The Honeymoon Outreach PR Strategy

The hon­ey­moon out­reach should improve your influ­en­cer marketing.

In a best-case scen­ario, you have a pre-exist­ing rela­tion­ship with the influ­en­cer you’re pitch­ing. However, we all know that this often isn’t the case. 

Typically, you must con­tact an influ­en­cer who doesn’t know who you are and what you’re selling. In a way, this is the mar­ket­ing equi­val­ent of cold-call­ing.

I hate cold sales—as I’m sure most of us do.
So, how do you avoid pitch­ing cold?

Here we go:

The Honeymoon Outreach

The fun­da­ment­al prin­ciple of doing a hon­ey­moon out­reach is straightforward:

Honeymoon out­reach = instead of pitch­ing or pro­mot­ing some­thing in your first con­tact with an influ­en­cer, con­tact the influ­en­cer pro­act­ively, intro­duce your­self, and ask per­mis­sion to con­tact them if a busi­ness oppor­tun­ity arises.

Why is this an effect­ive approach?

A hon­ey­moon out­reach makes it easy for the influ­en­cer to accept your role in the rela­tion­ship (without hav­ing to com­mit to anything).

It’s a small ask.

Small ask = a value pro­pos­i­tion that requires little effort and resources for a pro­spect to accept. It works best when the ask offers a swift, hassle-free solu­tion for an urgent pain point.

Big ask = a value pro­pos­i­tion that requires high engage­ment and a sub­stan­tial trans­ac­tion by the pro­spect. It works best when mutu­al under­stand­ing and trust are thor­oughly established.

Contacting Potential Influencers

2 – 8 weeks before your planned out­reach, you can con­tact your list of influ­en­cers and intro­duce your­self. Don’t try to act as if you’re about to become best friends or any­thing — state the fol­low­ing clearly:

When Influencers Says “No”

Some influ­en­cers (or someone on their teams) will either say that they aren’t inter­ested — or won’t answer at all. This is per­fectly nor­mal and allows you to take the fol­low­ing actions:

When Influencers Says “Yes”

Some influ­en­cers (or someone on their teams) will say that they are inter­ested. This is great because it allows you to take the fol­low­ing actions:

In my exper­i­ence, the hon­ey­moon out­reach boosts influ­en­cer out­reach res­ults sig­ni­fic­antly. It’s a form of per­mis­sion mar­ket­ing. ¹See also Permission Marketing by Seth Godin.

Learn more: The Honeymoon Outreach PR Strategy

Influencer Marketing vs Influencer Relations

There are three main types of influ­en­cer mar­ket­ing (digit­al mar­ket­ing) and one primary type of influ­en­cer rela­tions (digit­al PR):

Influencer Relations (Part of Digital PR)

Influencer out­reach (earned media) = the influ­en­cer receives invit­a­tions, demos, or exclus­ive mater­i­al without strings attached.

Influencer Marketing (Part of Digital Marketing)

Influencer advert­ising (paid media) = the influ­en­cer will pub­lish the brand’s pre-made con­tent in their channels.

Influencer spon­sor­ship (paid media) = the influ­en­cer will read a script to con­vey an offer­ing fol­low­ing the brand’s instructions.

Influencer col­lab­or­a­tion (paid media) = the influ­en­cer show­cases the brand’s offer­ing by cre­at­ing con­tent sim­il­ar to the influ­en­cer­’s reg­u­lar content.

Advertising, spon­sor­ships, and col­lab­or­a­tions are typ­ic­ally referred to as influ­en­cer mar­ket­ing, and out­reach is typ­ic­ally referred to as influ­en­cer rela­tions.

Organisations look­ing to util­ise the poten­tial reach of rel­ev­ant influ­en­cers will be wise to pay atten­tion to these dis­tinc­tions. ²Silfwer, J. (2020, January 15). The Influencers in Public Relations. Doctor Spin | The PR Blog. https://​doc​tor​spin​.net/​i​n​f​l​u​e​n​c​e​r​s​-​i​n​-​p​u​b​l​i​c​-​r​e​l​a​t​i​o​ns/

Learn more: Influencer Relations vs Influencer Marketing

THANKS FOR READING.
Need PR help? Hire me here.

Update: Since this post was writ­ten in 2012, the influ­en­cer mar­ket­ing industry has grown con­sid­er­ably. Today, there are many spe­cial­ist out­reach agen­cies whose primary strategy is estab­lish­ing many influ­en­cer rela­tion­ships before con­nect­ing them with brands.

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