Full Transcript for How to Get Your Product Featured in Gift Guides: PR Dos & Don’ts

don't get PR, you're basically invisible, because remember, AI is pulling directly from those editorial mentions. 00:02:11.241 --> 00:02:18.342 the more gift guides you're in, the more likely you're gonna not only appear in traditional SEO search but be the chosen brand that ChatGPT recommends. 00:02:18.572 --> 00:02:28.322 We know that AI search and AI shopping is the future, and the future is here because ChatGPT is processing over 500 million shopping inquiries per day. 00:02:28.551 --> 00:02:43.632 And we know that there is no higher converting engine than AI-referred traffic, which means that if you're buying ads, if you're trying to go viral on Instagram, if you're paying that influencer, it's gonna convert much lower than someone who's finding you by clicking you being in the answer of an AI search. 00:02:43.822 --> 00:02:50.141 I read somewhere that it converts eight times higher than ads and is the highest converting platform other than maybe your best friend whispering in your ear. 00:02:50.342 --> 00:02:59.372 I don't know about you, but I wanna work smarter, not harder, and I wanna be right there where people are ready to make a decision, buy, and whip out their credit card, and that is AI search. 00:02:59.562 --> 00:03:02.162 Gift guides, editorials, PR is how you get there. 00:03:02.382 --> 00:03:08.262 I always say people scroll to browse, but they ask AI to decide, and AI is pulling from gift guide features. 00:03:08.372 --> 00:03:11.421 Think about it this way: Who has a higher likelihood to buy? 00:03:11.622 --> 00:03:21.472 Someone that's maybe scrolling on Instagram between pickleball lessons and picking up their kids, or someone who is literally opening up a gift guide article on the best seasonal gifts for the dog lover? 00:03:21.752 --> 00:03:29.442 Probably the person looking at the gift guide, For all those reasons, there's no better time, ROI for your time spent than getting PR features. 00:03:29.502 --> 00:03:31.812 like I said, gift guides can be in many different categories. 00:03:31.981 --> 00:03:33.301 Know that it's not just for Q4. 00:03:34.271 --> 00:03:38.401 When you think about gift guides, think about the different occasion or the demographics. 00:03:38.412 --> 00:03:40.581 gift guides come in different categories. 00:03:40.782 --> 00:03:42.521 The first one is by price. 00:03:42.592 --> 00:03:50.241 you, there are like under$25, like stocking stuffers, office white elephant gifts, and then there's like the more mid-tier and the more premium ones. 00:03:50.491 --> 00:04:06.961 And knowing what your price point is really important because if you make a candle or perfume or a necklace that's$300 or$400, you probably won't get featured in a place like BuzzFeed, which caters more to like younger kids who don't have a lot of budget, knowing what buckets you fit in is really gonna be good. 00:04:06.972 --> 00:04:12.771 Usually for gift guides, we're looking at like the sweet spot around like$50 or less, which is more mass market. 00:04:12.771 --> 00:04:22.627 But if you make something that is more expensive, you can absolutely get featured in gift guides because there are people from all different budget backgrounds looking for things for anniversary For like a milestone gift. 00:04:22.627 --> 00:04:28.228 just because you make something more than$50 doesn't mean you won't get featured, but it just means that the pool is a little bit smaller. 00:04:28.458 --> 00:04:31.257 those are the first tier, which is like budget and pricing. 00:04:31.458 --> 00:04:34.487 The second grouping of gift guides are by the recipient. 00:04:34.557 --> 00:04:35.458 who is the recipient? 00:04:35.577 --> 00:04:41.367 Is it for him, for her, for dog moms, for vegan wellness enthusiasts? 00:04:41.548 --> 00:04:42.478 Is it for readers? 