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AN HONEST CASE STUDY OF SOME CONTENT CAMPAIGNS WE RECENTLY RAN FOR OUR OWN WEBSITE.
Spoiler: Long thread incoming.
Plus gifs!
#digitalpr #contentmarketing
Spoiler: Long thread incoming.
Plus gifs!
#digitalpr #contentmarketing
Some background first:
I’ve self-taught myself Digital PR over the last year and a bit. I didn’t wake up one day and start churning out great campaigns overnight. It took a year of reading, studying, learning, and most importantly of all:
MAKING MISTAKES.
I’ve self-taught myself Digital PR over the last year and a bit. I didn’t wake up one day and start churning out great campaigns overnight. It took a year of reading, studying, learning, and most importantly of all:
MAKING MISTAKES.
You’ll put out campaigns that are just bad ideas and never really stand a chance. But you’ll also have campaigns that are good ideas that don’t get the results they’re capable of getting.
This is good.
This is good.
You need these campaigns to not only be able to come up with great ideas but to also get the results that these ideas deserve.
It takes time, but you’ll get there. We all sucked at the start - we just don’t all talk about it.
It takes time, but you’ll get there. We all sucked at the start - we just don’t all talk about it.
Quick note on these campaigns specifically. These were all campaigns done for our agency not for a client. Our biggest weakness was a lack of strong case studies for Digital PR type campaigns. So I ran some campaigns to show what we’re capable of achieving.
We ran these campaigns on a brand new domain. The site was a work in progress but it was well designed and look professional.
The fact it had no existing domain authority or that we had no brand equity didn’t stop us building top tier links.
The fact it had no existing domain authority or that we had no brand equity didn’t stop us building top tier links.
I won’t get into the reasons behind using a new domain for these campaigns other than - “plans change”
1st up - The Potential Earnings of the Too Hot To Handle Cast
Insta-earnings isn’t the most original idea. We’ve probably all seen the “how much the Love Island stars could cash in on Instagram” campaigns. New dating show hit Netflix. I have an idea! https://www.weareattain.co.uk/too-hot-to-handle-cast-potential-instagram-earnings/
Insta-earnings isn’t the most original idea. We’ve probably all seen the “how much the Love Island stars could cash in on Instagram” campaigns. New dating show hit Netflix. I have an idea! https://www.weareattain.co.uk/too-hot-to-handle-cast-potential-instagram-earnings/
But I wasn’t the only one who had the same idea. So too did another site/agency. And they launched their campaign the day before I was about to launch.
I later found out the team at Digitaloft beat me to it. Bummer. But it was a confidence boost to know that I was thinking along the same lines as an agency like that. That didn’t mean that we couldn’t still get results.
Our campaign wasn’t going to reach its full potential anymore. But we adapted.
We found angles that weren’t being hit. The big wins were taken so we targeted international publications in Ireland, US and Canada and got results from these.
We found angles that weren’t being hit. The big wins were taken so we targeted international publications in Ireland, US and Canada and got results from these.
The other campaign looked at potential earnings just based on followers.
Ours needed a unique hook. So we were able to work out how many ads Francesca was posting before the show aired and worked out how much she would be set to earn at that rate over a full year.
Ours needed a unique hook. So we were able to work out how many ads Francesca was posting before the show aired and worked out how much she would be set to earn at that rate over a full year.
In pretty much every story there will be a local news angle. We found out where each contestant was from and outreached to the local news site.
Localised angles are great for easy wins. https://www.plymouthherald.co.uk/whats-on/netflix-hot-handle-star-plymouth-4106611
Localised angles are great for easy wins. https://www.plymouthherald.co.uk/whats-on/netflix-hot-handle-star-plymouth-4106611
Then I got my first big win for a campaign that was my baby from idea through to outreach. A link on Cosmo.
Don’t let anyone tell you that you can’t build high quality dofollow links on low authority domains for brands that Journalists haven't heard of. https://www.cosmopolitan.com/uk/entertainment/a32399675/how-much-too-hot-to-handle-cast-earn-from-instagram/
Don’t let anyone tell you that you can’t build high quality dofollow links on low authority domains for brands that Journalists haven't heard of. https://www.cosmopolitan.com/uk/entertainment/a32399675/how-much-too-hot-to-handle-cast-earn-from-instagram/
There were plenty of mistakes made on this campaign.
I emailed someone and called them the wrong name!
We didn’t make great use of the design team to support us with our assets.
We probably sat on the data too long and missed the peak of the media’s interest in the show.
I emailed someone and called them the wrong name!
We didn’t make great use of the design team to support us with our assets.
We probably sat on the data too long and missed the peak of the media’s interest in the show.
2nd Campaign - The Impact of Coronavirus on Instagram Influencers
This was more like completing a 2nd dissertation. https://www.weareattain.co.uk/the-impact-of-coronavirus-on-instagram-influencers/
This was more like completing a 2nd dissertation. https://www.weareattain.co.uk/the-impact-of-coronavirus-on-instagram-influencers/
Yes - I turned my job into studying Instagram Models for 3 weeks.
This was my first campaign that became something that I was proud to show off.
And it got me my first coverage for one of my own campaigns in one of the national news sites. https://www.standard.co.uk/tech/instagram-influencers-lose-money-coronavirus-a4448071.html
And it got me my first coverage for one of my own campaigns in one of the national news sites. https://www.standard.co.uk/tech/instagram-influencers-lose-money-coronavirus-a4448071.html
This campaign built nearly 30 links from the ones we tracked.
There are more out there that are basically C&P jobs from the top sites that covered it.
I could truthfully say that we built over 50 links for this campaign.
