We've all been there: you plan, launch, and eagerly await the many returns on a content campaign, only to be disappointed when it falls flat. But all is not lost: there are clever ways to give your failed campaigns a second chance at life and an opportunity to earn the links you missed out on the first time. In today's Whiteboard Friday, we're delighted to welcome guest host Shannon McGuirk as she graciously gives us a five-step plan for breathing new life into a dead content campaign.
Click on the whiteboard image above to open a high-resolution version in a new tab!
Video Transcription
Hi, Moz fans. Welcome to this edition of Whiteboard Friday. My name is Shannon McGuirk. I'm the Head of PR and Content at a UK-based digital marketing agency called Aira.
Now, throughout my time, I've launched a number of creative content and digital PR campaigns, too many to mention. But the ones that really stick into my head are the campaign fails, the ones that got away from the link numbers that I wanted to achieve and the ones that were quite painful from the client-side and stakeholder-side.
Now, over the last couple of years, I've built up a couple of steps and tactics that essentially will help me get campaigns back on track, and I wanted to take you through them today. So, today, I'm going to be talking to you about content campaign comebacks and what to do if your content campaign fails.
Step one: Reevaluate your outreach efforts
Now, take it right back to when you first launched the campaign.
- Have you contacted the right journalists?
- Have you gone to the right publications?
- Be realistic. Now, at this point, remember to be realistic. It might not be a good idea to start going for the likes of ABC News and The Daily Telegraph. Bring it down a level, go to industry blogs, more niche publications, the ones that you're more likely to get traction with.
- Do your research. Essentially, is what I'm saying.
- Less is always more in my eyes. I've seen prospecting and media lists that have up to 500 contacts on there that have fired out blank, cold outreach emails. For me, that's a boo-boo. I would rather have 50 people on that media list that I know their first name, I know the last three articles that they've written, and on top of that, I can tell you which publications they've been at, so I know what they're interested in. It's going to really increase your chances of success when you relaunch.
Step two: Stories vs. statements
So this is when you need to start thinking about stories versus statements. Strip it right back and start to think about that hook or that angle that your whole campaign is all about. Can you say this in one sentence? If you can get it in one sentence, amazing because that's the core thing that you are going to be communicating to journalists.
Now, to make this really tangible so that you can understand what I'm saying, I've got an example of a statement versus a story for a recent campaign that we did for an automotive client of ours. So here's my example of a statement. "Client X found that the most dangerous roads in the UK are X, Y, Z." That's the statement. Now, for the story, let's spice it up a little bit. "New data reveals that 8 out of 10 of the most dangerous roads in the UK are in London as cyclist deaths reach an all-time high."
Can you see the difference between a story and a statement? I'm latching it into something in society that's really important at the moment, because cyclist deaths are reaching an all-time high. On top of that, I'm giving it a punchy stat straightaway and then tying it into the city of London.
Step three: Create a package
So this seems like a bit of a no-brainer and a really obvious one, but it's so incredibly important when you're trying to bring your content campaign back from the dead. Think about creating a package. We all know that journalists are up against tight deadlines. They have KPIs in terms of the articles that they need to churn out on a daily basis. So give them absolutely everything that they need to cover your campaign.
I've put together a checklist for you, and you can tick them off as you go down.
- Third-party expert or opinion. If you're doing something around health and nutrition, why don't you go out and find a doctor or a nutritionist that can give you comment for free — because remember, you'll be doing the hard work for their PR team — to include within any press releases that you're going to be writing.
- Make sure that your data and your methodology is watertight. Prepare a methodology statement and also get all of your data and research into a Google sheet that you can share with journalists in a really open and transparent way.
- Press release. It seems really simple, but get a well-written press release or piece of supporting copy written out well ahead of the relaunch timing so that you've got assets to be able to give a journalist. They can take snippets of that copy, mold it, adapt it, and then create their own article off the back of it.
- New designs & images. If you've been working on any new designs and images, pop them on a Google shared drive and share that with the press. They can dip into this guide as and when they need it and ensure that they've got a visual element for their potential article.
