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!