But that would be padding my stats.
There are more out there that are basically C&P jobs from the top sites that covered it.
I could truthfully say that we built over 50 links for this campaign.
But that would be padding my stats.
Again, we could have done better.
With very limited time to spend on outreach we focused too much time on angles that weren’t connecting and spent too much time trying to get coverage on the elite sites and not enough on sites that in hindsight were more relevant for this story.
With very limited time to spend on outreach we focused too much time on angles that weren’t connecting and spent too much time trying to get coverage on the elite sites and not enough on sites that in hindsight were more relevant for this story.
3rd and final one - The Top Earning Celebs On Instagram During Lockdown
This one really took off and earned us at least 80 links that we’d call “valuable”. https://www.weareattain.co.uk/the-top-instagram-earners-during-lockdown/
This one really took off and earned us at least 80 links that we’d call “valuable”. https://www.weareattain.co.uk/the-top-instagram-earners-during-lockdown/
The reason we were able to build so many links for this campaign?
ANGLES EVERYWHERE YOU LOOK!
ANGLES EVERYWHERE YOU LOOK!
We had a huge dataset that we built for this and featured the Top 50 earners in our post. If we just did outreach around the overall top earners then it wouldn’t have been a success. We got very little coverage for Kevin Hart being the top earner.
But thankfully we split the list up and filtered it down to the Top Sports Earners and the Top Earning Reality TV stars.
This is what people were interested in.
This is what people were interested in.
Journalists want tailored stories. The sports media would have never cared about Ronaldo being the 2nd highest Instagram earner during Lockdown.
But the top earning athlete? They loved that!
This angle got us links on The Daily Mail, The Mirror, Sports Illustrated + many more!
But the top earning athlete? They loved that!
This angle got us links on The Daily Mail, The Mirror, Sports Illustrated + many more!
The Ronaldo angle was a massive hit. Getting it covered in The Daily Mail was huge as we get so much coverage from sites picking it up not from our outreach but from being covered in The Daily Mail (and likewise in The Mirror).
Side tangent - the idea that nofollow links are something to be disappointed by is nonsense. The Daily Mail and Mirror links were both nofollow but we got so many good quality dofollow links from sites that found the story on those sites.
I also don’t believe for a second that Google sees major national news sites like them with a blanket nofollow policy on external links and treat them the same way they do a normal nofollow link.
The Reality TV angle then gave us a second wave of coverage weeks after the athletes angle that picked up more links on sites like The Tab, OK! and The Sun.
Remember the local angle point I made earlier?
Vicky Pattison topped the list. Hit up the local news site for Newcastle - https://www.chroniclelive.co.uk/news/tv/vicky-pattison-instagram-sponsored-earnings-18397581
Vicky Pattison topped the list. Hit up the local news site for Newcastle - https://www.chroniclelive.co.uk/news/tv/vicky-pattison-instagram-sponsored-earnings-18397581
Not all of our angles worked though. Barely anyone wanted to cover the Kevin Hart angle. We also worked out that how much Kendall Jenner’s pattern of posting ads changed during lockdown and how it was costing her millions. Surprisingly, nobody covered that footnote.
Remember the Too Hot To Handle campaign that Digitaloft beat us to? A few days after the Ronaldo angle took off I noticed another similar campaign around Ronaldo’s Instagram earnings by the amazing team at Verve Search creeping into search results.
It works both ways round!
It works both ways round!
This campaign was pretty killer and an undoubted success. But it wasn’t perfect.
Time restraints meant we couldn’t really capitalise on some of the smaller angles. D. Wade & Shaq being featured earned awesome links but we didn’t have time to capitalise on the US Sports media.
Time restraints meant we couldn’t really capitalise on some of the smaller angles. D. Wade & Shaq being featured earned awesome links but we didn’t have time to capitalise on the US Sports media.
We built around 80 links that we’d call valuable from this campaign but because the Ronaldo angle got so much international coverage there’s a good chance if I tried to hunt them all down that I could brag about putting together a campaign that built over 100 links.
So which campaign was the most successful? The one that built the most links right?
Possibly.
The 3rd one built more links and higher DR links.
But the Influencers Lost Earnings campaign earned us more RELEVANT links (eConsultancy and “lower DR” digital marketing sites).
Possibly.
The 3rd one built more links and higher DR links.
But the Influencers Lost Earnings campaign earned us more RELEVANT links (eConsultancy and “lower DR” digital marketing sites).
Getting sites to link to us was never a problem.
Why?
Because we had super on site content with in depth detail of the full dataset that added extra value to the story they were reporting on.
Why?
Because we had super on site content with in depth detail of the full dataset that added extra value to the story they were reporting on.
Again - this was a site with no domain authority at the start. Not one journalist responded telling me they wouldn’t link to us because it was a new domain or because they’d never heard of our brand beforehand.
Having awesome infographics that we could include in our outreach emails also (imo at least) massively helped.
Digital PR isn’t just about links either. The traffic that we got from these 3 campaigns doubled the traffic we were getting on our actual website in the same time period.
Plus we got our great case studies that we wanted.
Digital PR isn’t all about the links!
Plus we got our great case studies that we wanted.
Digital PR isn’t all about the links!
Apologies for this ending up so longwinded. I don’t say much but once I start I tend to ramble on.
I learned Digital PR largely from @DigitalPREx and the Content Curated newsletter by @markcporter so eager to give back and help other SEOs like Carrie and Mark helped me
I learned Digital PR largely from @DigitalPREx and the Content Curated newsletter by @markcporter so eager to give back and help other SEOs like Carrie and Mark helped me
