14 Feb 2024
- 16 Mar 2020
- 3 Min read
How to capitalise on trends in your outreach
In every industry out there, new trends are emerging all of the time. Whether there’s a new lifestyle fad that everyone seems to be loving, a celebrity has caused something to fly off the shelves, or — as we’re seeing now with sustainability — shoppers’ values and concerns have shifted in a particular direction, capitalising on these trends can be a great way to secure coverage on high-quality websites.
However, for this kind of strategy to work, you need to do your research to back up the point you’re trying to make. Plus, you have to ensure that the trend you’re pinning your pitch on can be applied to your area of expertise. Here, I’m going to give you our top tips for using trends to strengthen your outreach efforts.
Use search tools to identify trends
One of the best ways to identify new trends is by using a search tool, such as Search Metrics, Google Trends, or SEMrush. These can identify spikes in searches for specific topics. For example, in the Google Trends graph above, you can see that searches for “sustainable fashion” have almost hit peak popularity several times over the last 90 days.
Brainstorm how the trend can be applied to your expertise
It’s important that you ensure the trend you have chosen can be applied to your expertise without being too far removed. For example, gender neutrality is a huge trend in the fashion and interiors industry at the moment, but it wouldn’t make sense for a car manufacturer to talk about the topic. Again, you could use a tool like SEMrush to see which words are searched alongside your chosen trend.
Outreach your findings
Once you’ve identified a trend, researched it, and decided how you’re going to apply it to your expertise, you need to choose how you’re going to outreach your findings. Here are just some of the techniques and formats that we use here at Glass Digital:
- Editorial: We will often contact websites and publications to see if they would like our clients to work on an article for them. This tactic is most effective when the trend is likely to be popular for a long period of time. For example, ‘zero waste’ would be a good trend to pitch editorial around, as it is unlikely to die out any time soon. We have a guide to cold pitching editorial ideas to publications, which can help you to work out where to start with this.
- Skyscraper: The skyscraper technique involves outreaching extra insight to websites that have already published an article on a particular topic. This could be in the form of a comment or design, which the journalism may be interested in adding to their piece. This tactic is great for fast emerging trends or hot topics, such as the Coronavirus.
- Designs: Journalists are always looking for ways to make their articles more visually appealing. So, we will often use data that’s available about a particular topic to create a graphic or image. We can then share these with writers who are already covering the subject.
- Media requests: This is the simplest tactic. We’ll sometimes receive media requests from journalists asking about a trend one of our clients is qualified to talk about. So, we’ll respond with a comment from them.
Write a convincing pitch
Finally, you’ll need to write a convincing pitch, which presents all of your findings in an easy to follow way. Combine what you’ve learned from your search tools with any other relevant stats, as well as some of your own expertise about the trend.
It’s also vital that you make sure the journalist will be able to find the exact information they need in your pitch, so make it clear, concise, and use bullet points or bolding if you think it might help.
Our outreach team have had a lot of success with shaping our work around current trends — it’s a great way to make your link-building efforts timelier, and certainly keeps thing interesting. So, if you’re looking for an SEO agency to help you gain coverage on high-quality and high-profile sites, get in touch to discuss your digital marketing needs today.
