Last week, you were introduced to a blog post titled “12 Reasons Bloggers Don’t Want To Work With Brands (Part I)”.
In this post, we shared information that was gathered through a survey where 500+ bloggers were asked questions regarding the relationships they’ve formed with brands in the past.
Well, that post only included the first six reasons. We’ve got six more reasons why bloggers don’t want to work with you, and they have just as much relevance as the ones you read about in part I. Let’s jump in!
7. Your Brand Isn’t ‘Socially Minded / Responsible / Eco-Friendly’
In a perfect world, every company on the planet would have core values revolving around being socially responsible or eco-friendly. In today’s day and age, consumers are practically expecting brands to support causes.
If you don’t believe us, here’s an article backed by several case studies that states people today are spending more on brands that have a social purpose.
Many companies are responding to this shift in ways that integrate social causes fully into their business and marketing strategies. Bloggers and their readers are in a sense consumers in this respect. If you’re a company that is socially responsible, let everyone know! Just like consumers, there’s a greater chance bloggers will respond to what you’re doing.
Romina, who writes about living green and health promotion on her blog Just Another Hat, tells us:
“Since I focus on green living, I look for companies that manufacture eco-friendly products, are socially responsible, or give back to the community/charitable donations. I also look for their past relationship with bloggers (i.e. if they have sponsored blogs before).”
8. You Have Poor Email Etiquette
If you’re emailing a blogger for the first time and you shoot the email off with the first line of the message saying ‘Dear Blogger’, you’re losing already. You’re losing by a lot.
A blogger can tell what a relationship might be like with a brand through that first email contact. When you write a blogger with an intro like ‘Dear Blogger’, you’re saying that ‘I want to work with the blogger, but I don’t care enough to look at their site to even find their first name’. First impressions are king, and if you’re firing off these emails, you’re making it appear that your strategy is a ‘spray and pray’ approach. It doesn’t sound like you care too much about getting to know them.
Jen, who writes about balancing work, school, and family, with a special focus on natural parenting at her site Life With Levi, explains that:
“How the company rep treats me helps me decide whether to work with them or not. Addressing me as ‘Dear BLOGGER’ will get less preference than ‘Hi Jen’ or even just ‘Hi!’”
Finally, it shouldn’t have to be said, but proper grammar goes a long way. Jeanette of It’s Jeanette writes:
“Because all of my contact is through email, the first thing that pops into my head is grammar. If you write me a pitch letter that my 5 year old can write better, I’m just going to delete it.”
9. You Are A Poor Communicator
Nothing makes us more upset than watching a blogger enter a relationship with a brand and shortly thereafter, the brand manager falls off the face of the earth. If you’re working with a blogger that is promoting your product and you have poor communication, the blogger will think to themselves “wow, if my experience communicating with the brand is this bad, I shudder to think of the difficulties regular customers might encounter.”
Becca, a blogger who ‘makes the world a better place…one cupcake at a time’ at her blog It’s Yummilicious talks about her best and worst experiences of working with brands:
“I was given the opportunity to demo and do a review post for a food product. The company’s marketing team was a complete joy to work with, very professional, helpful, and they had great communication.
My worst experience was a company that wanted me to endorse their product. They sent me coupons for free samples for myself and my readers, but they had an unacceptably poor response time to my email inquiries, their product wasn’t offered in enough market areas to make it easy to promote, and the company gave me no assistance or ideas on how to engage people outside of the areas where the product is available.”
10. Your Brand Has No Social Media Presence
If your brand’s social presence is poor (or even worse, non-existent), that means you probably don’t understand social media. If your brand doesn’t get social media, you probably won’t understand blog outreach fundamentals. Bloggers will pick up on that and turn elsewhere when deciding to partner with you or not.
Bloggers have told us that before deciding to partner with a brand, scanning their Twitter and Facebook profiles is a must. It helps them decide if the brand uses social media outlets like a megaphone or as a way to have conversations with their followers.
When Rachel of ‘Rachel’s Giveaways’ was asked ‘What are some characteristics you look for in a company when deciding to form a relationship with them?’, she answered:
“My interest in the product, their social media engagement level, if they’ve worked with bloggers in the past, whether or not it’s a brand I feel could benefit from this type of promotion.”
11. You’re Not Interested In Creating A Mutual Relationship
When a brand decides to partner with a blog, it’s just that: a partnership. In an extremely high-level analysis, brands want to grow their business, and bloggers want to grow their readership.
If a brand goes out of their way to help bloggers meet their goals, bloggers will be that much more enthusiastic about their partnership. So before bloggers decide to work with a brand, they ask themselves: do these brands share content that the blogger creates? If you enter in a relationship with a blogger, good brands will share the blogger’s posts as much as the blogger will share their thoughts on the brand.
So if you’re a brand, remember that blogs have goals too. Next time a blog post is written by a blogger on your behalf, pay it forward! I bet the folks that like your brand on Facebook would be really interested reading what the blogger has to say.
When asked about the best experience working with a brand, Teresha of Marlie and Me tells us:
“The best experience I’ve had working with a company is one that is ongoing. It’s a skincare brand and it’s a mutually beneficial relationship. When I run giveaways, they tweet/FB share to their followers too. They care about me getting exposure too.”
12. You’re Approaching Blogs Without A Clear, Organized Strategy
Suppose you’re going over to your best friend’s house because he or she has something to tell you. You walk into their house and a conversation sparks up:
Your best friend: “Let’s go on a vacation! I’m paying for it and you’re coming with me.”
You: “That’s awesome! Where are we going?”
Your best friend: “How about the Cayman Islands? You love the Cayman Islands.”
You: “I certainly do – that would be great! Where are we staying? How long? What airline?”
Your best friend: “Leave it to me! I’ll figure out all the fine details… don’t worry about it. We’re leaving in 4 weeks.”
Three weeks go by, and your friend hasn’t bought the plane tickets. After you call them, they finally get a flight. After getting the flight, you realize you don’t have other essentials: a car rental, a hotel, what you’ll be doing when you get there, etc. It hits you: your ‘dream vacation’ is going to be a hassle. With a week left before your flight, all hotels on the island are booked and the only car you can rent is a full size SUV that costs $163 a day. Push comes to shove, at least you can sleep in the car!
Your friend steps in: “But you’re going to the Cayman Islands!”
Doesn’t matter… nothing is in place, you have no strategy, and now the vacation is going to be anything but stress-free.
If you’re working with bloggers: have a clear, organized strategy before forming a relationship. Have a goal in mind, be organized, and communicate your plan with the bloggers that you decide to work with.
Thanks For Reading!
The objective of this article was to share some insights on what it’s like from a blogger’s perspective when they choose to partner with a brand. If you are a blogger or a brand that has worked with bloggers, share your experiences in the comments below, we’d love to hear them!
We love our bloggers that have been so passionate about telling us their stories. We’re also interested in hearing perspectives from brands as well.
Every Wednesday of each week moving forward, you’ll be introduced to a new brand that we’ve been fortunate to come across and work with in what we’re calling the ‘Rafflecopter Brand Showcase’. Brands will be able to speak up about what they’re looking for when partnering with a blogger.
If you’re a brand interested in hearing more how Rafflecopter hopes to help you work with bloggers in a more effective way, sign up to hear more at brands.rafflecopter.com. We’d love to talk!
Hopefully you’ve found this article helpful!
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