How to plan an effective Outreach Campaign

The way in which we consume content has changed tremendously over the years. The evolvement has reached consumer media, drifting us away from newspapers and letters, to a more digital consumption through websites, emails – and more recently, social media.

What remains consistent amid the change is the high demand for quality content. With an endless number of websites fulfilling the same demand, how can you ensure your brand stands out?

This question may seem broad, although one way in which you can target your audience is through the implementation of Outreach Marketing.

What is Outreach Marketing?

Outreach Marketing is known more commonly as the practice of seeking individuals or organisations that have a common interest in what you or your brand has to offer. In other words, outreach is simply the process of selecting influential people or organisations to tell your brand’s story.

A few of the benefits of conducting an outreach campaign include:

• Increased traffic: Links from influencers or organisations can really play a vital role in boosting traffic to your site.

• Better reach: Your content will be exposed to people that are not engaged with your brand. The room for converting these user’s and driving growth can be astronomical!

• Improved credibility: If your end goal is to be an expert in your respective field, having other experts linking to your site and promoting your brand will enable you to appear more credible.

Outline your Campaign Goals

The first step to any outreach campaign, is defining your campaign objectives. You may find you have multiple objectives within a single campaign, but it is vital to ensure that each remains measurable and specific (aligning with the SMART framework).

A few examples of strong outreach objectives include

• Increasing brand awareness: Number of target audience members reached through a variety of methods used in the campaign (websites, social media etc.)
• Behaviours you want your audience to carry out: Number of customers who are taking the desired action – joining your email newsletter, submitting a contact form etc.
• Audience showing interest: Number of responses to a call to action or click throughs on your website.

Regardless of what your outreach campaign objectives are, be sure to include a timeframe you expect to meet it within.

Define your Target Audience

After outlining your campaign’s objectives, you will need to spend some time focusing on your target audience. More importantly, asking yourself questions such as the following:

• What does my ideal customer look like?
• How old are they?
• Where do they spend the most time?
• What are their interests?
• How can my product / service resolve their pain points?

By developing a thorough understanding of what it is your audience require, you can refine your message to home in on what they need and target your content accordingly. This can benefit the overall success rate of your outreach campaign.

Identify Influential Bloggers and Organisations

Identifying and building a ‘hitlist’ of appropriate contacts is essential for the effectiveness of your outreach campaign. In this instance, the more the better! Your hitlist will be comprised of bloggers or organisations in your niche that you want to build relationships with, and whose network you’re aiming to tap into.

There are a variety of ways to identify bloggers, including a Google search and Social Media pursuit, although these may not always be fruitful. A fantastic place to start building your hitlist would be via searching for existing brand mentions. Companies or Bloggers that are already talking about your brand are more likely to accept content around. This can ensure your overall campaign is more efficient!

Alternatively, if you have discovered that your audience are spending majority of their time on Social Media platforms such as Instagram (and your campaign objective is to increase brand awareness), it may be worth identifying influential users on that platform.

Content Creation

With your hitlist, objectives and audience at the ready, you can begin to plan out exactly what kind of content you are aiming to share. This process will need to tailor from website to website since each audience can differ. The more specific and targeted your content is, the more likely you are to not only have this successfully placed, but also achieve your respective objectives.

Types of content commonly distributed in a outreach campaign can include:

• Press Releases
• Blogs
• Info-graphics
• Whitepapers
• Case Studies

Summary

After following the above steps, you will be ready to begin your initial contact with your outlined hitlist. It is important to recognise that this marketing method requires both flexibility and patience to really work. Be sure to follow-up with any contacts in your hitlist throughout to obtain the best results.