A Ninja Digital PR strategy means going from not existing to ranking first for 21 of your highest priority keywords. It’s what we do.
In May 2015, a business called Storage Equipment Experts asked us to create, run, and promote a website for them from scratch. Just over a year and a half later, this is the result:
Keywords
Position as of April 2015 (before Exposure Ninja took on the client)
Position as of December 2016
racking checklist
N/A
1
sema racking inspections
N/A
1
rack inspection training
N/A
1
pallet racking inspection checklist
N/A
1
rack inspections
N/A
1
racking inspection courses
N/A
1
racking system inspection checklist
N/A
1
racking inspection
N/A
1
racking inspection training
N/A
1
racking inspection checklist pdf
N/A
1
pallet racking inspections
N/A
1
rack inspection checklist
N/A
1
sema racking inspection checklist
N/A
1
pallet racking london
N/A
1
racking inspections
N/A
1
rack inspection
N/A
1
pallet rack inspection checklist
N/A
1
storage rack inspection checklist
N/A
1
racking inspection checklist
N/A
1
pallet racking inspection
N/A
1
pallet rack inspection
N/A
1
You’ll notice that, for every single keyword, the client went from “N/A” to “1”. That’s because before our campaign, Storage Equipment Experts didn’t have a website. That means we literally took them from not existing on the internet to the first organic result for 21 of its most important keywords!
There were a number of factors involved. We had a great website development team who created a brilliant website, a great SEO team keeping tabs on all the best target keywords, and a social media team sharing all our blogs and articles over Facebook and Twitter.
What really got Storage Equipment Expert’s name out there though is their Digital PR strategy. This ongoing campaign has had plenty of successes to brag about, but by far the most notable of those successes is this infographic:
Please include attribution to seerackinginspections.co.uk with this graphic.
The joy of a good infographic is when it goes viral and, before you know it, the thing is being featured in publications and shared without you even having to say “hey” to an editor. Lo and behold, that’s exactly what happened. Our plan worked perfectly!
Things started off simple enough. The original infographic featured on Storage Equipment Experts’ blog, which was shared a couple times. But then…
This infographic was featured on Cultbox, where it gained 257 total shares (across Facebook, Twitter and Google+).
It was featured on Science Vs. Hollywood, where it gained 33 total shares (across Facebook, Twitter, and Google+) which lead to a follow-up article on the most dangerous shoots of all time.
It was also featured on BuzzFeed, SmallBizClub, TV Republik, and Have You Nerd? where it received yet more shares across Facebook, Twitter, and Google+.
Then the infographic was featured on sites which we didn’t even pitch to like S**t Hot Infographics and Infographics Portal, where it got a further five shares across Facebook and Twitter.
To wrap it all up, the infographic was featured in quite a lengthy post on The Doctor Who Companion (who also posted the infographic without a pitch from us), where it generated 22 more shares across Facebook and Twitter.
Results Summary: Crunching the Numbers on Our Infographic
The net effect of all of this is an infographic that has…
featured on 10 different sites,
generated 23 backlinks in total,
and stacked up 321 social media shares.
Total number of sites the infographic was featured on
Total number of backlinks to Storage Equipment Experts’ website
Total number of shares across all social media platforms
10
23
321
Not bad for a niche company that provides SEMA approved racking inspections and racking inspection training.
So how did we do it? How did we turn an infographic from such a specific industry into a summer of 2016 sensation? An infographic so on-fire that (as of December 2016) if you Google “most dangerous fictional workplaces”, it is featured in all six of the top results… Yes, really!
Well, We didn’t get these results by luck. Here’s the breakdown.
Infographic and Digital PR Strategy Step 1: Brainstorming, Preparation, and Creation
While there’s no one magic answer for coming up with great infographic content, the key to this particular campaign was quirkiness, mass appeal, and timing. Let’s look at the title of that infographic:
The 4 Most Dangerous Fictional Workplaces (from the Perspective of a Health and Safety Expert)
First of all, we wanted an infographic with the potential to be shared across a multitude sites and by a multitude of people. But, we needed an infographic that was at least somewhat related to our client’s niche.
Justin O’Sullivan, the owner of the business and the person who I continue to work closely with as part of this campaign, is a SEMA approved pallet racking inspector. This role, while vital for his career, is hard to market for the purposes of an infographic.
Instead, I opted for the much punchier (and much simpler) title of “health and safety expert”. It’s broader and this gave us much more scope in terms of subject matter.
“Fictional workplaces” was a quirky idea born from the fact that a lot of the most-shared “geeky” content on the internet comes from the over-analysis of fictional universes. Heck, it’s more or less Cracked’s entire business model.