- Exclusive options. One final thing here that can occasionally get overlooked is you want to be holding something back. Whether that's some really important stats, a comment from the MD or the CEO, or just some extra designs or images for graphics, I would keep them in your back pocket, because you may get the odd journalist at a really high DA/authority publication, such as the Mail Online or The Telegraph, ask for something exclusive on behalf of their editor.
Step four: Ask an expert
Start to think about working with journalists and influencers in a different way than just asking them to cover your creative content campaigns and generate links. Establish a solid network of freelance journalists that you can ask directly for feedback on any ideas. Now, it can be any aspect of the idea that you're asking for their feedback on. You can go for data, pitch angles, launch timings, design and images. It doesn't really matter. But they know what that killer angle and hook needs to be to write an article and essentially get you a link. So tap into it and ask them what they think about your content campaign before you relaunch.
Step five: Re-launch timings
This is the one thing that you need to consider just before the relaunch, but it's the relaunch timings. Did you actually pay enough attention to this when you did your first initial launch? Chances are you may not have, and something has slipped through the net here.
- Awareness days. So be sure to check awareness days. Now, this can be anything from National Proposal Day for a wedding client, or it can be the Internet of Things Day for a bigger electrical firm or something like that. It doesn't really matter. But if you can hook it onto an awareness day, it means that there's already going to be that interest in the media, journalists will be writing about the topic, and there's a way in for your content.
- World events. Again, keep in mind anything to do with elections or perhaps world disasters, such as tornadoes and bad weather, because it means that the press is going to be heavily oversaturated with anything to do with them, and therefore you might want to hold back on your relaunch until the dust is settled and giving your content campaign the best chance of success in round two.
- Seasonality. Now, this isn't just Christmas. It's also Easter, Mother's Day, Valentine's Day. Think about the time of year you're launching and whether your content campaign is actually relevant at that time of year. For example, back home in the UK, we don't tend to launch content campaigns in the run-up to Christmas if it's not Christmas content, because it's not relevant and the press are already interested in that one seasonal thing.
- Holidays. Holidays in the sense of half-term and summer holidays, because it means that journalists won't be in the office, and therefore you're reducing your chances of success when you're calling them or when you're writing out your emails to pitch them.
So there are my five steps for your content campaign comebacks. I know you've all been there too, guys, and I would love to hear how you got over some of these hurdles in bringing your content campaigns back to life. Feel free to comment below. I hope you guys join me soon for another Whiteboard Friday. Thanks.
Great stuff Shannon! I found this really useful even though content and PR isn't really part of my day to day tasks. It's good to have an understanding of what to do when things go wrong :)
Thanks Dan! :) I totally appreciate the Aira love.
We are the best we have done as a strategy. It gives you more visibility, more traffic, trust with customers, branding, better position in Google ... And that just a few months ago that we are implementing, I'm sure in the coming months all these benefits will increase more. I recommend it, and as you say, start small and go climbing and do not stop doing it, allocate part of the marketing budget in this. It works very well.
Thanks for sharing your article Shannon
Good checklist to follow.
We tend to forget that content is a "product" that we offer. The best "product", or "content" should always have a proper strategic mapping for the launch. Your post is a marvelous road map to avoid being buried under any major event that would take over the news!
Thanks!
Very useful post. I really liked "Seasonality. Now, this isn't just Christmas. It's also Easter, Mother's Day, Valentine's Day. Think about the time of year you're launching and whether your content campaign is actually relevant at that time of year."
Last year in fact I have read several post themed around around Halloween like "10 SEO Horror Stories"
With regards to seasonality - think about where you campaign will reach. The seasons are offset in the Northern and Southern Hemispheres. Orchestrating a Winter-themed campaign in December will suck in Australia or South Africa....where it is Summer.
A great tip!
Hey Shannon.
I really enjoyed your Whiteboard Friday, and I especially appreciate your tip about proper content timing.
