Berocca has started a little blogger outreach programme, neatly capitalising on a recent(ish) report in the the NY Times that blogging is stressful.

They work long hours, often to exhaustion. Many are paid by the piece — not garments, but blog posts. This is the digital-era sweatshop. You may know it by a different name: home.

… bloggers complain of weight loss or gain, sleep disorders, exhaustion and other maladies born of the nonstop strain of producing for a news and information cycle that is as always-on as the Internet.”

New York Times, In Web World of 24/7 Stress, Writers Blog Till They Drop

Berocca is inviting registrations for a Blogger Relief Pack, basically a pack of Berocca and assorted executive stress toys.

Only the first 50 qualifying bloggers will receive a pack and by entering you have to agree to T&Cs, which include permission to being contacted again in future and also authorising Bayer to:

…use, promote or reproduce your blog in the promotion and that you will not assert any intellectual property rights including without limitation copyright or moral rights in relation to such usage.

There’s also no guarantee, that if you do get a pack, and write a glowing review of Berocca’s blog stress busting capabilities, of a link back. Which all seems a little against the spirit of the blogosphere and the joy of linky love.

I don’t know if Berocca is approaching bloggers on an individual basis with this promotion, but after  looking at the site and reviewing the T&Cs it all just seems a little impersonal and more like a marketing competition than a genuine attempt at blogger engagement.

I also question why Berocca has linked to the Guardian post about blogger stress as it is less than complimentary about the NY Times article.

Um, yes, it’s really tough: sooo much worse than making cheap rugs or sneakers, subsistence farming, or my previous job in the Uranium mines. I don’t know if I could get through a day without the constant supplies of coffee and Bach cantatas.

The Guardian, Does blogging kill more people than video gaming?

Via Stephen Davis at PR Blogger

High Concept

“I want my MTV” campaign for planes

Story

Ian Delaney has published an excellent case study for how Virgin USA used social media to beat a US Department of Transport ruling and get their planes off the ground.

• They created a “name our planes” campaign that led to one plane being named “Air Colbert.”
• They posted time-lapse video of a plane being painted (yes, it’s as boring as it sounds, but somehow it got more than 1,400 diggs)
• They created a petition “Let Virgin Fly” (now down, but here’s a snap from the wayback machine; which was picked up and spread by the blogosphere.
• They invited Diggnation to film an episode on a Virgin America plane.
• They kept the relationship going: after the DoT reviewed their license (unheard of) they gave Diggnation viewers a twofer deal.

Bloggers are becoming an increasingly important part of the media mix, with some of the larger, more established blogs having huge readerships. Mainstream media outlets often look to the blogosphere for inspiration and breaking stories, while consumers are increasingly looking to bloggers as trustworthy “people like me” who can give them unbiased advice and opinions.

However, unlike the press, bloggers aren’t under pressure to adhere to a code of conduct – and there are no established practices of how best to work together. Just as you get annoyed by unsolicited telemarketing calls trying to sell you irrelevant products, bloggers and journalists get annoyed by PR pitches they feel to be poor or irrelevant or regard as unsolicited. The added risk for you is that, unlike journalists, many bloggers will happily post about the poor pitch, reprinting the content of you email and possibly naming you and your agency.

Therefore it is important to be cautious and thoughtful when considering any blogger relations programme and to proceed with care.

How long will this take me?

Like any relationship, building it will take time and effort and the more of each that you put you put in, the more likely you are to be successful.

What do I need to know first?

Before considering approaching bloggers you must have already gone through the following stages:

• Created a keyword list
• Identified who is talking about the issues you are interested in
• Evaluated those blogs to find the top 10 – 20 in terms of influence
• Started to monitor those blogs on a regular basis

How do I do this?

1. Read

Even more so than with traditional mainstream media, it is vital that you are very familiar with the blogger, their blog and their interests because as mentioned above they are more likely to react publicly to your ignorance. Most blogs will have a variety of RSS feeds, use these to track posts and comments.

Read more