From 20 Bafflingly Illogical Details of the Star Wars Universe to 5 Silly Rules That Old Dinosaur Movies All Seem To Follow, and 4 Times Movie Characters Didn’t See A SUPER OBVIOUS Solution, Cracked’s content is a perfect example of how popular ripping apart a fictional universe from an analytical perspective can be.
Finally, there was the timing. This was a no-brainer. Here are the Google results for the search term “Game of Thrones”:
That massive spike, bigger than all the other spikes, was the most recent season finale. That period, from 26th June to 2nd July, was when we wanted our infographic to be out and about on the internet. After all, what’s a more dangerous workplace than Castle Black?
Infographic and Digital PR Strategy Step 2: Pitching the Infographic
The second step of our infographic digital PR strategy was pitching. The aim was simple: find geeky sites, get the infographic featured, and watch the shares roll in.
I wound up using a variety of different Google searches to find sites friendly to geeky content that were also interested in guest posts. In total, I pitched to around thirty different websites from June to August 2016.
For each site I tried a different tact. Science Vs. Hollywood, for example, isn’t a self-proclaimed “geeky” site. Rather, it celebrates the application of science to the art of film. By contrast, a site like Have You Nerd? is proud of its geek credentials and this is something which I was able to mention in my pitch. Then, there is Cultbox: a website which isn’t for film “geeks” so much as it is for film “aficionados”.
Understanding exactly how a website views itself is essential to any pitch, but my basic format involved pointing out the following:
Point out that the content of the infographic matches the content on their site. Seeing as the infographic featured Game of Thrones, Star Wars, Doctor Who, and The Simpsons, this was always true in some form or another.
Point out that our love for these fictional universes is mutual, hence why we’ve created such an awesome infographic.
Point out exactly which section of the site the infographic would work on.
Perhaps point out that, what with the Game of Thrones season finale approaching (which it was at the time), now would be the perfect time to host this infographic.
Mention that we’ll happily write some content to go with the infographic (which we did in most cases).
Sign off by saying how exciting it would be to work with their site (which was true in every case!)
The result was a whole host of positive responses which eventually culminated in 321 shares.
Side Note: But What About Your Blogger Outreach Strategy?
Blogger outreach is possible for clients in many niches. For some clients, though, it isn’t the most productive way to build links as part of their digital PR strategy. This is because some subject niches naturally have fewer bloggers which often means they’re harder to find, and some niches have less desirable content topics for bloggers to post about.
In this case, we didn’t go for blogger outreach for a couple of reasons:
Finding bloggers in the racking inspection niche (though not impossible) is quite difficult. There are a handful of bloggers who we could have approached, including Christopher Sciacca from Supply Chains Rock, but we didn’t feel our infographic campaign suited this audience so well.
One of the most popular blogger outreach strategies is product giveaways. With pallet racking inspections and racking inspection training, this strategy (though not impossible) is difficult to implement. We always want to find the most efficient and lucrative areas to publish in, and this strategy wouldn’t give us the results we were after.
Infographic and Digital PR Strategy Step 3: Follow Up and Social Media
Since the infographic has started being shared, we’ve been doing a lot of follow-up work. Specifically, we’ve been keeping a close eye on exactly who’s been sharing our infographic. When they do, we’re there to capitalise.
This one Tweet alone lead to a further 24 retweets — every single one of them meant more exposure for Storage Equipment Experts.
Following up also means emailing editors when the posts had gone live. In the case of Science Vs. Hollywood, this led to a second article. However, in every other case, the benefit of following up was just helping to maintain a strong relationship with an editor who — if the right opportunity emerges — we may end up working with again in the future.
Conclusion: Pallet Racking Inspections Can Be Cool, Too!
The art of marketing, whether that’s online or offline, is making something seem as cool to your target market as you (the business owner) think it is. We have had and continue to have clients who create window displays, sell computer software, build playgrounds, sell baby pyjamas, fireworks, beauty treatments, and so on. All of them, every single last one of them, thinks that their business is — at the very least — somewhat interesting. Otherwise, they’d be doing something else.
The joy of this digital PR campaign is the joy of knowing that the many people who shared, saw, and interacted with our infographic across the internet thought that the brand we were promoting was involved in something a little bit more than itself. For this infographic digital PR strategy, Storage Equipment Experts was about more than just ensuring the safety of racking systems; it was about ensuring the safety of the Death Star, the largest battle station in the galaxy.
Aside from all of that, the infographic also got results. More shares means more backlinks which, when taken together with all of the other work we do for this company, is why it is so dominant in its industry.
If you want us to help to create a Digital PR strategy for your business, contact Exposure Ninja for a free website review to get started!
The post How We Gained Over 300 Shares For a Niche Health And Safety Website With One Infographic & One Awesome Digital PR Strategy appeared first on Exposure Ninja.