Contents

Praise for Pitch Perfect

Acknowledgments

About the Authors

We Want to Hear from You!

Reader Services

Foreword

Preface

Who This Book Is For

Why Pitch Perfect

How This Book Is Organized

1. How Blogs Work

A Typical Day at a Major Blog

Making Sausage: How Reviews Happen

Performing the Review

Elements of Review

How Much Time Is Spent Reviewing Each Product?

What Kinds Of Reviews Do Bloggers Write?

Choosing a Review Type

Why Blog Reviews Matter

Marketing Realities

Wrapping Up

2. The Attractive Product

Product Definition

What Makes a Good Product?

Why Good Interface Design Matters

Refining the Product

Falling in Love with Your Product

Nondisclosures, Embargos, and Exclusives

Competing Against the Big Guys

Building In Self-Promotion

Wrapping Up

3. Crafting Your Pitch

Designing the Pitch

Essential Pitch Components

A Sample Pitch

Remind Us Who You Are

Capturing Attention Through the Subject Line

Promo Codes

Differences Between Hardware and Software Pitches

Hardware Pricing

Video Gold

Hardware Review Logistics

Benchmarks

A Word About Kickstarter

Common Hardware Product Categories

Hardware Pitches

Wrapping Up

4. Pitching Do’s and Don’ts

Know the Site

Scheduling Out

Leverage Personality

Communicate Well

Checking In

Watching Your Timing

Gaming the System

Avoiding Offense

Submitting Through Channels

When to Pitch

Wrapping Up

5. Case Studies

Case Study: Short but Sweet

Case Study: The Solid Query

Case Study: The Professional Pitch

Case Study: The Lost Holiday Opportunity

Case Study: The Meh Pitch

Case Study: The Completely Inappropriate Pitch that Made Us Smile

Case Study: Winning by Charm

Case Study: Completely Missing the Mark

Case Study: The Perils of Autocorrect

Case Study: Buzzwords

Case Study: Not Enough Detail

Case Study: The WTF We Don’t Even Pitch

Case Study: The Pitch that Got Away

Case Study: Don’t Submit Multiple Products All at Once

Case Study: Machine Translation

Case Study: Avoid Unspecific Bullets

Case Study: The Excellent Response

Case Study: The Pitch Rewrite

Case Study: Remembering that the App Is the Hero

Case Study: The Twitter Pitch

Final Tips: Avoiding Grandiosity

Wrapping Up

6. Preparing For PR

Get Your Product into Shape

Prepare Your Marketing Text

Choose Strong Branding

Website Essentials

Creating a Reviewer’s Guide

About Press Releases

Preparing that All-Important Product Video

Preparing Review Materials

Social Media

Wrapping Up

7. The Care and Feeding of Your Blogger

Establishing Relationships with Bloggers

The “Be a Decent Human Being” Rule

Responding to Reviews—Both Good and Bad

Why Wasn’t My Product Reviewed?

Wrapping Up

8. Worksheets and Checklists

Know Your Customer: Developing a Customer Profile

Competitive Analysis

Potential Market Size Calculation

Pitch Checklists

Reviewer’s Guide Checklist

Blogger Relationship Database

Wrapping Up