In my previous posts about the benefits of being a guest poster and having guest posts on your blog, I danced around the idea of advertisers who are looking for free or paid advertising on your blogs... and I've finally figured out the linchpin for me as a blogger - it's keywords...
Showing posts with label blog tips. Show all posts
Showing posts with label blog tips. Show all posts
Guest Posting - Why to invite guest posts to your blog...
I blogged earlier on SadieLankford.com about the benefits of being a guest blogger, but why would you as a blogger want to encourage guest posts? Are there pitfalls?
Well there are a number of really good reasons to have guest posts on your blog and a few pitfalls...
Benefits:
Getting Sponsors for Giveaway Hops and Events - my take
With new giveaway hops and events springing up almost daily, I have been finding that one of the questions that is often asked is how do I get sponsors for the giveaway, so I thought I would share what has worked for me. Please feel free to add your suggestions in the comments section so we can all generate more ideas and leads...
A couple of things before I begin:
So, on to getting sponsors:
1. Go with who you know. Keep in regular contact with companies and PR firms that you have worked with in the past. Let them know what you are participating in and how it would benefit them. I worked with a PR rep quite some time ago and approached her again this past spring because I was doing a Mother's Day event. She had just signed a new client who was happy to offer a review and giveaway. I have another contact who wants to be pitched for every blog hop that I do that fits certain criteria and I love working with her, so I keep her in the loop constantly!
2. Use your networks - tweet, post to your facebook wall, your linked-in account, your blogfrog, your blog and anywhere else that you are looking for sponsors for your upcoming event. You never know if someone has a fabulous etsy store waiting to be discovered, a home-based business or even who works for a company that would love to work with you.
3. Use services such as profnet.com, pitchrate.com and ReporterConnection.com. These services allow you to send out a customized press release or e-blast to a large number of contacts who want to get information like this.
4. Cold pitch - Search for the media or blogger contact at a specific company that has something that you'd like to review or giveaway. If you can't find the right contact you can even blind pitch to through their general email or contact form (just make sure you clearly post that you are a blogger wanting to connect with their marketing/social media department)
What makes a good pitch?
1. Be clear - Make sure you get the who, where, what, why, when and how covered in your pitch
2. Make sure you ASK for something - sending out a press release without a call to action will not get you noticed, so ask for what you want. If you are putting together a package with a specific theme, explain that and be clear what you are asking for. If you want to do a giveaway AND REVIEW make sure they know that.
3. Sell the event and your blog - use your own blog statistics and any information that you can glean from the event organizer. For instance, if there are 100 blogs participating in an event and each will have a minimum $25 prize, you can confidently say that there will be over $2500 in prizes available to be won. If you are joining a hop that has grand prizes or additional advertising, mention that too! You want to make your case as strong as you can - people who are pitched by you will probably be pitched by others too - make yours stand out by selling your opportunity!
4. Tell them how they will benefit specifically - will you do a separate teaser post, extra facebook or twitter posts? How many links/entries will you provide? This can be on a sliding scale - if they only want to sponsor a small dollar value you can offer a basic opportunity with one or two links, for a larger sponsorship you will offer more.
5. If you have a media kit with details about your blog, attach it!
Here is a sample email that I sent to a targeted cold pitch for an upcoming event
My media kit contains my blog stats, policies and a brief history of my blog, so I don't include that in my pitch email. If you haven't put yours together yet, you should check out this great tutorial from MomSpark Media.
What has worked for you in the past? Where have you found sponsors? What is your # 1 tip? Please share!!!!
A couple of things before I begin:
- Remember that some people will have outrageous prizes and dollar amounts for their giveaways but don't be intimidated by this, but remember that it's okay to have one sponsor for at or around the minimum dollar value and you will still get bang for your buck!
- It is okay to sponsor yourself - I personally take a percentage of my blog profits and keep it in reserve for purchasing things like Amazon.com GC or doing paypal giveaways, not because I can't find sponsors necessarily, but because PEOPLE LIKE THEM and YOUR GIVEAWAY CAN BE WORLDWIDE, attracting more followers!
So, on to getting sponsors:
1. Go with who you know. Keep in regular contact with companies and PR firms that you have worked with in the past. Let them know what you are participating in and how it would benefit them. I worked with a PR rep quite some time ago and approached her again this past spring because I was doing a Mother's Day event. She had just signed a new client who was happy to offer a review and giveaway. I have another contact who wants to be pitched for every blog hop that I do that fits certain criteria and I love working with her, so I keep her in the loop constantly!
