All about Newstips Product Sweep Electronic Review Solicitations

REACHING REVIEWERS

The same e-mail and fax delivery mechanisms that deliver Newstips Electronic Editorial Bulletins to thousands of the journalists who cover the industry also deliver another innovative PR tool: the Product Sweep. It reaches the hundreds of those journalists who do reviews, an important and influential subset of the press.

PRODUCT SWEEPS

This document describes our Product Sweep automated system for soliciting (and forwarding) editorial product review requests. Product Sweeps are a unique (and uniquely productive) way of arousing interest among the people in the press who do reviews. And they aren't all "reviewers".

WHO DOES REVIEWS?

What do we mean by review and reviewer? We're referring to any editorial coverage that results from a writer's direct, personal involvement with a product or service. Traditional reviewers are one key segment of those journalists we reach with Product Sweeps, but they're far from its "universe". We also reach columnists (officially, contributing editors), for example, and "editorial labs". We reach reviewers regardless of the name or title a publication adopts for its review operations. (More and more renaming goes on as each publication tries to make its own review activities seem somehow more consequential than those of competitors).

WHAT WE SEND

What do we send these review decision-makers? What incredibly sophisticated machination is at the root of our success? It's as dumb as a tractor: a checklist of products available for review. But like a tractor, it makes the Earth move - to the tune of 500 reviews in a typical month, month after month.

WHEN THEY RESPOND

They check off the products they want to review. We enter their selections into the computer, and the computer automatically faxes a full-page self-explanatory formal request to the vendor or marketer of that product (or to their fulfillment designate, as in an agency or third-party service).

WHAT'S REVIEWABLE?

What kind of reviewable do we list? It might be a product or something to review, a supporting package, anything that's more likely to come on a UPS truck than in an e-mail message. Or it might be a chance to arrange the performance of a service.

BULLETIN REQUIRED

There is one trade-off for the simplicity of our checklists: Product Sweep electronic editorial review solicitations are not available alone; participation in Product Sweeps requires participation in the Newstips Electronic Editorial Bulletin. That's because the 1- to 2-line description of the reviewable product in the context of the checklist is often not compelling (nor sometimes, even informative) unless and until the reviewer has read about that product or service in the Bulletin. By the same logic, we do not offer Product Sweeps to journalists who do not receive the Bulletin. Historically, the addition of Product Sweeps yields 4-5 times as many review requests as participation in the Bulletin alone (itself an effective review-getter).

Participation in Product Sweeps adds $500 per month to other program costs.

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©1997 Newstips, Inc. All rights reserved.
Newstips(SM) is a service mark and Newstips(TM) is a trademark of Newstips, Inc.
The Newstips Electronic Editorial Bulletin is a collection ©1997 Newstips, Inc.

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