Are you looking for a way to make your sales this year the best
it can be? Now that you've created your online shop and made your product line,
the next step is to get your name out there
so you can start to scale up your sales. If you take the time to plan
now, in quarter two and three you could place yourself for liftoff status by the end of the year.
How? The answer might surprise you.
Hello. My name is Mei and it is my passion to help other makers build
and grow their handmade businesses online.
In today's video, I want to talk about a particular marketing strategy that has been proven time
and time again to launch and grow businesses.
And that is with pitching or media outreach.
I'm going to describe how pitching works, why you should do it now, steps
for how to be successful, and then some tips and tricks I've learned along the way.
Let's start off by defining what media outreach
is. Media outreach is simply straightforwardly marketing
your product specifically to a particular person that can promote your business for you.
Basically, you get more awareness around your product or service which can lead to a ton of sales.
And in this video, I want to help you focus on pitching your products to magazines for the holidays.
People have been conditioned to holiday marketing in just a variety of forms,
right? We expect our catalogs and magazines to be filled with gift ideas
that help direct our buying trends for the year.
And did you know that magazine editors start planning their holiday
issues in the middle of summer? Larger print publications
like those glossy magazines you see when you check out at the grocery store,
they work on a 4 to 6 month
lead time. That means they're gathering products
they want to feature now for the holidays.
When it comes to print media,
while there is a much longer lead time, the impact can be much bigger
and longer lasting than other types of media, like online
media or social media. It is proven that getting your products in a nationally
distributed print magazine has a huge impact on the growth of a business,
but it can also be an intimidating mountain to climb
if you're just starting out or if you've never done this before.
You may think that editors will come to you, because you have an amazing product,
right? Don't we all. But spoiler alert.
They won’t and that’s simply because there's just so much competition.
There's so many products out there on the internet that it's become just so vast with so much
content. It's like finding a needle in a haystack.
So you need to find them and pitch your idea or product or story.
That's where the magic gets made. To quickly
share my own experience with you, there is just tremendous power in getting featured.
I got my first five-figure sales a month
because I was able to nab a spot in a popular website called Daily
Candy. Websites have shorter lead times of one to three months,
so there's still time to pitch yourself for inclusion in holiday
gift guides even in the months before November. And I made my first $20,000 in sales months
through being in a print magazine and it was all for free.
Like I didn't have to pay advertising dollars.
I just paid for the cost of making my products and postage to send them to the magazine editor
for them to check out my product and take photos of them.
Here's one major difference from media outreach to something like social media marketing.
When people buy magazines they tend to hold on to them sometimes even for years at a time.
Unlike social media where your social media post
gets buried and becomes irrelevant after a few hours magazines have
the staying power to help promote your shop for
months and years to come from
just one feature. And who are you going to trust more,
right? The person who says “my shop is awesome,
come buy my stuff” on social media or someone else who says “that shop is awesome,
go buy their stuff”? We always trust other people's recommendations more and magazines
hold that credibility and their opinions are trusted more which
ultimately leads to a greater conversion to sales
and recognition for the long term,
which is exactly the shot in the arm your business needs to get to that next level.
When you've been in a magazine, you can put up graphics on your
website to talk about that exposure to further
establish credibility, which garners trust with your website visitors
and makes them much more likely to buy.
It really is this beautiful cycle.
After using this strategy, I was able to see my jewelry
business bring in $200,000 a year consistently
and this marketing strategy doesn't require your constant effort.
I mean, if you did give it, it would be amazing.
But you don't have to. I want that kind of success for all of you watching right now.
So I'm here to break down the process and steps to be successful for you.
What do your customers read? First of all,
you need to know who is your customer.
People are nuanced and don't necessarily fit into any stereotypical box.
However, there are trends you can notice between your customer base
that may help you find the best magazine to target.
When someone favorites
an item in your Etsy shop, check to see what other types of items
they're marking as favorites as well, because this provides a better view of what your customers
like, therefor helping you narrow down magazine choices.
Have some of those other favorite items been featured in magazines
or online websites before? Will those same sources work for your business?
And if you're stuck, you can also ask your followers on social media.
Just ask them what magazines and blogs they read.
When you're searching through print media, be sure to review all of the columns or sections
where promotions happen so you know
which of those sections suits your product best.