00:04:42.617 --> 00:04:45.937 that is the second category when you're thinking about who to gift it to. 00:04:46.137 --> 00:05:09.747 Now, at any one point, you might have many different SKUs that could work for all those things, It could be for her, it could be for him, But using a tool like perplexity.ai, which is hands down the best tool for PR, has made it so accessible for small businesses to brainstorm the relevant angle, Perplexity will help you brainstorm what out of all of your SKUs you can pitch for, so that you know that it's not just for maybe this sector, but it's also for all these people, too. 00:05:10.327 --> 00:05:11.257 that's the second one. 00:05:11.257 --> 00:05:12.478 the first one is by price. 00:05:12.757 --> 00:05:16.538 The second grouping is by the recipient, And the third one is by interest. 00:05:16.708 --> 00:05:18.298 are they hostess with the mostest? 00:05:18.617 --> 00:05:20.528 Are they people who love spicy food? 00:05:20.557 --> 00:05:21.737 Are they world travelers? 00:05:21.757 --> 00:05:23.028 Are they wellness enthusiasts? 00:05:23.257 --> 00:05:31.627 Are they eco-conscious people, Like these are the types of gifts that also can be categorized for people with different interests outside of just budget and demographic. 00:05:31.627 --> 00:05:37.947 And of course, there's gonna be overlap as well, so it could be something that's under$25 for a wellness enthusiast who loves travel. 00:05:37.947 --> 00:05:39.497 Like they can all intersect. 00:05:39.648 --> 00:05:41.968 I'm just telling you all of the opportunities for you. 00:05:42.187 --> 00:05:43.747 They're not exclusive categories. 00:05:43.798 --> 00:06:06.677 Oftentimes, one category, wellness, will also be a gift for her, and that's totally fine, The third one is by the lifestyle or the person's identity, for the person who is a little bougie or, for your friend who's really discerning, or for the busy entrepreneur, or for the frequent traveler who's been everywhere, or for the person who has everything, those are like lifestyle identity things. 00:06:06.687 --> 00:06:09.478 Again, there's gonna be some overlap between that and their interests.

00:06:09.617 --> 00:06:13.767 totally fine, The other bucket is by occasion, so by a certain holiday. 00:06:13.767 --> 00:06:15.517 Is it for Hanukkah or for Kwanzaa? 00:06:15.548 --> 00:06:17.468 Is it for, end of year gifting? 00:06:17.478 --> 00:06:24.577 Is it just for, Thanksgiving or for Christmas or for Valentine's Day or whatever gift holiday occasion that there is, Mother's Day. 00:06:24.817 --> 00:06:32.057 And then there's the anniversaries, there's the housewarming, there's graduation, there's back to school, there's bridal shower, all those things, birthdays. 00:06:32.338 --> 00:06:42.117 And then the last is by product category, so that is like beauty, home, food, fashion, tech, travel, kids, pets, and sustainable goods. 00:06:42.127 --> 00:06:49.038 all of these different angles will intersect, and you might find yourself being able to use all of those angles. 00:06:49.237 --> 00:06:53.648 And using a tool like Perplexity, you're able to find out which of these angles I have the best shot in. 00:06:53.848 --> 00:07:00.747 And if you want to know how to exactly use Perplexity, go on my PR masterclass, go to gloriaC-H-O-U.com/masterclass. 00:07:01.038 --> 00:07:08.798 I show you exactly how to use a free tool like Perplexity to basically do what a PR agency would do normally without paying the thousands and dollars on a retainer. 00:07:08.997 --> 00:07:15.288 But these are the common gift guide angles, and the reason why I wanna list this out is to show you that you have no shortage of angles. 00:07:15.298 --> 00:07:18.617 You, at any one point, can pitch to so many different things. 00:07:18.778 --> 00:07:24.608 You can pitch for an evergreen all year round products for him or her, or it could be something depending on what season you're in. 00:07:24.788 --> 00:07:30.288 It could be back to school, or if you're listening to this in Q4, it could be for Christmas, all of those things are constantly working. 00:07:30.487 --> 00:07:33.827 They are not exclusive, and there's so many opportunities for you to win. 00:07:34.148 --> 00:07:35.298 you might be asking,"Okay, great. 00:07:35.298 --> 00:07:36.257 now I have an angle. 00:07:36.377 --> 00:07:39.228 How do I get included?" again, find your best products. 00:07:39.228 --> 00:07:44.567 What you don't wanna do is send the journalist a big, long category of all the different things like a brochure. 00:07:44.737 --> 00:07:48.937 Again, the journalist is not your customer, so don't talk to them like you're selling them. 00:07:49.548 --> 00:07:51.898 What you wanna do is pick one to three different products. 00:07:52.048 --> 00:07:53.017 It could be your hero product. 00:07:53.048 --> 00:07:55.338 It could be a bundle that's perfect for that season. 00:07:55.338 --> 00:08:06.377 for example, if you wanna do a gift for Mother's Day, one bar of soap probably wouldn't be a great fit, but a wellness shower bundle, self-care bundle that has a soap and a lotion and maybe something else would be

