The rise of the 'super-blogger' who can raise a brand's profile with just one tweet, has seen a rush of businesses signing up to do more and more blogger marketing. However, just as a blogger can build a brand with one tweet, they can also equally destroy a brand with the next tweet.  Luckily creating a successful blogger marketing campaign and avoiding a brand catastrophe is easy, it just involves following a few basic rules.

The brand and blogger collaboration

The general way collaborations work between bloggers and brands is by brands sending bloggers their products to feature on their Instagram, Pinterest, or Wordpress feeds. When the product is received the blogger will style and photograph the product with their own aesthetic. After editing the imagery, the blogger will then post the imagery on their blog and market it via their social media channels including a tag or link back to the brand's e-commerce website. Sometimes a custom discount code will be offered to their audience, but that usually depends on whether the brand can afford to offer a discount. There's normally, no contract, and no signed agreements and everything is done on a trust basis, and it's this lack of agreement and a lack of experience in basic marketing where the relationship often breaks down? With bloggers upset about brands using their pictures in their own marketing and bloggers not delivering on what the brands ‘thought they agreed on.”

So to avoid this confusion, here are some tips that will help you make the most of working with bloggers:

Barter Collaborations

With a barter collaboration, no money changes hands. Instead, you  exchange your goods for a service from the blogger. Even though no money changes hands, it's still essential that you get the blogger to sign a simple barter agreement, which outlines the conditions of the collaboration. Make sure you are clear on what you expect of the blogger and double check the blogger is happy with the conditions before going ahead with this non-cash transaction promotion.

Some of the things to include in the agreement:

• Number of posts expected to be shared by the blogger.

• Info to be included in the posts or blog.

• Hashtags or tags that that will be included in the post.

• Permission from the blogger to use their photos for your own marketing purposes.

• Duration of the collaboration.

Paid Collaborations

Paid collaborations include the brand paying the blogger to promote their products. This usually works the same as a barter collaboration but with an up-front payment to the blogger.

• Some of the things to include in the agreement:

• Agreement on payment terms with the blogger (eg an invoice from the blogger).

• Details of products that will be included in the promo.

• Number of posts expected to be shared by the blogger.

• Info to be included in the posts or blog.

• Hashtags or tags that that will be included in the post.

• Permission from the blogger to use their photos for your own marketing purposes.

• Duration of the collaboration.

Running a Competition with a Blogger

Running competitions with bloggers can be a great way to gain an engagement and audience for your brand. There are some basic rules that you need to abide by when running a successful competition.

• Agree on terms of the competition with the bloggers before going ahead.

• Establish the rules of the competition clearly and make sure everyone understands these.

• Make sure your competition abides the rules of UK Code of Non-broadcast Advertising and Direct & Promotional Marketing (CAP Code) https://www.asa.org.uk/codes-and-rulings/advertising-codes/non-broadcast-code.html that says competitions must be honest and legal.

• Make sure that your competition has a clear start and end date.

• Specify any restrictions to the competition including age and location.

• State clearly how the winner of the competition will be selected.

Using Bloggers Photography

If you use a bloggers (or anyone's) imagery without asking for permission from the owner of the image you are infringing copyright laws (http://www.gov.uk/topic/intellectual-property/copyright). To avoid legal action, contact the blogger directly and discuss their terms for use of the image that you would like to use.

Working with bloggers will certainly help your brand increase its profile and hopefully increase your engagement, which in turn should lead to more sales - as long as you carry out collaborations in an organised way.

We hope these simple guidelines have helped you get a better understanding of how to successfully work with bloggers. Keep coming back as this is just the first in what we intend to be a long line of articles to help make your marketing more effective and more profitable.