Community Discussion - Pitches from content marketers versus publicists: any difference?
-
Howdy, Moz community! Hope you're all having a fine Friday so far!
Tuesday on the blog we featured Samuel Scott's superpowered "Advanced Guide to Online Publicity Campaigns." One interesting tidbit stood out to me as I was reading; the author states:
On online marketing websites and blogs, I see pitching often being discussed by "content marketers" as a way to gain shares of and links to one thing or another. They should stop. I receive e-mailed pitches from PR executives and "content marketers" all the time — and I can tell within three seconds which one I'm getting.
How? Here is the difference between the two.
"Content marketers" pitch me:
1.) To share or link to some random article, and they do so often when
2.) I have no connection to or interest in the topic at allPublicists pitch me:
1.) To write about an idea because
2.) They already know that I have a connection to or interest in that topicI ignore or delete the pitches from "content marketers." Following the pitches from publishers, I may choose to include their source, study, or idea in some future piece in the publications to which I contribute. Most "link earning" methods are poor imitations of traditional publicity practices.
Pitch in a way that will genuinely interest the people who you are contacting. Do not pitch thinly-veiled attempts to get links and shares for you or your clients.
I definitely get these emails fairly regularly, but I've never given thought to just what it is that makes me respond positively to some and decline others. So here's my discussion question for the week:
What's the distinction for you? Have you noticed that, in your own pitches, you've had a better reception to a certain strategy? Does the "publicist" angle work better in your experience, or have you had plenty of luck with the "content marketer"-type pitch? What do you actually find yourself responding to, in these situations?
-
Always happy to see an EGOL response. For me the issue really is one of credulity. When regularly I am approached by those who want to put something on one of our websites or client's websites I am always struck by how blatant they are and how assumptive they try to be. These we can call content marketers, but I like EGOL's reference - they are solicitors. They are not unlike when I was in another business and had a lot of customers; regularly people would approach with the world famous ... "VALUE ADD!" We were supposed to let them market to our customers for free because there world changing product or service was so massively valuable. I think my sarcasm tells you my answer to them was the same as my answer to any content marketer, good bye. Please stop the spam.
With requests to write something I am fairly cautious but do have a couple of known business or marketing blogs that I infrequently contribute to. Since they are publishing media on the web, I am fine with calling them publicists.
Interesting discussion you started Felicia,
Robert
-
I have gotten many hundreds of solicitations over the past 12 years of running a growing content site. A solicitation is simply a query that asks if you are open to publishing an article written by someone else. These are a total waste of my time. Delete.
So, here are my standards. You might not like them and you might not agree with them. But, this is what I use because I am done wasting time on spammers who wear suits to work, people who spin rubbish, plagiarists, and people who think that fluff is substantive.
I called them "solicitations" in the first paragraph. I didn't call them "pitches". The difference, in my opinion, is that a "pitch" reveals the topics that you are qualified to write good substantive content about. A sign that you are qualified to write about a topic is that you have access to the places, people, equipment and materials needed to get good photos - which are required for a good article. Another sign is that you can - in one sentence - explain why you have experience to write about the topic. It could be formal education, substantive work history, or other experience that required you to spend a lot of hours engaged with this topic. If you don't do that. Delete.
If you say that you can write about anything, then I know you are not telling somebody the truth - you are either BSing yourself or trying to BS me. Delete. Ban your email from my inbox.
If you are still in the running and tell me you can write about atomic emission spectroscopy we will speak by phone. In a few sentences I will probably be able to tell if your selection of words and care of speaking reveal a person who knows what they are talking about. Gossip, prattle and blather are no substitute for factual technical content published for experienced audiences.
So, after about 12 years and hundreds of solicitations, only a couple dozen people have submitted something that I have been willing to publish. Most of them have work experience or teaching experience about the topics that they wrote about.
A publisher who values his or her audience is able to say "thanks for trying out, but sorry, we can't use this". If your message was deleted, I didn't waste your time.
Got a burning SEO question?
Subscribe to Moz Pro to gain full access to Q&A, answer questions, and ask your own.
Browse Questions
Explore more categories
-
Moz Tools
Chat with the community about the Moz tools.
