The Art of the Blog Giveaway (Part Two): How do you even get stuff to give away?

So the art of the giveaway actually begins before you’ve given anything away, before you announce the giveaway, before you’ve done a product review (if your giveaway is attached to that).

It begins with your blog and a brand.

There are two ways, that I know of, to secure stuff to give away:

1. You contact a company to ask for stuff to give away OR
2. A company contacts you to ask you to give away their stuff

This distinction is actually pretty important to you, the blogger. There is absolutely nothing wrong with contacting companies you love, whose products are relevant to your readers, and asking them for product to give away. However, going on to propose that you receive payment for that promotion (even if it includes a product review) can be generally regarded as a “bait and switch.” Not saying it isn’t done, but don’t be surprised if it is perceived that way.

If you want a company to pay you to run a promotion (and if you have the readership/marketing skills to back up that desire) you should probably put that out there up front. In the very near future (I promise!) we’ll go over blog rate sheets, but for now if you have one, include it with your pitch (we’ll go over this too…in fact I’m sensing my next series!).

But if you’re not comfortable doing that quite yet, embrace the fact that you will not be paid to do this promotion. In reality, that’s ok. Companies that run promotions on your blog can become future advertisers or sponsors for things like travel.

However, if a company approaches you this means a few things. Firstly it means that you’re “on their radar.” Someone has mentioned you, you came up frequently in searches, you have a good Klout score, but most importantly, your blog has something they want. This gives you just a little bit more negotiating power than the first scenario.

In that situation (which usually happens by email), you would also include your rate sheet, but not in a “I don’t get out of bed for less than $10,000” kind of way. In my case, most of the time I get an email from a company that says something like this:

Dear Bariatric Foodie,

We love your blog and think your readers will love our product. We’d love to ship you some samples to try for a review and some to give away. Please email me back if you’re interested.

Signed,

Company X

To which I usually reply:

Dear Company X,

Thanks so much for checking out my blog! I’d be interested in discussing how you can work with Bariatric Foodie to raise awareness about your products.

I’d like to do some research on your products before we talk any further but in the meantime I’ve attached my Promotions Rate sheet for your review. Please let me know if you have any questions.

Sincerely,

Me

This accomplishes two things:

1. They are now on notice I am doing my due diligence on them (and every good blogger should. Never, ever agree to do a product review or giveaway without vetting the product first!). This means that I recognize that they get as much benefit from this as I do.
2. They are now on notice that this probably isn’t going to be free. And companies need to embrace that. They pay for newspaper ads, radio and television spots. This is another form of advertising for them and, yes, there is a cost associated with that.

And in the end they’ll say yes or they’ll say no. Many times they’ll try to negotiate and you should just use your best judgment in that. Or consult some sort of advisor (a blogger who does this stuff regularly).

Ok, so this seems like a good place to break but we’re still not at the point of announcing a giveaway yet. In my next post I’ll tell you my experience with negotiating the finer points of a giveaway, some pretty basic “do’s and don’ts” and we’ll begin to think about structure.

Until then!

The Blogger Mentality

When I read blogs about blogging, I always see this question. “How often do I have to post to my blog?”

Call me a provocateur if you’d like, but I am of the opinion that if you are asking that question one of the following must be true:

1. You are blogging about the wrong thing.
2. You shouldn’t really be blogging.

The best, most successful blogs come from people who are passionate about their subject content. Because they are passionate about their subject content you almost can’t stop them from blogging about it. The passionate blogger feels compelled to share things and draws inspiration to do so from many places. This is not to say a blogger doesn’t experience burn out every now and again (I have). But eventually “the itch” comes back.

If you don’t get the itch, you might consider why you’re in this.

Having said that there’s definitely a “blogger mentality,” from my observations. So I thought I’d speak on that. There are three distinct habits I’ve noticed. Successful bloggers tend to:

• See nearly anything as potential content: I’m a food blogger. So anything having to do with food is potential content: a trip to the grocery store, a restaurant meal, a new product I’ve heard about. Anything that is of interest to me as a foodie is potential content for my food blog. This is not just limited to food blogs, though. For fashion bloggers, people on the street, mannequins in store windows, a fashion magazine cover in the grocery store line, it can all become good content!
• Are prepared to market content in nearly any situation: I finally broke down and got an iPhone. It really is a blogger’s friend. With it, I’m a one-woman media center. But your favorite smart phone will do just fine. The point is if you see potential content you should be able to capture it. That means having the capability to take pictures, make videos and upload that content to either your blog platform, Facebook, Twitter, Instagram or YouTube.
• Know how to market content as a part of their daily lives. I’ll give you an example. Even my kids know we rarely sit down to a completely new meal (home-made or otherwise) without photographing it. Further, they tend to arrange their food on their plates in aesthetically pleasing ways just in case I get the urge to snap them with their food. When I’m out and about I know how to get good shots of things that I can use later. I always make sure to shoot the fronts of products so I get the logo/branding. When making a product at home, if I have a piece of branded material to go in the picture (like a branded tumbler with a protein company’s logo on it) I use that. That way when I Tweet it, I can tag the brand and they’ll re-share.

This may all sound like a pain in the butt to someone who just wants to write. Again, if that’s the case, BSHU is probably not the blog for you! But for those looking to build an audience, if doing these things isn’t second nature, make them so!

When you open yourself up to the endless possibilities of content generation, your audience responds in kind. You become a part of their everyday lives. You start a conversation. People want to support you and they begin to!

You’d be surprised.

So…do you have a blogger’s state of mind?