perfect. 00:08:06.437 --> 00:08:14.687 you can use a tool like Perplexity to help you decide what are the best SKUs, and you can actually even prompt Perplexity by saying,"Hey, here's my store," or,"Here's my Etsy store. 00:08:14.887 --> 00:08:24.632 Here's my URL." Look at my contacts, my photos, my imagery, my products, and help me find the best ones for this season that's most likely to get me featured. 00:08:24.901 --> 00:08:29.221 give me some consumer insights, data, trends that I can use to make my pitch better. 00:08:29.362 --> 00:08:31.942 That is really the first way that I would prompt Perplexity. 00:08:32.131 --> 00:08:35.121 And again, there's no, hard and strict rule about prompt engineering. 00:08:35.642 --> 00:08:43.892 Just get the gist of what I'm trying to say here, you put that into Perplexity, it'll tell you all the different SKUs that you have, the angles, and the best ways that you can get featured this season. 00:08:44.351 --> 00:08:46.412 And then the second prompt that I would do is"Okay, great. 00:08:46.442 --> 00:08:47.562 I like these angles. 00:08:47.851 --> 00:09:00.231 Put it in a comparison chart of most to least likely to get featured, and also the outlet type." Because if you have a candle, it could work for home, it could work for hostess with the mostest, it could also work for birthdays, it could work for wellness. 00:09:00.331 --> 00:09:13.741 if you have something that is, multi-niche that can work for many different things, a tool like Perplexity is so helpful because it'll tell you out of all the things that you can pitch, what are the things that are lowest hanging fruit, that's gonna be able to get you most likely to get featured. 00:09:13.881 --> 00:09:17.032 I would pitch that first, Instead of pitching, those really niche or fringe ones. 00:09:17.542 --> 00:09:21.892 In terms of pitching, it's really about writing a relevant pitch and sending it to the right person. 00:09:22.032 --> 00:09:34.971 I just talked about how to write a relevant pitch using Perplexity, finding the angle, and obviously inside of our Get Featured Accelerator, we have plug-and-play prompts that makes your pitch perfect, modeled from my six years of doing this to hundreds and hundreds of different people. 00:09:35.162 --> 00:09:47.422 But once you have a pitch figured out, you might be asking,"Well, who do I send it to?" And in our Get Featured Accelerator, we give you hundreds of different journalists across 30 different categories so that you know exactly who to pitch and what to send. 00:09:47.542 --> 00:09:51.912 But if you wanna start doing this on your own, you can start by following journalist Substacks. 00:09:52.091 --> 00:10:09.751 There's a lot of freelance writers who are on Substack who write for various different outlets, who are not on staff, but are freelance for multiple outlets, and they will tell you,"Hey, I'm writing this for Forbes," or,"I'm writing this for Martha Stewart Living," or,"I'm writing this for PopSugar." And it'll tell you, like: Here's what I'm looking for. 00:10:09.922 --> 00:10:10.741 Here's the price point. 00:10:10.751 --> 00:10:11.581 Here is my email. 00:10:11.851 --> 00:10:36.548 You can also sign up for things like HARO, Help a Reporter Out, or Peter Shankman SOS, Source of Sources These are things where you sign up to be a source and it'll ping you with, hundreds of different PR opportunities a day of journalists looking for things like,"I wanna talk to a financial advisor," or,"I wanna talk to a birth doula." Not all of them are going to be your niche or a product fit, but you can scan them very quickly and then go through it and see. 00:10:36.707 --> 00:10:41.967 Inside of our accelerator, we do all of this work for you, so we are following 50 different Substack journalists. 