Top Blogger Outreach Mistakes and How to Fix Them

 
 

Long-form copy is making a comeback!

If you're a marketer or a business owner, chances are you've already heard of blogger outreach and the amazing benefits it can offer. However, there are many things that you should take note of to ensure it is successful.

Like with all marketing processes, there are some common pitfalls that you need to be aware of.

Let's look at a few of the most popular (or unpopular!) ones that you need to be aware of and their solutions.

Common Mistakes in Blogger Outreach and How to Avoid Them

1. Sending Generic Emails

Probably one of the most egregious mistakes a marketing team can commit is to send a boilerplate email to the blogger.

Today, companies that follow this decadent email practice are immediately thrown into the spam folder and blocked. Sometimes, people also share embarrassing emails on their social platforms, which means huge amounts of negative publicity. It makes something like this difficult for a company to recover from.

The solution?

Well, it's pretty easy to create a personalized email campaign for your blogger outreach! Personalized emails are shown to improve click-through rates by 14%.

In a niche where even a small advantage matters, this is massive. Ensure you get the name right and touch on their recent work or accomplishments.

2. Reaching Out To Wrong Bloggers

Getting the blogger industry wrong is another embarrassing failure that indicates a lack of research.

Let's say you're the top neurosurgeon in the country; how would you feel if some random email asked you to write about construction tips?

That's exactly what a seasoned blogger would feel - not great.

Ensure you spend a lot of time working on a list of bloggers you can contact. Here are a few things you should look for - they write for the same niche, need to be active, have a reasonable follower count, and are willing to collaborate.

You can add more to this list, but these should be the basic requirement. Once you've got these down, reaching out to some bloggers is time.

3. Not Engage With Social Media

With billions of people active on social media platforms, every business worth its salt has a presence. Social media platforms can be overwhelming for many of us, which is understandable. But its business benefits are undeniable.

The problem is that many businesses tend to ignore a blogger's social media profiles.

Most bloggers have pretty active social media feeds, and if you want to connect with them on a favorable level, interacting with their social accounts is a great idea. It helps to build familiarity and rapport, which can put you in good stead during further interactions.

4. Poorly Written Email

While we touched on one aspect of email, lack of personalization, there is another glaring issue you need to be wary about. An outreach email with many grammatical errors and typos will fail to impress. And this is especially true when you're getting in touch with people who write well for a living!

And it's not just these mistakes that make a bad impression. A mediocre subject line, unprofessional language, and overly elaborate body text worsen the situation.

If you don't trust your writing skills, hire a writer to draft a few business emails for outreach. Have tools like Grammarly and ProWritingAid to help you edit your email for the best results.

5. Sending Generic Pitches

One of the biggest sins a marketer could commit with their pitches is to be generic.

Creating a boilerplate pitch without any specifics about the engagement with the blogger will receive no response. As someone trying to entice a popular blogger to write for your brand, you must show them you've done your groundwork.

A few things you should include in your pitch are your reason for choosing them and why this collaboration matters.

The pitch should also discuss how the engagement aligns with their interests and can be used as social proof for their audience. Never use a one-size-fits-all approach to pitches; it will do more harm than good!

6. Not Highlighting Mutual Benefits

Creating a blog takes time and effort, especially when the blogger writes something aligned with your company's interests. Pitching only what you stand to gain makes you come across as someone selfish. The key to any collaborative effort is that all parties involved stand to gain some benefits.

Don't ignore what the blogger can bring to your business. They can use their unique perspective to highlight something about your brand you've not considered.

Set up a discussion with them to convey how the engagement can benefit their audience. Many bloggers appreciate a discount coupon personalized to their brand - so make it happen!

7. Sending Too Many Followers Ups

Nobody likes someone nagging them to complete their work!

Sending repetitive emails every day or hour will not make them happy. Since you're collaborating with them, ensure you adhere to professional standards when interacting with them. Allow them a couple of days to respond to your emails.

Don't force your views on people who have declined to work with you or people who haven't responded. Repeatedly bombarding them with emails will only sour your business reputation with the tightly-knit blogger community.

Coming across as pushy and desperate will ensure that nobody will respond to your outreach attempts in the future, and that's something you don't want.

8. Not Doing Any Research On Bloggers

The most important part of blogger outreach has to be the research process. Most companies reach out to the most popular bloggers without knowing anything about them.

Understanding various aspects of their blogger profile, including their niche, posting frequency, and audience demographics, is important to consider.

Also, it is vital to consider their past collaborations and writing style. Having bloggers who have worked with your competitors or slightly dubious companies might be a red flag. As a business owner, choose the style of content based on who your audience is.