2. Use your networks - tweet, post to your facebook wall, your linked-in account, your blogfrog, your blog and anywhere else that you are looking for sponsors for your upcoming event. You never know if someone has a fabulous etsy store waiting to be discovered, a home-based business or even who works for a company that would love to work with you.
3. Use services such as profnet.com, pitchrate.com and ReporterConnection.com. These services allow you to send out a customized press release or e-blast to a large number of contacts who want to get information like this.
4. Cold pitch - Search for the media or blogger contact at a specific company that has something that you'd like to review or giveaway. If you can't find the right contact you can even blind pitch to through their general email or contact form (just make sure you clearly post that you are a blogger wanting to connect with their marketing/social media department)
What makes a good pitch?
1. Be clear - Make sure you get the who, where, what, why, when and how covered in your pitch
2. Make sure you ASK for something - sending out a press release without a call to action will not get you noticed, so ask for what you want. If you are putting together a package with a specific theme, explain that and be clear what you are asking for. If you want to do a giveaway AND REVIEW make sure they know that.
3. Sell the event and your blog - use your own blog statistics and any information that you can glean from the event organizer. For instance, if there are 100 blogs participating in an event and each will have a minimum $25 prize, you can confidently say that there will be over $2500 in prizes available to be won. If you are joining a hop that has grand prizes or additional advertising, mention that too! You want to make your case as strong as you can - people who are pitched by you will probably be pitched by others too - make yours stand out by selling your opportunity!
4. Tell them how they will benefit specifically - will you do a separate teaser post, extra facebook or twitter posts? How many links/entries will you provide? This can be on a sliding scale - if they only want to sponsor a small dollar value you can offer a basic opportunity with one or two links, for a larger sponsorship you will offer more.
5. If you have a media kit with details about your blog, attach it!
Here is a sample email that I sent to a targeted cold pitch for an upcoming event
I saw your post on xxx and wanted to connect and tell you about my blog, www.actingbalanced.com in the hopes that you might be interested in participating in a review/giveaway event that I have coming up from September 21st - 25th. The event is called Rafflecopter Round-up and will feature more than 100 blogs with prizes of $25 or more.
I am putting together a prize package containing sustainable packaging for travel and lunches, and I thought that your reusable snack bags would be a great addition. In the past, my participation in hop-style giveaway events has garnered over 1000 entries into my giveaways and multiple impressions per visitor for my sponsors.
In exchange for a review, you will get a preview post during the week before the event which will include links to your store and any social media that you'd like me to highlight. If you are only interested in donating a giveaway prize, I am happy to accommodate that as well, however you will only be mentioned in the giveaway post and will have a maximum of two direct links.
I am attaching my media kit to give you an idea about my blog and would love to hear from you if you think that your company would be interested in this opportunity.
My media kit contains my blog stats, policies and a brief history of my blog, so I don't include that in my pitch email. If you haven't put yours together yet, you should check out this great tutorial from MomSpark Media.
What has worked for you in the past? Where have you found sponsors? What is your # 1 tip? Please share!!!!
Alexa Ranking and Review Exchange
Do you use Alexa Rankings as part of your media package? I am working hard to lower my Alexa ranking to make it an attractive part of my P/R info... one of the ways to do this is to have peers review your blog... and rate it!
If you are also using Alexa, and would like to do a review exchange, please leave a comment here with your alexa page and I will do a review for you.
My page is http://www.alexa.com/siteinfo/actingbalanced.com#
H.
If you are also using Alexa, and would like to do a review exchange, please leave a comment here with your alexa page and I will do a review for you.
My page is http://www.alexa.com/siteinfo/actingbalanced.com#
H.
Friendly Wednesday: Blog Tips
Today on Friendly Wednesday, I am featuring another fellow mommy blogger, Melissa from Mommy Living the Life of Riley! who is way more tech savvy than I am and who has shared snippets of two great blog tips with us for managing graphics!
If you want to be featured on a future Friendly Wednesday, please let me know - just leave a comment saying you want to be featured!
My bio:
How to Add a Scrolling Image Bar to Your Blog!
I wanted to write this post tonight because it is a question that I get from a lot of my readers and it is a great tool for any blogger to use. This is a very convenient way to squeeze as much content onto your site without having a blog that continues on FOREVER! I want to try and explain in a few steps how you can turn your sidebar into a scrolling sidebar so that you can display an unlimited amount of graphics in a very small space. Before we begin, I want to admonish the following:
PLEASE DO NOT TINKER WITH YOUR HTML CODE IF YOU ARE NOT COMFORTABLE DOING SO.