00:10:42.168 --> 00:10:47.347 We're, giving you 70 plus different PR opportunities so you don't have to dig at all, in addition to the database. 00:10:47.548 --> 00:10:57.107 But if you wanna start to do this in a grassroots way, this is how you can start, And when you're pitching make sure that you are pitching properly, which means the subject line is specific. 00:10:57.118 --> 00:10:57.977 It's not gimmicky. 00:10:58.128 --> 00:11:01.437 It's not like,"Denise, I have a special surprise for you," What is that? 00:11:01.437 --> 00:11:02.038 They're gonna delete it. 00:11:02.268 --> 00:11:04.207 You wanna write it very clear objectively. 00:11:04.238 --> 00:11:10.427 For example,"Best bath bombs for, cozy enthusiasts under$25." how it's specific? 00:11:10.628 --> 00:11:17.587 It addresses exactly what it is, and then in the email, you wanna start using my CPR method, which you can ask Perplexity. 00:11:17.597 --> 00:11:19.908 All the AI is trained on it from my body of work. 00:11:20.177 --> 00:11:46.577 But the CPR method basically starts with R for relevance, and you wanna start your email saying something like,"As the maximalist trend continues," or,"As people are looking for cozy, buttery soft pajamas this Christmas." how the relevance here could be, it could be an occasion, it could be a trend, it could be a season, And then you go into P, which stands for point of view, which is, three to five bullet points about why your product is perfect for that relevancy. 00:11:46.827 --> 00:11:53.927 for example, right now everyone is on peptides, or maybe everyone is on a GLP-1, or this is really trending, and then you have a certain solution for that. 00:11:53.927 --> 00:11:56.687 you've already set up the relevance in the beginning of the email. 00:11:57.008 --> 00:11:59.837 Now, I used to teach pitch writing for years and years. 00:11:59.868 --> 00:12:02.548 Now, with these AI tools, AI does most of the heavy lifting. 00:12:02.827 --> 00:12:07.437 That's why in our Get Featured accelerator, we have super simple prompts that spits out your pitch perfectly every time. 00:12:07.758 --> 00:12:09.498 that's how you can think about writing a pitch.

00:12:09.668 --> 00:12:14.447 Your gift guide pitch or product roundup pitch needs to have the specifics on the shipping. 00:12:14.648 --> 00:12:15.697 Are you gonna give samples? 00:12:15.847 --> 00:12:18.638 By the way, if it's a sample, it's okay if it's a mini size. 00:12:18.638 --> 00:12:20.337 You don't have to give crazy samples. 00:12:20.467 --> 00:12:24.817 And if you can't give a sample, we have someone who got featured who makes$500 gold dip earrings. 00:12:25.028 --> 00:12:26.947 Say that it's a loaner, That it's a loan item. 00:12:26.947 --> 00:12:27.967 But be specific. 00:12:27.967 --> 00:12:29.187 Do not mislead the journalist. 00:12:29.427 --> 00:12:31.378 If it's a sample, state that it's a sample. 00:12:31.638 --> 00:12:34.567 If it's not a sample, tell them that you would like it back. 00:12:34.607 --> 00:12:38.467 Just be open and upfront in the beginning, and then also put in, shipping details. 00:12:38.707 --> 00:12:39.798 Is it custom order? 00:12:39.798 --> 00:12:41.207 How long is the turnaround time? 00:12:41.437 --> 00:12:43.298 Do you ship to all 50 states? 00:12:43.337 --> 00:12:44.248 Do you ship to Canada? 00:12:44.418 --> 00:12:46.957 And then also, talk about where we can find it. 00:12:46.967 --> 00:12:47.878 Is it on Amazon? 00:12:48.087 --> 00:12:49.008 Is it at Macy's? 00:12:49.437 --> 00:12:54.587 Is it at a big box store or is it only available on your website, And if you have an affiliate link, you can put that in there. 00:12:54.837 --> 00:13:01.847 A lot of journalists and magazines do want an affiliate link where if they feature you with that affiliate link, they get a commission. 