the difference between spam and a "pitch"
A lot of the work that I do with Tell Ten Friends is in PR. For the past few months, I've seen some success in pitching stories about my clients to bloggers in addition to the "mainstream" media. The only way to do this right is to follow a certain degree of blogging etiquette, so as not to labeled a spammer.
Most fans of this blog have their own great blogs, many of which have large audiences. As the rest of the world catches up with RSS and the online conversation, those audiences are going to be more and more coveted by PR firms and various other "marketers."
This means two things:
1. Bloggers will see plenty of pitches
2. Bloggers will see plenty of spam
I'm here to help identify the difference, in a blinding flash of the obvious: Spam was written for "them," while pitches are written for you. The principle difference is whether or not they have taken the time to identify you by name, prove that they've read your blog, and leave legitimate contact information for themselves.
I receive plenty of spam- some comes randomly via email, some comes in the form of comments here on the blog, and yesterday I coined a term because I get so much "MySpam" via MySpace. But today I received an honest-to-goodness pitch.
Here's what they did right:
1. Used my name
2. Wrote the subject line specifically for me.
3. Complimented me on my blog and even quoted two separate posts (flattery will get you everywhere).
4. Left his full name
5. Sent it from his personal email address, with a link to it in his signature.
Not because I'm plugging his product but rather because he was so diligent, I'm going to link to him: www.igotnewsforyou.com. And I'll let their site do the talking.
To be fair to "Benjamin" and his project, I won't offer my review of the product here, but rather I'd love to hear what my readers have to say. Follow the link to their site, and please leave your feedback in the comments section here. I'll pass it on to them via email, along with my two cents.
Comment away.
posted by Jordan Behan @ 6:50 PM
3 Comments:
Okay, you made me laugh. Well done.
Jordan I know exactly what you mean. It hasn't migrated over to the Garden yet, thankfully, but occasionally I'll get emails from someone through BMA wanting me to write a post about them, with the 'pitch' usually being 'Hey thought you would like this, thanks.'. and then a link. I ignore them all.
However there is one PR firm that always refers to me by my name, mentions a post I left on BMA that they liked, and answers any emails I have about the campaign within the hour. I go out of my way to post about every email tip I get from her, all because she took a few minutes to personalize the email.
I've yet to see good blog spam or pitch. Maybe I'm just in the wrong marketing niche :)
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