Getting ‘published’ could create massive wins for your online brand!

This might fly under the radar for you...

But getting ‘published’ could create massive wins for your online brand!

When we started our eComm business in 2013, we boot strapped it - no investment, just pure week to week cash flow funding the lot!

We were growing our sales and socials organically (by like 50 IG followers per month ) and were treating each day as a learning experience.

But one day, about 12 months in, we were approached by a local Melbourne online publication called The Urban List.

They wanted us to sign up to a 3-month package for about $1,500, that included a photo shoot, a couple of articles, mentions, Facebook posts and a couple of other things. It was something we were unfamiliar with.

At the time, this publication was relatively new and were looking to find their feet in the Melbourne market as well.

So we had to make a decision - invest most of what was in our bank account OR carry on as we were, hustling for slow, incremental growth.

The package sounded great but we were really unsure of what the results would be and whether we could justify the cost (we were probably only making $3K - $4K/ mth gross at this point).

And we deliberated over this decision for days, probably a week - it was a lot of money to us at the time.

Until we just decided, “Let’s DO IT!” Use it as a learning experience, see what comes of it and if nothing happens then at least we know.

Well, I can tell you, the results were astounding!

Not only did we triple our following on every social media platform and triple our website traffic, we doubled our sales overnight (and made our investment back!)

It truly put us on the map. There was a buzz around our business like we’d never experienced before, and suddenly people were coming to us, instead of the other way around.

And the best part was that for the very first time we actually felt like a legitimate business.

Even in the early stages, it felt like we had made it.

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And so this is my recommendation to you, for your online business.

Get published! Form a relationship with an editorial to spread the word and the story about you.

So, here’s some tips on how to get published:

Research publications that write about brands like yours and has a following of your ideal customers!

(a) The Paid Way - most publications will have a formal list of packages that you can purchase. Pretty straightforward.

(b) The Organic Way - research who the main authors/ editors are and get in contact with them via phone or email. Explain who you are, what your business is about and the story behind it. If they’re interested, they will offer to conduct an interview to get some details to write an article about your business.

And that’s it! Simple as that!

The best part is, publications are actually looking for new content all the time, so you are actually doing them a favour by reaching out to them!

PRO TIP* for option (b) you might need to ‘sell yourself’ a little bit to get the attention of the author, just to entice them enough to respond. Never be dishonest or lie, but there are ways to ensure you communicate your message the right way (for us, our story was that we left our corporate jobs to pursue a passion for health by starting a cold pressed juice company).

I hope this helps, it sure did for us!

- Will