From Our Inbox

Let’s see how many things we can find amiss with the email I just received, shall we?

Hi,

I’ve really enjoyed your recent work on your blog, and can see that you are a big fan of the latest fashion and styles. I’m writing because we’ve just launched a men’s fashion website that you might be interested in, both from a personal and professional perspective. As such, we are looking to spread the word about {redacted} and have identified your blog as the perfect space due to the high-quality content and overall website style.

{redacted} were wondering whether you would be interested in receiving a guest post from one of our personal stylist team. We are happy for the blog post to be about a subject that you require, and we can write it in the same technique as your current content. If you would be interested in this proposal, or even better to mention {redacted} in one of your upcoming posts, we would really appreciate the effort.

Thank you for your consideration; we look forward to your reply!

Best, 

The {redacted} Team

1: I do believe this is the first time we’ve ever corresponded. Perhaps the inclusion of Sarah in my Sarah@StyleITOnline.com email address was misleading, but I do believe you have absolutely no idea who I am.

2: Speaking of, who are you? You share your site’s name, but in no where do I see a link to visit your site. Are you hiding from me? The internet is many things, but a keeper of secrets it is not.

3: Who are these stylists? Are they the same invisible gnomes that attempt to help me get dressed in the morning by scattering my already-worn clothes all across the floor? I really wish that I had more information. 

4: Oh, I see. You’re “offering” me a “guest blog post” (because I don’t have enough content of my own). It’s a thinly veiled attempt to boost the SEO rankings of your own site. This might be a great tactic if I had absolutely any idea who you were and found your content compelling.

What have we learned today? Even a seemingly two way street can only be wide enough for a smart car.

it’s unlikely that ANY blogger needs a high-res image.

does not a pitch make.

Earlier this week, I attended a holiday press preview at a reasonably reputable pr agency. I walked in, was greeted by someone who had no idea who I was (which, sadly, is quite typical) and asked “What are you working on? What do you cover?”. Both of these might be completely reasonable questions for a magazine editor, however I personally find the “What are you working on?” question to be so awkward. Um……whatever I want?

After letting her know that I cover personal style, beauty and lifestyle, she proceeded to take me through the children’s & men’s sections of their showroom. Easy enough mistake to make, but as I left their office, I was handed a paper bag simply containing - wait for it - a cd.

Don’t get me wrong, press materials can sometimes be helpful for the finer details of writing about a product, but I don’t even work on a computer that has a cd drive.

What are the key takeaways from this experience?

• When it comes to press materials, keep it simple. If you feel that you must give us materials when we leave, FTLOG please don’t give them to us on cd or in paper form. 9 out of 10 times we’re going to throw it away the minute we leave your office & you’ve wasted your client’s money (not to mention trees & some poor intern’s time).
• If you put materials on a flash drive, please not only label the flash drive with the brand, but also which product launch or event the drive is from. I have over 200 flash drives sitting in a drawer, taking up space & I couldn’t tell you Fall 2010 from Spring 2012.
• This may sound radical, but what’s so wrong with digital press materials? Perhaps emailing them to us or - and I know this sounds extreme - a digital press room or FTP site that we can visit at our leisure and from anywhere we might find ourselves squeezing in a blog post.

-Sarah Conley, StyleITOnline.com

So in my inbox yesterday was a link to an article (from a friend) entitled “10 Dead-Honest Reasons Reporters Delete Your Emails” that was recently published on Business Insider. Since it came from someone I knew…I didn’t delete it. In truth the title alone was compelling enough for me to click the link.

I’m not going to go through the entire article as one, you can read it for yourself and two, not all of the information is pertinent to fashion & beauty bloggers, but for the most part it was pretty dead-on.

Here are three of my favorite reasons why pitch emails get deleted (of the 10 detailed):

1. Accept that most of your emails get deleted instantly.

Not only do I (and I assume every other fashion/beauty blogger that has been at this long enough) receive anywhere from 200-400 emails per day…most are worthless. I find myself hitting the delete tab at rapid-fire pace. Do I possibly overlook something worthwhile? I’m sure I do, but the headline wasn’t compelling enough for me to open it then. The main reasons I delete your email (even if I do open it) is because:

• I don’t know who the sender is
• You spelled my name wrong or worse yet, called me “Dear Blogger”
• Your first sentence was boring or confusing. That’s about all the time I can give you. Next!

2. Do not ambush or give a false sense of urgency.

I can not tell you how many pushy follow-up emails I receive from PR peeps and all this does is turn me off more. Trust me, if I were interested I would reply. And probably pretty quickly. When you send me the initial email, and the next day send me a “just checking in” and then an “I thought I would try one-more time” (but proceed to send me 3 more emails, so you lied) and then call me? Well, you are a stalker and are now on my black list. Oh and marking your email as urgent is plain annoying. As is putting ‘RE: XXX’ to make me think we have communicated before on this subject. We are all on to this sly tactic. Delete!

3. Decide what is most compelling about you to the vast majority of people.

True most PR sent emails nail this (or why would they get paid?), but I do get quite a few emails from start-ups doing their own PR and marketing and so many miss the mark. I appreciate a start-up may not be able to afford professional marketing help, but that is no excuse to be vague about what you do. If you can’t communicate what you do, how you are doing something fresh and what sets you apart from your competition in the first (short) paragraph, you are going to lose me. I don’t have time to figure out what you do. I have at least 200 more emails to read/delete.

Read the rest of “10 Dead-Honest Reasons Reporters Delete Your Emails” here.

- Lauren Dimet Waters, Second City Style

Image: Business Insider