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5 Tips To Help Navigate Using HARO In Your Everyday Business Life
How To Utilize HARO- Why Use HARO?
HARO (help a reporter out) is an ingenious site connecting journalists and/or bloggers to all kinds of different experts for quotes, interviews, and contributions to add to a story. Utilizing HARO will give you a valuable helping hand with your website by providing a backlink in exchange for your quote or contribution.
1. Search For Great Opportunites
Always, Always, always scan your HARO emails daily. You will receive 3 each day, one in the morning, afternoon and evening. This gives you plenty of opportunity to respond to at least hopefully one query. Don’t always waste your time on queries that do not help your products or your particular expertise. Some random queries about desserts or home products will always not aid your business. Does this mean you should not respond to random queries. No, not exactly.
Let’s say for example you are a financial advisor, upon scanning your emails from HARO you might not find anything that applies to your expertise. When this happens why not at least respond to one query? But, ask yourself “Is this subject something I want to be known for?”
2. How To Respond To A HARO Query
Write a clear, concise and the point response that follows the directions of the query. It should take about 30 mins or less to write a simple, to the point pitch. Some reporters or bloggers will provide some direct instructions for you to follow, and even some tips on how to avoid a pitch that they are not looking for. If you are writing about a particular product, be detailed on how the product works, and why it would help consumers.
When writing about a particular service, be specific about pros and cons, or why this service is beneficial or whether consumers should look elsewhere. Queries will also vary when it comes to giving you credit for your pitch. Some will provide a backlink, others will post the article on social media and include a LinkedIn or twitter handle for you. If you are specifically looking for a backlink, be sure to avoid certain queries that pointly say please provide your LinkedIn or Twitter handle.
3. Cross Your Fingers And Move On
After submitting a pitch for a query, it is not necessary to follow up. With HARO, these reporters or bloggers get so many responses, it seems a bit redundant to follow up on your pitch. If you hear back from a reporter, and are quoted in a story then fantastic! If you don’t hear anything, move on to the next query.
4. Set Up a Google Alert For Your Name Or Company Name
Reporters are usually pretty decent about following up concerning a pitch you submitted. Unfortunately, at times some reporters won’t always give you a heads up or provide a link to the published, finished product. So, if you haven’t done so already, set up a google alert with your name and/or your company name. A google alert will pop up in your inbox notifying you of a possible story. In addition, it doesn’t hurt to subscribe to the reporters feed to ensure you don’t miss anything!
5. Celebrate Your Accomplishments
How to Utilize HARO – If you do get a placement through HARO, it is important to celebrate! Share the post with coworkers, on social media, you could even send a reporter a thank you note! Pat yourself on the back, you have earned it!
Last Updated on by Lauren Mckenzie