Once your blog becomes established, the chances are that you will be contacted by PRs and brands who may offer you products to review, ask if you will host giveaways, invite you to events or ask you to be a brand ambassador for them. But what is a brand ambassador and how does it differ from just doing a review?
As a brand ambassador, you are likely to form a longer term relationship with a brand, often reviewing many items for them in exchange for free products or payment. All programmes will work slightly differently but they will usually expect you to write multiple posts on your blog about their products and in return they will often link back to your blog from their website. It is important to make sure the relationship works well for both parties. You may also be asked to share your reviews on Facebook and tweet using certain hashtags.
The same guidelines apply as for when you write any other review posts – always disclose your relationship with the brand and any payment you have received, and make sure you are honest in your write up. You should never feel pressured to champion a product that didn’t work out for you.
Katie from Feeding boys and a firefighter has been working with Morphy Richards. She says, “I’m one of Morphy Richards’ Home of the Houseproud Innovators - which means I regularly get sent kitchen appliances to test and review. It’s a two-way street in that the brand gets both my feedback on their products and exposure to my readers, and in return I get to keep cool gadgets like slow cookers, steam cookers, milk frothers, bread makers etc. I can pass the benefits onto my audience too, like discounts and the chance to win gadgets in regular giveaways.
It’s great having a more long-term relationship with brands as you gain a better understanding of each other. Morphy Richards’ PR are particularly great to work with as they don’t pressure you to review everything – only the products you’re genuinely interested in. That way you don’t end up with piles of useless stuff clogging up your house with annoying emails wondering why you’ve not written about them yet!”
Hannah from Home Baked is an ambassador for Friends of Glass, a non profit organisation trying to raise awareness about using glass over plastic and other packaging for both health and ecological reasons, and enjoys working with them because she really believes in the cause.
She says, “Friends of Glass approached me during my year of preserving as I was using glass jars and asked if I would like to be an ambassador. They are very laid back in terms of what they expect from me. They encourage me to spread the word about my preference for using glass and share videos/campaign information periodically for me to share. I have written for their blog and link to them when I use a recipe that specifically uses glass packaging or cookware.”
Have you worked as a brand ambassador? How did the programme work for you?
I am a brand ambassador for Haggen-Dazs, I think it is great, I love it. I don’t have much else to do but try out new flavours, go to parties and lightly spread the word. I would not do it if it required lots of time.
Sounds great!
Thank you for this very informative posting.
Hope it is useful for you Maggie.
I would love to do this, how does one go about being a brand ambassador?
Usually a brand or PR company will approach you. Make sure you keep your Foodies100 profile up to date as there will be opportunities cropping up in the future.
it depends,last year approx 8 weeks into my blogging career people were asking me for recipes/ideas on feeding Bob and people like him, I e-mailed a company and asked them if they fancied sending me some food stuff to blog about, they said yes would love to and now 10 months later I still get to put in a big order every month and still blog for them….sometimes it pays to ask ( but them I am quite niche)
I also got a £300 ice cream maker from a company and a £129 milk maker and a cup cake maker….all cos I e-mailed and asked…. there were other things from other companys that said no bit that was fine