get this right!
Have just checked out the product and wow, this is a serious bit of kit. This is certainly something I would love to own. They have found a niche with this one, I think it will do well.
Will be keeping my eye out for more on this.
@Yasmin @CV – Thanks so much for your comments.
Yasmin were you hinting to me to write a best practices blogger outreach post? Because if you were – I’ll happily begin writing it. I don’t want to take away anything you might have been writing.
CV it is 100% true, connecting with actual people is the best part of marketing. I enjoy pitches, I don’t follow through with most, only the best. It’s simple to get my attention though, don’t look like spam.
Samir, isn’t it nice to connect with actual people, even when the connection is for commercial/marketing purposes? Funny how when people are enthusiastic about their product AND have an understanding of their audience (in this case, bloggers) they can reach us to connect on what matters?
Given my own concerns about when people (marketers and bloggers) are asked to shill for products and use their personal reputations to sell things, I appreciate it when people can make a genuine person-to-person connection within a marketing context. And, it can’t hurt to be pysched about a really innovative and fun product!
cvh
Samir, thanks for writing about this and giving us insight into why this blogger outreach program worked! These are all great important points that you bring up. Definitely see a “Best Practices for a Successful Blogger Outreach Program” paper coming out of this
. Do you know how many other bloggers they reached out to? Did you meet other bloggers there and did they feel the same way?