Outreach Marketing: Definition, Benefits, and Examples

As a small business owner, you know growing a business is no easy task. Finding a means to make a business stand out from the crowd is one of the most difficult aspects of beginning and expanding a company.

Using the power of influencers and prominent businesses in your industry is one of the most effective methods to stand out in a competitive market.

Outreach marketing is one of the most popular types of digital marketing since it focuses on establishing a personal connection and maintaining a mutually beneficial relationship with influencers or targeted businesses in your industry. It's a great approach to increase your visibility while also fulfilling your marketing and sales objectives.

Keep reading to learn more about what outreach marketing is, its benefits, and outreach campaign examples that will help you grow your business.

What is outreach marketing?

Outreach marketing is the process of reaching out and building relationships with people or other businesses in your target market in order to boost the visibility of your website, build momentum around a campaign, and promote your products or services. 

For example, if you are a wellness company trying to get the word out about a new organic skincare product you are launching, then you might consider reaching out to natural beauty bloggers or wellness influencers to ask if they’d like to try your product for free in exchange for a written review or piece of content on their platform promoting your product.

This marketing strategy is very powerful because consumers tend to trust earned media messages from influencers, bloggers, journalists, or other brands they’ve done business with before more than brand advertising or owned media.

In fact, digital word-of-mouth is trusted by 83% of consumers more than content created directly by advertisers. This is due to a growth in social media usage as well as the amount of channels and options available.

On every channel, there are influencers. These individuals assist startups in expanding their reach. They can also help you engage with your audience and provide the social proof that buyers need to believe in your brand.

Benefits of outreach marketing

As you can probably tell, outreach marketing is a great strategy to get your business and offerings more visibility. Check out these great benefits outreach marketing can have on your business.

Increases brand awareness

One of the biggest benefits and goals of outreach marketing is increasing your brand awareness. By collaborating with other well-known brands or individuals in your field, it exposes your business and offerings to their respective audiences. 

Outreach marketing will provide you access to larger audiences that have been built by the businesses or influencers you're associating with, which is especially beneficial if you're a small business. 

Since 63% of people actively discuss products and services online, and 81% read what others have to say about them, it's critical to get others talking about your company to raise visibility of your brand.

Boosts lead generation efforts

Another major advantage of outreach marketing is that it helps boost your lead generation. Since you'll be working with influencers or companies with a similar target audience, you'll be able to leverage their relevant traffic source.

With these companies and people promoting your brand, you can produce quality traffic to your website, resulting in an increase of lead generation. In fact, 25-40% of all traffic and lead generation comes from earned media due to outreach marketing.

Even better, because these leads are already slightly familiar with your brand, thanks to those you collaborate with, they are considered warm sales leads which are more likely to convert than those who received a cold outreach email or exposure to an ad. 

Builds better relationships

You can’t overlook the value of business networking and establishing connections with those in your industry.

Establishing strategic collaborations with other brands or people in your industry is a great marketing strategy that will help you build better long-term relationships with valuable partners. The value of these connections may be shown in the fact that mid-sized businesses who use collaborative marketing are $430,000 better off than those that don't.

Increases your thought leadership

If you want to grow your business, you’ll need to establish and build your authority to gain consumer’s trust. Collaborating with well-known businesses and influencers boosts your brand's authority and as a result, you gain the trust of your target audience and establish a positive reputation. 

For growth and increased business, brand authority and consumer trust are essential. Establishing your authority is critical, with 46% of U.S. buyers indicating they would pay more for a product from a brand they trust than those they aren’t familiar with.

How to do outreach marketing 

Now that you have an understanding of how much you can benefit from conducting outreach marketing, now it’s time to show you how to get started.

Find influential people or brands

The first step is to identify influencers to help you promote your business. When scouting for influencers, you need to make sure they meet specific criteria such as: 

• Activity: The influencer you're looking for should be active on social media.

• Relevancy: The influencer you choose must have some tie to your business or industry.

• Popularity: Choose an influencer that has a sizable following but still has room to develop.

• Engagement: Look for influencers that engage with their audience.

Reach out to influencers

Once you’ve identified the influencer or brand you’d like to collaborate with, you need to begin building a relationship with them. This may look like sending them an email asking for a collaboration.

If that doesn't work, try reaching out by direct messaging them on their most active social media network or via phone call. Make sure your pitch is clear and succinct, and that you include any benefits they can receive from teaming with you. A terrific pitch can make all the difference, so do everything you can to make one.

Outreach campaign examples

Check out these outreach campaign examples that will demonstrate how you can reach these potential partners. 

Phone outreach campaigns

Phone outreach campaigns are our speciality, where we will contact potential partners to help you promote a special offer (in addition to many other features). It's a great tactic for B2B businesses looking to partner with other brands for marketing campaigns.

For instance, if you are a pet grooming business looking for a way to get the word out about a summer deal you are throwing for dog haircuts, you may consider contacting all local veterinarians within 25 miles of your storefront to promote your deal on their website and social media.

Email outreach campaigns

Email is probably the most popular way to get in contact with journalists, bloggers, or other businesses for outreach marketing purposes. This method works great for those who are trying to build links to their website, build relationships with others in your industry, or earn press coverage. 

Let’s say you are a landscape service that just published a new blog post on backyard flower garden ideas on your website. To gain the attention and potential engagement of their audience, you may email home-improvement websites, gardening bloggers, or relevant lifestyle influencers to share your link on their site.

Social media outreach campaigns

Social media is a great way to directly contact potential businesses or influencers for outreach marketing. One of the most popular social media platforms for outreach is LinkedIn as it makes it easy to quickly locate people who are a perfect fit for your brand.

For example, if you’re a hiring and staffing company, you may compile a list of profiles who engage with the kind of content your brand publishes and message them about a potential collaboration. 

No matter which platform you decide to use for your outreach efforts, pick the one that fits your brand voice and business the best. Here’s how to direct message (DM) someone on each platform:

• LinkedIn: Go to an individual’s LinkedIn profile and click on “Message”. You can also click on the “Messaging” tab on the homepage and tap the compose icon on the upper right corner to send a direct message.

• Facebook: Go to the page you want to send a message to and click “Send Message” found below the Page’s cover photo. Keep in mind that you can only private message to Pages that have turned on messaging.

• Twitter: Click on the envelope icon on your homepage and then tap the blue letter icon found in the bottom right corner of your screen. You can search for users by their Twitter @handle or name. Keep in mind that you can only send messages to accounts that have their DMs open.

• Instagram: Go to the account you’d like to message and click “Message” found below the account’s bio.

• YouTube: Go to a creator’s YouTube channel and click “About” and then “Send Message.” This will direct you to a form where you can compose and send a private message.  

• TikTok: Go to a user’s profile and click the three dots on the top right of the screen. From there you can tap the envelope icon that says “Send message.”

Engage more leads and clients with Smith.ai

Outreach marketing is a fantastic technique to promote your business and get more leads. With more leads pouring in, you'll need to stay on top of them in order to turn them into paying customers or clients.

Let our 24/7 virtual receptionists help you reach out to those influencers and keep up with the new leads they generate for your business.  We can handle all your phone inquiries, web chats, outbound prospecting calls, and more so you can focus on other matters of business. 

To learn more about how Smith.ai can help your growing business, contact us at (650) 727-6484 or book a free consultation.

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‍Sources: Pressfarm | Deloitte | G2 | Salsify