I think we marketers are sometimes so enthralled with our work that we imagine, and seriously believe, that the whole world holds their breath for a moment when we are about to launch (or relaunch) our content.
It so isn't like that.
The Moon circles the Earth, our planet circles the Sun, and we are not the center of the universe (just ask Galileo).
Proper timing is crucial for success.
Thanks you Shannon
Great tip for finding the right time keyhole to plug our content key in:)
One of the most useful articles I read this month.I have been blogging for 3 years and I have learned a lot from the Moz blog.Campaigns are all unique .Its good to go back to drawing board.
I'm so glad the post is of use to you Dr Amrita! I think we all need to learn from, and share our experiences when things don't work as well - it's the only way we can get better at what we do.
Thanks for these wonderful tips Shannon, i really loved specially 3 of those.
I just have one query, since we speak about asking for feedback from journalists, or contacting influencers for contributing our contents, does it really as simple as we speak?
Practically, I've seen many people spend a lot of money and time behind creating contents that audience would love to read, but when it comes to contact influencers, it becomes very hard to get speak with them, they may never reply you back. So, i would like to know how we can save time and get maximum approvals or discussions with them?
Thanks in advance.
Hi Shubham,
No, it's not always as easy to get feedback from a journalist as it may seem. They sometimes won't reply to you straight away, so it's important to remember that there are other forms of contact rather than just email. Sometimes it's best to pick up the phone or send a tweet...
There's no real quick fix to getting as much feedback as you can for a campaign, it can take time and often a lot of hard work. You need to start to understand how your target journalists communicate and tap into this.
I hope that helps!
Thanks for the response Shannon.
Well, i tried other forms of contacts as well, but again, it is not as easy as it sounds, but i strongly agree that once you get connected, it helps a lot.
Anyways, i will keep your suggestions and let you know if need your help.
Great WBF, Shannon - so useful to now have these ideas up my sleeve. In the past i've found journalists as super-busy people, and anything that helps them to get an interesting angle on a story seems to go down well. I've had some success in the past, but hopefully I can now achieve more. Thank you.
Thanks Andrew - I hope the tips come in really useful! Feel free to share any you have as well, I'm always keen to learn new ones too.
Great post Shannon.
In my opinion to relaunch a campaign you have to have good contacts and better preparation than in the original campaign. For this it is essential to point out the mistakes you made in the first place.
Personally, I think it's important to change the name and pretend it's a new campaign. Small changes make the difference.
Have a nice weekend
That's a great tip - I'd recommend switching out the headline/change the name too. It could mean that journalists/bloggers think you're offering them something 'new'. Have a great weekend too!
Hey Shannon, fair play for sharing really useful tips and advice that I am sure many of us have had to find out the hard way.
Your step by step process isn’t just for failed campaigns but it’s how you should approach any online PR campaign really!
Forget the statement, Tell the story in one sentence! 100%!
Adding all the resources journalists need is critical, love your suggestion - adding all the facts/data/press copy in google docs that’s easily accessible in one click!
If a journalist has to take the time to download your files, that’s way more time than it’s worth to them!
As an added tip if I may - strip your email signature images! Or any file that’s two large in your email.
Sometimes this may be the reason your email doesn’t get through - ie blocked by their internal spam filters and you may not even have known!
Great Whiteboard Friday! Well done
Awesome tips Shannon, we like to use press releases on occasion for our clients and have run into content failing before unfortunately. Thank you for sharing your insight on this topic and we love your easy to implement, but effective 5 Steps!
Great WBF, thanks. I'm curious - what are some warning signs in a campaign failure that make you think scraping a campaign is a better way to go instead of trying to reboot it?
Ideally, I'd never want to scrap a campaign if I can help it. Personally, I think there is always some thing you can get out if it, whether it's generating links/coverage through guest posting or trying to make it a hit on social media.
If I was getting lots of 'no thank you' responses off the back of my outreach, that would be an early warning sign that some thing wasn't quite working. If I was to get 4/5 in succession, I'd go back to the contacts and ask the to feedback why.