For example, tons of women's magazines
have shopping pages. Note to yourself
how they sell the product and if that will work for you. Side note,
business owners sometimes overlook a valuable printed resource the trade magazine.
Although the circulation may not be as wide as larger print media
these trade publications land directly in the hands of retailers,
who could sell your products and would be placing really large
wholesale orders with you. Contact editors.
Now, magazines have tons of editors.
There are often editors for each and every section of a publication as well.
So narrowing down the right person may be a challenge.
However, the information is often listed in the magazine’s masthead,
which is the list of editors at the front of the issue,
or on the publication's website. Start by looking in the About Us and Contact Us sections.
When in doubt you could always simply call the magazine
and ask. Sometimes the old school way works better.
You may also want to do some basic research on the editors that you plan to pitch to.
You could do this via Google or on social media
if you can find them on there. You want to
look for someone who writes the kind of story you would like
to be mentioned in or perhaps what the editor tends to pick for those shopping sections
so you can appeal to them in the best way possible.
This will help you nurture a mutually beneficial
and more engaging relationship with the editor
and they're much more likely to open your email and say yes to you.
Now it's time to pitch. Each publication
you identified in the last step should have its own personalized pitch.
Just like you would update and edit a resume for any job you apply for the same strategy
applies to this situation. By targeting your publications and personalizing the pitch for them
you are upping your chance of making it to print.
What you share with these editors should be short and sweet,
okay? Ideally this email shouldn't be longer than eight to ten sentences
and you will need a strong subject line title
that helps you stand out. Talk about why your idea is a perfect fit
for the magazine's readers and bonus tip here.
If you can connect your product to other products
they featured before, it shows that you are putting in the work to get this done.
Publishers love and appreciate this.
You may also want to create a call to action that is urgent and appealing to the magazine itself.
So perhaps you can create a discount code
for the readers of that magazine or offer to send them product samples,
which is what I like to do. You also want to embed pictures of specific products
you're pitching to the editor. The pictures are most likely
what will grab attention the most in an e-mail at first so make sure they're great photos,
okay? Simple, but high quality pictures with white backgrounds work
well and then perhaps a couple of lifestyle photos too. Follow up.
Now, I know that nobody likes waiting and waiting for a reply.
I use the analogy of applying for a job just a minute ago and it works here as well.
Patience is a virtue but persistence is key to success.
Keep in mind these editors are bombarded with emails
every single day. So many business owners assume that if they don't hear back immediately,
it means that the editor isn't interested, but this is just not the case,
okay? Do not get discouraged if you don't hear back right away.
However, you don't want to sit on your heels and just simply wait it out either.
Wait a week and send a follow-up if you don't hear from them and try not to take it personally
if they don't respond even after a follow-up.
They may just not have a spot for your product at this point
or are passing your information around to another editor who could potentially do a write
up for you.
It doesn't hurt to reach out once more a few months later.
Perhaps a new season or a new trend comes up and your product suits that story
well. As you know, as a maker, persistence is one of the top skill sets
you need to keep a business going. They called or more likely emailed.
So now what? In reality,
magazine editors and online bloggers are always looking for new products and content to cover.
So, the deck is not stacked against you in this process,
which is why I am suggesting it to you in the first place.
I was able to find success in this strategy
as did most successful brands online and I want you to have that as well.
You may just get an email back thanking you
and telling you that you've been selected for a certain month's issue.
So exciting! Once the issue is published if the publication is large enough
and the readers are truly your ideal customers
then there is no reason you shouldn't see an increase in sales.
But to further maximize your new exposure,
share your feature on your social media profiles,
take photos of your feature in the publication
and put it on your own website and email your subscribers about it.
Tell everyone and shout it from the rooftops.
While this process has you doing a lot of outreach in the beginning,
because like with everything else in this business world it's a numbers game,
one magazine spot can lead to not just more sales but many more other features in the future.
That's what I call the domino effect with media outreach.
I know it may be hard to start thinking about the holiday season at this time of the year,
right? You may be juggling work and kids home for summer or dreaming of taking that vacation.
But by spending some time right now
focusing on your business's growth, I promise you you won't regret it. Having
your product featured in a magazine could mean the difference between a 1000 dollar
sales month versus a 40,000 dollar sales month.
That is a huge impact and I know that if you've made it to the end of this video,
that is the kind of growth you are looking for.
Are you planning anything else now for the holiday season?
Comment below and let me know.