How to Make Friends With Bloggers and Journalists to Gain Influence
The art of the PR pitch and building relationships with influential bloggers with special guest John Rampton.
John writes for Inc, Forbes, and TechCrunch (amongst other sites) and took the time to discuss the pitches he gets, which ones work and which don’t. The two also talk a bit about entrepreneurship — John just launched Due.com.
Listen in and discover:
- Stalking bloggers and journalists on social media
- Building relationships and getting to know influencers
- How to offer value, not just ask for favors
- The perfect email pitch
- How to cut through the noise
- Not letting SEO goals get in the way of great coverage
The Show Notes
How to Make Friends with Bloggers and Journalists to Gain Influence
Voiceover: This is Rainmaker.FM, the digital marketing podcast network. It’s built on the Rainmaker Platform, which empowers you to build your own digital marketing and sales platform. Start your free 14-day trial at RainmakerPlatform.com.
Loren Baker: Good afternoon, and welcome to another installment of Search & Deploy, a Foundation Digital and Rainmaker.FM podcast publication here on the Copyblogger Network.
Last episode, we talked a bit about content marketing and distributing content out there to really get the links and citations that your business is looking for to help with overall search. One thing that we didn’t really get into, and that I alluded that we’d be talking about in the future, was really building true press and publisher relationships in an effort to get your news, your content, or your studies picked up by some of the top influential sites, networks, and news organizations out there that are really all craving content right now.
With me today, I have John Rampton, a man who wears many hats — some funny, some silly, and some all over the place. John has a background in search. He’s a serial entrepreneur, yet he also is a published journalist/blogger on some of the top sites and publications out there right now, especially in the business realm. John, welcome to Search & Deploy.
John Rampton: Thanks. Thanks for having me.
Loren Baker: You’re welcome. Before we get started, I just want to talk about the first time I met you. It may have been the second time, but it was the first time we actually had a real conversation. I was in JFK, and we were in the JetBlue Hub. I was doing a flight out of New York to LA. I was sitting there talking with some colleagues in the terminal. I’m not sure if you remember this or not.
You walked over after Affiliate Summit, and you introduced yourself. It was really nice because we had interacted online multiple times. Then, I was pretty sleepy, so probably grabbed a coffee or something like that and got on the plane. I was in the very front, scrunched in between a couple of folks as you do when you’re flying from one coast to the next. About 30 minutes into the flight, you walked up and let me know that there were some extra exit row seats open in the back of the plane, and we hit it off from there.
John Rampton: Yes.
Loren Baker: Thank you for that, by the way.
John Rampton: Anytime.
Loren Baker: You probably saved me a couple of blood clots and got me sleeping for a little bit of that flight. I don’t know if you were pitching me at the time, or just friendly, or just trying to make that connection, but I was thinking to myself, “Not only what a nice dude, but also a great way to make that first interaction memorable by helping someone out.”
I was talking to Neil Patel the other day about some of his secrets around online marketing. One of the things he said was his biggest secret is just to help people, so John, thanks for helping me on that flight. I really appreciate it.
John Rampton: Anytime. I love helping people.
Loren Baker: To get started out, how about a quick introduction of yourself, John, because I really don’t know where to start. You have so many things going on.
John Rampton: Yeah. I’m John Rampton. I’m an entrepreneur. That’s the easiest way to say it. I am the founder of Due.com. I also have my own personal site, JohnRampton.com where I ramble on about stuff. I am located in Silicon Valley. I’ve had some successes. I’ve had some losses, and I’m having fun along the way.
The biggest thing about me, and what most people find out pretty quick, is I do love helping people. I find that the more you help people, that the more you get out of life, one, but more people trust you and are willing to help you out in the long term.
Loren Baker: Absolutely. You’re pretty well-published from what I hear.
John Rampton: Thanks. Yes. I write for Entrepreneur.com, Forbes, Inc, Huffington Post, as well as a lot of other sites.
Loren Baker: If you’re writing for Forbes, for Inc, for Entrepreneur, and Huffington Post — I’ve been pitching people for years, man, and when I started out, I didn’t know what I was doing. This was back in the day. I was just doing some initial link building and trying to build buzz for a tool called Effective Brand, which ended up evolving into Conduit Toolbar Service over the years.
My job was to do PR — I was pretty young at the time, and the Internet was pretty young, too — but I was pitching a lot of different websites on Effective Brand, which is basically a toolbar that you could build with your own brand and distribute to your readers, your fan base, or your audience. I joined Peter Shankman’s Young PR Pros Yahoo Newsletter.