-
SEO Tactics
Discuss the SEO process with fellow marketers
-
Community
Discuss industry events, jobs, and news!
-
Digital Marketing
Chat about tactics outside of SEO
-
Research & Trends
Dive into research and trends in the search industry.
-
Support
Connect on product support and feature requests.
Related Questions
-
Reusing content on different ccTLDs
We have a client with many international locations, each of which has their own ccTLD domain and website. Eg company-name.com, company-name.com.au, company-name.co.uk, company-name.fr, etc. Each domain/website only targets their own country, and the SEO aim is for each site to only rank well within their own country. We work for an individual country's operations, and the international head office wants to re-use our content on other countries' websites. While there would likely be some optimsation of the content for each region, there may be cases where it is re-used identically. We are concerned that this will cause duplicate content issues. I've read that the separate ccTLDs should indicate to search engines that content is aimed at the different locations - is this sufficient or should we be doing anything extra to avoid duplicate content penalties? Or should we argue that they simply must not do this at all and develop unique content for each? Thanks Julian
Content Development | | Bc.agency0 -
Blog for content
Noob here so be gentle... We have a blog on our homepage that we're using for content/SEO purposes. Does this content rank as highly as it would if it were a simple HTML page as opposed to a blogspot or wordpress from our page? In other words, are we getting as much content cred in this way as we would if blogspot wasn't affiliated? http://greatmats.blogspot.com/
Content Development | | Greatmats0 -
Where to add content
Hello, In looking at GA for a client, his top 100 landing pages are all category pages with only a slight amount of articles and product pages. We haven't added content to the product pages, we just rewrote descriptions for unique content. They are about 100-200 words per product. Does that mean we should focus on adding content to category pages first? We're thinking of totaling 500 words or so (though less sometimes) of quality content to category pages. Your recommendations?
Content Development | | BobGW0 -
Suggest Me About my Site Content
I have build a " Healthy Breakfast " related website...I have some post on my site related "health breakfast" keywords.But i am not sure is my Content is Doing well to beat my Competitor or what type content i should write My Competitor for " healthy Breakfast" keywords are : http://www.realsimple.com/food-recipes/recipe-collections-favorites/healthy-meals/breakfast-to-go-10000001047596/index.html http://www.eatingwell.com/nutrition_health/nutrition_news_information/healthy_breakfast_foods_for_weight_loss http://www.womenshealthmag.com/nutrition/healthy-breakfast http://www.fitnessmagazine.com/recipes/healthy-eating/nutrition/the-you-can-do-it-diet-breakfast-choices-/ http://www.foodnetwork.com/topics/healthy-breakfast/ Actually I am confused what i should write to keep my traffics happy and get Good Rank in Google Let me know if you have any more info thanks
Content Development | | seolearner0070 -
Any freelance writers with viral content / linkbait experience?
Looking for a great freelance writer to assist in creating linkbait and viral content pieces. Please contact me if you are, or know of, such a person. 🙂
Content Development | | AdamThompson0 -
With the structure of WordPress when multiple tags are selected, SEOMoz reports show each URL/tag as duplicated content? What to do?
wordpress.com/blogpost/tag/word1 wordpress.com/blogpost/tag/word 2 etc. Same page, but WP generates multiple URLs for each tag. in reports, this shows as duplicate content. Is it something to worry about? If yes, what is the best fix?
Content Development | | VividImage0 -
Finding Good Content Writers
I have a small but growing SEO company. I don't have in house content writers...where is a good place to find good content writers? Please help! Thanks.
Content Development | | ClickIt0 -
How quickly should one add content?
I'm building a content site (the model is AdSense revenue) around a certain niche, and I'm currently paying for about 6 articles to be contributed per week. I have the capacity to be paying for a lot more articles, however, so I'm wondering what, if any, factors exist to recommend building the site up slowly as opposed to throwing on e.g. 100 articles over the next week? Those I can think of are: 1. Going slowly leaves room for better keyword optimization etc. 2. Google seems to favor aged domains/content, so 100 good articles now certainly isn't as advantageous as 100 articles 2 years from now. All that being said, I still feel like the benefit in terms of traffic of adding more content now - since I can - might outweigh these considerations. Does anyone have any thoughts?
Content Development | | ZakGottlieb710