Your outreach process wouldn't be very successful if you were a law firm and had a blogger create content with a casual tone.

9. Lack Of Clarity

When contacting a blogger, you must be clear with your communication. Clarity ensures that you spend less time with back-and-forth messages and more time productively

. Have a clear set of directions and expectations that you expect to be fulfilled with this blogger engagement. Don't leave critical aspects of the collaborations vague, like the number of deliverables or deadlines

. Another area to be wary about is the underlying brand message in every blog. Ensure that the blogger understands your business and that the message must be amplified

. Ambiguous pitches or emails can be a huge problem on pivotal business topics, so take the opportunity to communicate with them through a call when possible

.

10. Overpromising

When collaborating with bloggers, many companies forget they're leasing someone else's platform.

What we mean by this is that brands need to be aware of the clear limitations of unrealistic commitments related to their products. It is easy for brand executives to make overzealous estimates of their services, which turn out to be hollow promises.

During blogger outreach, ensure you stick to results you can deliver for your product.

Avoid overpromising and underdelivering with fake metrics or statistics when engaging a blogger or anyone else. Doing this can have nasty repercussions, including being called out on social media by other users.

11. Not Getting Feedback

Talking about creating blogs for your audience, something to note as a business owner is the importance of different perspectives.

One of the mistakes many companies make is simply ignoring blogger input for their content framework. This extremely close-minded approach will result in subpar performance for your blogs.

Meeting with the blogger to ask for their input on your listed topics is great.

They're experienced content creators with an audience, so they can offer valuable insights you can include. Interacting with them can also give you input on mistakes you can avoid when creating a blog.

12. Not Tracking Results

Perhaps one of the most vital takeaways from this article is that any business should have a proper analytics program for blogs.

Modern analytics gives businesses much information about hundreds of different data points. To start on this, understand your goals for your blogger outreach program.

The next step would be to translate them into the right KPIs. Working with chosen bloggers to get more insights regarding metrics is encouraged.

Not only will they suggest better ones for your needs, but they will also help you achieve them! Not setting the right KPIs for your blogger outreach can have disastrous results for your campaign.

13. Not Using Tools

Many brands today are guilty of not using the right tools for their blogging process. This is a huge oversight, considering today's tools are much more advanced than ever.

You can choose from a vast array of tools that can help you track emails, manage bloggers, and highlight specific analytics, just to name a few.

A few examples of powerful tools for outreach are BuzzStream , NinjaOutreach, and Mailshake.

With the introduction of AI-assisted tools, their advantages have only gotten bigger. Several tools can help you craft personalized email outreach programs to work with the best bloggers.

These platforms have a dashboard that keeps track of different niches, associated bloggers, and other important information about them.

14. Not Sending Thank-you Note

Companies sometimes forget to show appreciation to the bloggers in their outreach programs. While it doesn't happen often, in our connected world, word does get around.

Acknowledging the blogger's involvement with the project after completion is good practice.

Even though most bloggers are paid for their engagement, sharing a kind word for their effort and time spent doesn't hurt.

Some brands offer discounts on their products as a thank-you message. It all depends on your arrangement with them, but acknowledgment is key so you can work with them in the future.

15. Ignoring Legal Guidelines

Are there legalities when it comes to blogging on the internet?

You bet there are! The blogosphere has many rules and legal guidelines that every company and blogger must follow.

Companies must disclose sponsored content on their website or at the blogger's end. Failing to do so can create legal issues which might dent your brand.

Ensure you're within local guidelines and FTC laws when planning blogging outreach.

If you're engaging an experienced blogger, chances are that they know enough to stay within these rules. On the other hand, if you're doing this for the first time, you might need to read up on them.

16. Using Too Much Of Automation Tools

Automation is both a boon and a bane to people today.

On one hand, it can remove the tedium associated with repetitive tasks like messaging and data collection. However, overreliance on them can take away the personal touch of a brand.

For blogger outreach, ensure that you use automation tools sparingly.

The reason is that they can put bloggers off because they receive many of them throughout the day!

There is also a chance that messages created by automation tools are classified as spam by software. This can lead to your email being put on a spam list, handicapping your ability to reach out effectively.

Conclusion

● Personalization is key for a better response and continued relationship with the blogger.

● Ensure you highlight mutual benefits when pitching an idea - don't just talk about yourself.

● While automation can help, overreliance on it can be problematic for your outreach.

● Create a strong analytics process for your blogger outreach to keep it organized.

● Understand legal guidelines and laws so you can protect your brand's reputation.

● Avoiding these common mistakes can ensure you have a great blogger outreach campaign!

Copyright 2025 © All Rights Reserved.