That’s really where I cut my teeth, and I started pitching people. I started doing little surveys. When I first started, I would pitch people right off the bat, like “This is a great toolbar. You really have to check it out. You just download it,” and some other responses I got back were not positive.
It was just very, “Why are you trying to sell me this? Why are you trying to do this?” Now that I look back at it in retrospect, there was probably a lot of mixed messaging to the emails I was sending out. Then sometimes I would have success. I pitched a lot earlier on, and I learned what to do and what not to do. Then, like you, I’m behind some publications, so I get pitched myself. That’s a great way to learn, but how many pitches would you say that you get a day in your email box?
John Rampton: Easily 20. Twenty legitimate pitches a day.
Loren Baker: How many of those 20 do you actually read and take action upon?
John Rampton: I probably glaze over every single one. I legitimately like helping people. Actually writing about, most of the time it’s zero. If they do a really good pitch, I’ll write them back. Sometimes I’ll ask them for more information — the really, really good ones — but most of the time, it’s null.
Loren Baker: If you’re getting, say, a 140 email pitches per week, what can someone do — whether they’re representing a product, whether it’s a press announcement or a news announcement, or whether they’re just trying to get you to link to them or something like that — what can they do to really cut through that noise because that’s a lot of emails to read over the day?
How to Cut Through the Noise
John Rampton: Yeah, it is a lot of emails.
Loren Baker: Especially when you have a lot of other things going on, right?
John Rampton: Yeah, exactly. The people that I feel that cut through the noise truly are people that go above and beyond, people that write an amazing pitch. First of all, I have all my sites, like JohnRampton.com/Contact, I have, “Here are my rules for pitching,” and you can find out within 10 seconds whether they have followed my rules or not.
If they haven’t followed my rules, I’m just going to disregard them. If they’ve followed my rules, I usually almost always respond to those people. Usually, people are like, “Ha, ha. I’ve followed you on social media. I stalked you a little bit,” because I always say, “Hey. You should follow me on social media. You should get to know what I write about. You should really know me.”
Loren Baker: Right.
John Rampton: Because if you pitch me a payday loan company and I’ve never talked about that in my life, it’s not something that I care about, so don’t waste my time with an email.
Loren Baker: Don’t waste your own time, too, right?
John Rampton: Yeah. Don’t waste your own time. You’re wasting five, 10 minutes on that. That’s five, 10 minutes you’ll never get back. You’ll wait, and you’ll be like, “Oh. I think he’s going to respond.” No way. Those that are like, “Oh yeah, I read your rules. I think they’re awesome. I have this cool company. I’m working on this. You’ve written about this type of stuff two or three times. Here’s a free account. I already set you up. Log in with this information.” Things like that will at least get my attention.
Loren Baker: Let’s deconstruct what you just said. You’re writing all over the place, but you mentioned that you have your pitch rules on your website. What I’m getting from this is that if I see that you or someone else is a writer, writing on multiple blogs, you may actually have your own site or you have your own contact information where I don’t have to go through the publication that you’re contributing to or bother you on Twitter. You may also have some ‘best ways to contact me’ right on your site that can be read.
John Rampton: Correct. Yep. For example, everybody wants to be on TechCrunch, especially if you’re on the tech world. If you go to most of the TechCrunch writers, they have their email right there. They maybe don’t publish like I do saying, “Hey, here are my rules,” but most people make themselves pretty available out there to pitch. That’s how they make money. That’s how they make their livelihood is reading these and finding the best stories.
Loren Baker: Did I ever tell you how I met Sarah Perez by the way?
John Rampton: No.
Loren Baker: Sarah’s from Tampa, right?
John Rampton: Yes.
Loren Baker: I think that’s still her handle.
John Rampton: Yes.
Loren Baker: I don’t know if she was with TechCrunch at the time or ReadWriteWeb, but I had followed her. Of course, I had connected with her on Twitter because of her handle, @SarahinTampa. I’m like, “Hey. She’s in Tampa,” so I invited her to a couple of different meetups. I had started a blogging meetup at the time. I think she lived in Wesley Chapel or one of these towns that’s like a suburb for about 20 minutes outside of town. I had never met her in person, but I recognized her from Twitter and her articles and stuff like that.
One day, I’m at the mall with my wife and my boy, who was a newborn at the time. He was probably about five, six months old, so I guess a toddler, not a newborn. In the Tampa mall, in the walking area, there’s a Starbucks kiosk with all of these chairs and sofas around it, right? My son had doodied in his diaper, and my wife has this thing about publicly changing kid’s diapers. Some moms do it. Some don’t, but my wife did.