I hope that helps! :)
Hi Shannon,
Do you tend to discuss the all important link to your client before a news item is published?
I've found journalists tend to be very touchy and tight-lipped on the subject of linking back even if there is a strong benefit to the reader.
On a few occasions I've spent ages writing an in-depth article including primary research, stats and quotes from industry leaders only to find that they won't include a link.
There's often an inconsistency about a media outlet’s approach to outbound links, with some articles including them, others not.
Some sites seem to think that you should be pathetically grateful just for the privilege of writing for them while giving you absolutely nothing in return. A company name citation is great but let's be honest, it's pretty weak compared to an actual link.
This has happened so often that I've put together a 3-email charm offensive campaign in order to get the link after an article’s been posted. Most of the time this has worked but there are a few high DA sites where I’ve come away completely empty handed.
I’d be interested to hear what your approach to this is. Do you tackle the link issue in advance or play Russian roulette and hope they include one?
Hi Henry,
Sure, we will always advise our clients what kind link we're hoping to get as a result of our outreach. Sometimes, we know we're not going to get that all important followed link (normally from high DA sites as you mentioned), however it's still important to recognise the value in nofollow links or a brand mention:
There's no doubt that followed links are the ones that will make the biggest impact to your SEO strategies and brand websites, although we should keep in mind that Google use a range of signals to determine rankings and while links are still an important part, there is more to the puzzle and ultimately, Google want to see that you’re a legitimate brand and that you have authority across the web - nofollowed links and mentions are a part of this. So don't be too down heartened when you've got a brand mention or nofollow as a result of you're hard work - it's still has a positive impact! :)
You have a three email charm offensive - I love that approach, and I'm glad to hear it's working for you!
When we're pitching our stories in to the press, in the initial email we won't always address that we're going after a link because it's important to keep the journalist's audience at the forefront of your mind - they're the one reading the feature at the end of the day. Then, when we have engaged in a conversation and we know we have a contact interested in our content, we will start to introduce the idea of linking back to the content or brand's site.
I hope that helps Henry!
Thanks,
Shannon
Super response Shannon, thanks very much.
It's good to be reminded that no follows and brand mentions form part of the overal picture. I tend to get quite cross when it feels like the media outlet is happy to take your stuff for free and give absolutely zippo in return.
One website wanted to charge me £400 for adding a link to a news item I'd written for them. I had to take a walk round the garden or I was in danger of hurling my laptop out of the window.
This might be a slightly technical question but have you any idea how Google recognises a brand or company name when there's no link? So our company name is The SMS Works Ltd but those 3 words could appear in a sentence that's not connected to us. For example, the sms works by sending a signal etc..
Should I be pushing for the citation to include the 'Ltd', so that Google has something to grab hold of so to speak? I'd love to know if you have any insights on this.
Thanks again.
Would love to hear more about what this 3-charm offensive email entails ;)
One of the most useful articles I read this month.I have been blogging for 6 years and I have learned a lot from the Moz blog.Campaigns are all unique. thank you
Great Whiteboard Friday. Thanks!
This is great advice for starting up a successful campaign from scratch as well. I've been pushing for more personalized press outreach, and I'm glad to see that validated. Also the idea to offer exclusive quotes is a great one, I will definitely use that.
Glad it's of use to you, let me know how the exclusive quotes/comments pitching goes!
Influencer-marketing could be the most important social media strategy at play.
Excellent WBF! Glad I watched this one. I myself have failed on a content project before! It doesn't feel great. Giving up means that you have wasted all the time you have invested.
I look forward to trying this out if I hit a little bump in the road. I'm sure it will produce at least some results, which is better than none.
Thanks for the tips Shannon!
Nice post Shannon. I apreciate your valuable tips to help us taking more profit to our posts.
Thanks so much ;-)
Muy buenos consejos, realmente, tenemos que tener control sobre lo que hacemos y lo que no hacemos. Hacer un buen control de SEO debe ser muy importante, el contenido es lo que tenemos mejor y lo que nos ayudará a posicionarnos. Si te gusta Google, Google te amará
One of the most useful articles I read this year. Thanks Shannon
I was very disappointed to not see social-reach metrics in the evaluation. In some industries, this is a deal-breaker.