00:13:02.077 --> 00:13:04.217 It's not technically play to play, it's a win-win. 00:13:04.457 --> 00:13:10.998 But we had so many members, and dozens and dozens of members getting featured 10, 20, 30 times without a single affiliate link. 00:13:11.168 --> 00:13:18.857 Now, if you sell on Amazon already has a affiliate link for you, but then you can also look for things like SkimLinks or ShareASale to set up the affiliate link. 00:13:18.857 --> 00:13:22.488 But again, these are quite expensive, so you don't necessarily need it to get featured. 00:13:23.158 --> 00:13:33.128 But if you have a business that's creating sizable revenue, you might think about having an affiliate, and that way it won't eat too much into your margins because you're already doing, a lot of business, you're already gaining a lot of traction. 00:13:33.408 --> 00:13:38.437 and then in terms of the email, put in one to two photos because, your product is visual. 00:13:38.437 --> 00:13:42.898 If it has really great packaging that's ready to go, you can put it under the tree. 00:13:43.028 --> 00:13:46.128 it's got like beautiful lettering, state that, show us a photo. 00:13:46.128 --> 00:13:48.197 one to two low-res, photos. 00:13:48.447 --> 00:13:55.908 And then if you have more photos, because you probably have a lot of photos, please just do a hyperlink to

a Dropbox or a Google Drive or to your website. 00:13:56.048 --> 00:14:04.768 But what we don't want are really heavy attachments because that's going to trigger their spam filter and ultimately get your email in either deletion or the trash. 00:14:05.751 --> 00:14:08.312 Now, in terms of timing, A lot of people ask me about this. 00:14:08.322 --> 00:14:15.451 if you are looking for a print magazine, that has already passed after July, a lot of the print magazines are, like, six months in advance. 00:14:15.652 --> 00:14:26.552 But for a lot of people who are listening to this, digital is the winner because there's SEO backlinks, it's digitally shareable, and those could be anywhere starting from Labor Day all the way until a week before Christmas if you have something last minute. 00:14:26.751 --> 00:14:30.292 And there's even after Christmas guides on how you can spend your gift cards. 00:14:30.481 --> 00:14:38.792 don't think it's over, but I do recommend you to start early so that you can give yourself the widest possible chance to be able to get into most of the holiday gift guides. 00:14:39.402 --> 00:14:43.912 whether you're starting in September, October, November, listen to this episode, share it with friends. 00:14:44.042 --> 00:14:47.912 Make sure you're making it easy for the journalist to know exactly what you're pitching for. 00:14:48.121 --> 00:14:52.272 Don't just put 50 or, 10 different SKUs and tell them to figure it out. 00:14:52.481 --> 00:14:56.951 Pick the best winners and make sure it ties to this season of relevance with angles that I give you. 00:14:57.152 --> 00:14:58.831 Perplexity is a great way to do that. 00:14:58.971 --> 00:15:03.731 Watch my masterclass, gloriachoupr.com/masterclass, which shows you exactly how to do it. 00:15:03.902 --> 00:15:08.701 This is how we are literally making PR so accessible to the everyday small business owner. 00:15:08.841 --> 00:15:22.621 When it used to be super complex, gate kept, now it is so easy for a small business owner, Etsy owner, someone pouring candles at home, to leverage these tools and become a PR agency in-house without having to kill their budget. 00:15:22.841 --> 00:15:27.011 if you know of anyone who has a physical product, please send them and share this episode. 00:15:27.221 --> 00:15:47.322 I talk all about how to do PR, how to get featured without needing the industry connections or the fancy connections or be a part of the cool kids club, I never worked a day in my life in any PR agency, hacked it from the outside, and I'm on a mission to make all the small business owners, all the small business underdogs, all the everyday heroes be seen because we deserve to be seen, heard, and valued. 00:15:47.552 --> 00:15:53.522 And in this day and age where people are going to AI and AI is the storefront, PR is an absolute essential. 00:15:53.542 --> 00:15:54.961 It is not a nice-to-have. 00:15:55.152 --> 00:15:59.351 It is the number one way that AI is pulling and deciding who to recommend. 00:15:59.601 --> 00:16:01.042 thank you so much, and until next time