Maybe it wasn’t a doodie. Maybe it was the other. Maybe it was number one, but story is we’re sitting there on the sofa or the little bean chair or whatever, and my wife is pulling down my toddler’s diaper and changing it. I’m looking around thinking, “Oh my God. I’m sitting here in the middle of the mall. I hope I don’t see any of my staff, or any my clients, or someone I know.”
I look over to my left, and there’s this girl, I guess lady, sitting there right next to me. I’m thinking to myself, “I recognize her. Where do I know her from?” I’m looking and looking, and I look at her Starbucks cup, and it has ‘Sarah’ written on it.
I didn’t say anything at the time, but I sent her an email later — or maybe it was a DM — I’m like, “Sarah, were you at the Tampa Mall the other day, and was there a lady sitting next to you changing a baby’s dirty diaper?” She replies, “Yes. How did you know?” Like, “I was right there. That was me. That was my wife and my kid, and we were sitting right next to you.” We traded some DMs and hit it off from there, but that’s how I know Sarah. I know you had mentioned her name a couple of times in the past, so I wanted to give you that tidbit, that story.
John Rampton: That’s funny.
Loren Baker: Anyway, you have your rules. A lot of writers out there are freelance writers, so they’re marketing themselves at the same time.
John Rampton: Correct. Yes.
Loren Baker: You have your site with your rules. What would you say is rule number one, and how many rules do you have by the way?
John Rampton: I actually don’t even remember. Let me check. I believe I have five rules.
The Perfect Email Pitch
Loren Baker: Okay, so the five golden rules of pitching John.
John Rampton: I have three.
Loren Baker: Three. That’s easy, man.
John Rampton: Yes, three.
Loren Baker: That’s easy to remember.
John Rampton: My golden rules is number one, I’m human. I like being flattered. The more you flatter me and tug at my heartstrings, the more I’m likely to respond to you. You could start by following me on social media and being an active part of my community. Do this before contacting me. You can see my links easily on my site, so do that before coming to me.
Rule number two, I get pitched 15 to 20 times a day. If you’re going to pitch me your company or story, please keep it brief. Sum up what you do in the first sentence, or I’ll stop reading. This isn’t me being a jerk. It’s me conserving all my time for other emails I receive and other things I have to do.
Loren Baker: Okay. What I’m getting from that is get everything you need to say in that first sentence because you don’t have time to scroll down.
John Rampton: Correct. Yes. One thing, Dave McClure, famous guy, 500 startups, he’s a big Silicon Valley guy.
Loren Baker: Yes.
John Rampton: He has this rule, three to five. You need to be able to explain what your company does in three to five words. If you can’t describe what your company does fully in three to five words, you need to work on that. So I recommend people start with that. If you can explain everything that your company does in three to five words, you will go somewhere.
Loren Baker: You have an example of that by the way? What’s a good example?
John Rampton: Nike, ‘just do it.’
Loren Baker: Because I’ll talk your ear off trying to explain my company. So probably like the hundred word sector … Okay. Nike, just do it.
John Rampton: Yeah. Just do it.
Loren Baker: Perfect.
John Rampton: Airbnb is ‘find a place to stay.’ For example, my company, Due, ‘online invoicing company.’
Loren Baker: Simple enough.
John Rampton: Simple. It explains everything that we do in three words. Uber, ‘peer-to-peer rides.’
Loren Baker: That does it.
John Rampton: Lyft, ‘point A to point B.’ Stuff like that.
Loren Baker: Okay, so got the concise. First sentence, have your attention, rule number two. What’s rule number three?
How to Offer Value, Not Just Ask for Favors
John Rampton: With number two, let me just finish that. One other thing with rule two is I get asked for just five minutes of my time several times a day. If I gave five minutes to a million people, my wife would hate me.
Loren Baker: Can you do this real quick favor for me? Can you just …
John Rampton: Yes, or “Do you just have five minutes of your time for this email?” Stop asking me for five minutes. It never takes five minutes, and don’t take it personal. Number three, I love seeing companies grow and being part of their success. It gives me a high that I can’t live without. Truly it gives me this thrill. If you have what it takes, make it amazing.
Keep in mind, I always say if people want consulting or things like that, I’m the most expensive consultant in the world. You won’t find anybody more expensive than me. That comes with your time and stuff like that, too. If you want to work with me, just know that I’m expensive.