Hi Simon,
It's a shame you're disappointed that social media metrics aren't involved in my WBF. There's no doubt that integration with social media for any campaign you're launching is valuable, but we have to keep in mind that this post has been crafted and designed to help digital PR campaigns generate links and coverage for their campaigns - the two things that SEOs/digital PRs are tasked with achieving for brands.
Arguably, you wont get a followed link from a tweet or Facebook post. That's why the focus for this WBF was on coming up with actionable take homes that Moz fans can put in place immediately to see quick results at a time when the spotlight is often on them to turn things around fast. Yes, lots of traction on social media could result in your campaign getting pick up from news sites and therefore links as journalists do use the likes of Twitter to source news, but this can take time unless your campaign goes viral over night, in which case, you're probably not going to be reading this post!
And yes, influencer marketing (your comment below) is a powerful part of any social media strategy - agreed. But, how does this tie into bringing a campaign back from the dead and generating links if you're focusing on it from a social media point of view? Paying for a brand partnership with a blogger that includes paid for links back to your campaign? That requires more budget - which you may not have or get authority to spend if your campaign is failing - and the tactics above might prove a better ROI if you need to act quickly under pressure.
I guess it all depends on what success looks like for you and the brand your working with.
Social media is the best option to generate coverage for the campaigns and the least expensive. Just last week one of our partner companies did a simple tweet-up which resulted in a ton of media coverage, over 19 bloggers to write about the tweetup and the company's participation, all because of one re-tweet. Just one.
Don't knock on social media until you try it and use it as part of a cohesive strategy.
There's no knocking here - we've used it plenty of times as part of an integrated strategy and I highlighted the value of it in my previous reply.
Interesting that you've said social media the least expensive way to generate coverage - I'm not talking about paying for links at all, I'm talking about bringing a content campaign back from the dead to secure organic and editorial links that don't require payment, after all they're the links that Google rate highly. In terms of investing time and man power into media relations, well, that's invaluable in my eyes. Relationships are key in this industry and they get you the big heavy hitting links...
It's great that your campaign generated coverage as a result of the tweet, but I'd argue there is more to to the picture than just that... Did the tweet open the door and start conversations with bloggers on a paid partnership basis? OR was the coverage organically built? It's rare for bloggers to operate without payment these days.
Hi Shannon McGuirk,
I'm also working as Sales manager and Content strategies at India-based Digital Marketing Agency called Media Search group.
I think you have aggressive experience and tactics in content writing and Content marketing, So, I have small question about content research.
What is role of Audience Survey in content research?
Thanks
I think, the best part of this edition was about the small and medium size campaings; and tip of the month was no need to rush after big houses but do reach out within the indusrty high niches and blogs. (y)
Seasonality and holidays/vacation are SO important when it comes to link building campaigns. My team works with a ton of bloggers and influencers in the crafting/cooking/mommy blogging space and we pretty much suspend all reach outs end of November and all through December because no one is reading let alone replying to emails at that time.
Hi guys,
Thanks Shannon excellent article about the importance of content but I have a problem and need some guidance.
I have started done few SEO jobs but now I am doing SEO on a company which hasn't got any content and if theres any its thin very thin. The webpage which is under discussion is https://www.rapidphonebuyer.co.uk/ the company buys used and broken mobile phones all they can really say is we buy them and pay cash etc. maybe 500 words if the most and its so hard to makeup stories. Now if we look from the business point of view its alright but from SEO point of view its not.
The have another page https://www.rapidphonebuyer.co.uk/why-use-us/ which explains why to use them etc... But again the content is thin is crispy but if we add more content it takes the readers away which will harm the customer experience if the text is not added and stays thin the SEO wont help.
Please guide me what to do with a website like this.
Also would like to know why some blog posts are not picked up by google even after a year?
No backlinks picked up whatsoever.
All answers will be much appreciated