Episode 53: How to Connect with Your Audience This Holiday Season through Gift Guides with Jessica Toscano

 

Gift guides—they're everywhere during the holiday season! 

In published magazines and web articles, businesses showcase their products through these promotional tools because that's what gift guides are best known for. They let you highlight your products, inspire your customers, and make people remember you.

But getting your products featured on holiday gift guides is an even more intriguing activity that remains challenging for business founders. 

Let's face this—many business owners have amazing products! 

However, these same people don't often get the recognition and authority they deserve on gift guides simply because they have not really connected with the audience of their products.

Now, what does connecting with your audience have to do with getting your products featured on holiday gift guides?

This calls you to do these two significant activities— first, finding the relevance of your product to the season and the market, and finally, pitching before the right publications.

As the adage goes, 'there's a reason for every season,' and the same applies to your products. There are compelling stories and benefits behind them, so use that! 

And with your products' message, you have to pitch before the editors of the publications that feature gift guides. In that way, you give yourself the opportunity to have your target audience remember your product.

The best part of doing these activities is that you can potentially receive your return on investment without spending any cash. 

At the same time, you continue to build your authority in your industry.

That sounds like a win for you already!

By now, I'm sure you've found more reasons to be excited about this episode. But the best reason to be hyped for this episode is that we have Jessica Toscano, a journalist, and business founder, back on the podcast this time to share with us the best actions you can take to make this the best holiday for your business.

"It doesn't matter where you are in the process, as long as you have a clear message and you believe in yourself, go on. Send those emails. The only thing that I will definitely suggest is rather than send to 20 million different publications, just to get in any gift guide, I would start off by targeting specific publications."
-Jessica Toscano

Jessica Toscano is a skilled content creator and editor with experience in print and digital media. She founded digital unisex lifestyle publication, IntrigueMag in 2014. She continues to serve as CEO and Editor-in-Chief. Additionally, her articles have been published in Cosmopolitan, Men's Health, SELF, SHAPE, SheKnows, InsideHook, Giddy, and Cliché, with branded content featured in a variety of outlets, including Buffalo News.

Continue discovering how to get featured on holiday gift guides with this special episode. Let's take a deep dive into finding the reason for every season for your products, so you can finally land that gift guide feature you genuinely deserve!

 

Topics We Cover in This Episode: 

  • The distinct purposes of gift guides

  • Fitting your gift guide pitch in the publisher's timeline

  • How to find the right publication to feature your product

  • Insider tips and insights on pitching for a holiday gift guide

  • Finding the reasons in your product all season long

  • How affiliate links help your product get more visibility

 

If you want to land your first feature for free without any connections, I want to invite you to watch my PR Secrets Masterclass where I reveal the exact methods thousands of bootstrapping small businesses use to hack their own PR and go from unknown to being a credible and sought-after industry expert. Register now at www.gloriachou.com/masterclass.

Resources Mentioned:

Gloria Chou's Masterclass: PR Masterclass

Follow Jessica Toscano on Instagram: Jessica Toscano IG 

Connect with Jessica Toscano on LinkedIn: Jessica Toscano

Follow Jessica Toscano on Twitter: @msjtoscano


Additional Resources:

Watch the PR masterclass

Get the PR Starter Pack

Join the Small Biz PR Pros FB group

Listen On Your Favorite Podcast Platform

Follow the Podcast

Follow Along on Instagram

Follow Along on Facebook


Follow & Review on Apple Podcasts

Are you following my podcast? If you’re not, I want to encourage you to do that today so you don’t miss any future episodes!

I would also appreciate it if you would leave me a review! Reviews help me make sure I am providing the content that you need! Plus, you will be entered to WIN a 1:1 pitch writing session with me where I will help you find your press-worthy angle! Click here to review, select “Ratings and Reviews” and “Write a Review”.

Here’s a glance at this episode…

[1:47] Gift guides encompass every holiday. So, it's not just focused on Christmas time. It could be for anything.

[3:39] You want to offer ample time for the editors to review your pitch, potentially test the product, and offer feedback as to whether or not they want to be able to feature it.

[8:06] If you're a brand who has an affiliate link attached now, by all means reach out to the publisher and say we've worked with you in the past. We just want to be able to share our affiliate links, so you can earn commission as an incentive to include our product.

[17:05] First sentence, introduce your product. Introduce your brand. Introduce whatever it is you're promoting. Keep it very short, very straight to the point. Bullet points are super, super helpful, but don't go too crazy. I would avoid like 20 bullet points.

[19:38] Everything is absolutely important. But for this purpose, you want to consider your overall goal. What is the angle of your story? So, your goal is to get into this gift guide. What kind of gift guide is it?

Guest User