REMEMBER TO BACK UP YOUR SITE BEFORE PROCEEDING:
First, you should decide wherever you'd like to install your new scrolling image bar on your blog. Most of the time, this will be done on a sidebar, but you could also easily use this code to create an image slide show in a post of yours as well as in the footer region of your blog too. Next, you should insert the following code above the images that you'd like to scroll together:
Read more here >>
Clean Up Your Graphics!
Today's "Tackle It Tuesday" theme is going to address how to make your blog load faster as well as give you many more search engine links. I'm fairly new to this whole blogging hobby, but I have been dealing with HTML code, in an amateurish way, for quite a while. I'm a big believer in making any website or blog more streamlined, because there's nothing worse than waiting for what seems like an eternity, for a page to load. I myself have left many people's blogs and have never returned, for just this reason. Everyone's time is valuable and what could be slowing your site WAY DOWN is the abundant use of graphics.
I personally enjoy visiting Website Grader (http://websitegrader.com/) to fully analyze my blog for free. Simply type in your blog address as well as your e-mail address, and Website Grader does the rest. It will give you an in-depth report on a full scope of issues and even give you a numeric "grade" between 1 and 100. My grade is currently a 73. When I first started, it was a 62. Here's what I did on "Tackle It Tuesday" to raise my score:
PLEASE DON'T TRY THE FOLLOWING IF YOU ARE NOT COMFORTABLE TINKERING WITH HTML CODE.
Also, make sure that you back up your blog page before continuing.
Find your image graphic HTML code on your site. Most of the time, this is very prevalent in your sidebars. Then, graphic by graphic, search the html code and see if there is an alt=" " code inside that html image code. If there is, then great! You do not need to do anything else. If there is NOT, then simply add it inside the bracket with a description of the graphic. Please see the example below:
Read more here
Thanks for these great tips Melissa!
**Don't forget to enter my Safety Tats Draw
If you want to be featured on a future Friendly Wednesday, please let me know - just leave a comment saying you want to be featured!
My bio:
I'm a former Science teacher turned stay-at-home mom. My blog is about my interests now, such as parenthood, contests and sweepstakes. I always try to give my point of view on a variety of topics and infuse those opinions with plenty to make you smile! I’m reviewing products and hosting giveaways here too!
How to Add a Scrolling Image Bar to Your Blog!
I wanted to write this post tonight because it is a question that I get from a lot of my readers and it is a great tool for any blogger to use. This is a very convenient way to squeeze as much content onto your site without having a blog that continues on FOREVER! I want to try and explain in a few steps how you can turn your sidebar into a scrolling sidebar so that you can display an unlimited amount of graphics in a very small space. Before we begin, I want to admonish the following:
PLEASE DO NOT TINKER WITH YOUR HTML CODE IF YOU ARE NOT COMFORTABLE DOING SO.
REMEMBER TO BACK UP YOUR SITE BEFORE PROCEEDING:
First, you should decide wherever you'd like to install your new scrolling image bar on your blog. Most of the time, this will be done on a sidebar, but you could also easily use this code to create an image slide show in a post of yours as well as in the footer region of your blog too. Next, you should insert the following code above the images that you'd like to scroll together:
Read more here >>
Clean Up Your Graphics!
Today's "Tackle It Tuesday" theme is going to address how to make your blog load faster as well as give you many more search engine links. I'm fairly new to this whole blogging hobby, but I have been dealing with HTML code, in an amateurish way, for quite a while. I'm a big believer in making any website or blog more streamlined, because there's nothing worse than waiting for what seems like an eternity, for a page to load. I myself have left many people's blogs and have never returned, for just this reason. Everyone's time is valuable and what could be slowing your site WAY DOWN is the abundant use of graphics.
I personally enjoy visiting Website Grader (http://websitegrader.com/) to fully analyze my blog for free. Simply type in your blog address as well as your e-mail address, and Website Grader does the rest. It will give you an in-depth report on a full scope of issues and even give you a numeric "grade" between 1 and 100. My grade is currently a 73. When I first started, it was a 62. Here's what I did on "Tackle It Tuesday" to raise my score:
PLEASE DON'T TRY THE FOLLOWING IF YOU ARE NOT COMFORTABLE TINKERING WITH HTML CODE.
Also, make sure that you back up your blog page before continuing.
Find your image graphic HTML code on your site. Most of the time, this is very prevalent in your sidebars. Then, graphic by graphic, search the html code and see if there is an alt=" " code inside that html image code. If there is, then great! You do not need to do anything else. If there is NOT, then simply add it inside the bracket with a description of the graphic. Please see the example below:
Read more here
Thanks for these great tips Melissa!
**Don't forget to enter my Safety Tats Draw
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