Loren Baker: There you go. We have the most expensive consultant in the world here on Search & Deploy who does not have five minutes for almost anyone, but we’re going to have you for almost a half an hour giving free information to listeners. That’s the value here.
John Rampton: I consider my time very, very valuable. Every person listening to this, you should consider your time very valuable, too, because you’ll never get it back. My recommendation is find something that works to conserve as much time as possible for the things and ones you love the most.
Loren Baker: Okay. I have my product or whatever my story is, and I have my first sentence. I have my perfect subject line. In that sentence, I can define myself, and I’m proving to you that I’m a growing company and I’m legit, or I’m proving to the world. Where do we start from there?
John Rampton: I would say even before you start, just make sure that I write about this. If I don’t write about Fusion, don’t pitch me Fusion. I’m never going to write about it. That’s before you start. Next is flatter me. Get to know me. After that, make sure you pitch the story, three to five words in the first sentence. After that, I like telling a little bit about competition.
Obviously, I pitch more in the tech world. I know the tech world a little bit more, so tell me a little bit about your company, what you do in the next two sentences. Tell me who your competition is, and how you differ from your competition. I also like a little bit after that, that’s all I would send in my first pitch email is a little bit about my company, why I make a difference, and some of the competition — and why the hell I matter. If I respond to that, then you can tell me, “Oh. I compete with Uber who’s raised $10 billion,” or “I compete with this little company that raised $500,000,” or here or there.
Tell me because that proves a little bit more like, “This is my competition, and here’s why I’m better than them.” That’s a real story to me, being like, “Oh. You’re a company that has gotten a 100,000 customers in the past six months,” which is more than your competition who raised $5 million three months ago. That’s a real story. Prove to me that you have a real story, not, “Hey. I’m launching a new product feature.” I don’t care about product features. I care about helping features. How are you helping and changing the world?
Loren Baker: Is there still any value or advantage to offering an exclusive or an embargo?
John Rampton: Yes. Embargo, not as much, but exclusive, yes. I don’t get a ton of exclusives because I don’t write about a ton of stuff, but if you’re pitching a TechCrunch, a VentureBeat, a Wall Street Journal, New York Times, Mashable, and a lot of bigger, huge publications that talk about that type of stuff, they will require those. If you don’t have those, most of the time, they won’t even look at you.
Loren Baker: How do you know who to give the exclusive to?
John Rampton: Typically, when I’m pitching an exclusive, say my company has just raised $5 million, I’m most likely going to go to somebody that I know. This is where I pitch PR professionals. I typically don’t like PR people even though I do a lot of PR work, but I don’t pitch PR people, except in the circumstance where you really need PR. Then, I’m like “It’s the relationships.”
If you have a relationship and you’ve been stalking — that’s what I always call it because it really is stalking — but getting to know and establish a relationship/friendship with the reporter, go to the relationships that you have. They’re going to be a lot better than just pitching some random person. Even if you just raised $5 million for your company, the likelihood of you getting written about by a cold pitch is slim to none. You need to have a relationship there, but exclusivity really helps.
Loren Baker: So stalking leads to a relationship. If I’m following a person, liking their stuff, Retweeting them, learning about them — how do I turn that into not being a weirdo, but being a friend or someone that they recognize?
Stalking Bloggers and Journalists on Social Media
John Rampton: Right. This may sound horrible, but stalking leads to knowing where a person is going to be at and putting forth the right thing to be able to meet that person. The more you can have a personal relationship … for example, here’s a good one that I have. I wanted to write for Forbes. I had wanted to write for Forbes ever since I was literally a kid. I had applied. Bruce Upbin — he is the managing editor of Forbes and basically the gatekeeper — if he says you write for Forbes, you write for Forbes. I had, had three introductions to him. I’d done this. I’d send him an email. Literally, I probably wrote 50 amazing posts, and he had been sent all of them.
I’m talking like six months, eight months’ worth of work. It didn’t work out. No. I mean, he responded, “Send me this,” and stuff like that, and I’m not faulting him or saying he’s a jerk or anything like that, man. He gets probably pitched to be a writer like a thousand times a day.
Loren Baker: Oh my God, yeah.
John Rampton: Easily. Then, I got really into stalking, and I found out that there was going to be a Forbes party exclusively for Forbes writers in San Francisco.
Loren Baker: Okay. You stole a tuxedo and a tray full of champagne and walked around the party, right?
John Rampton: I get to that party. I walked up, and I looked on the list and found — this is horrible. I always recommend this doesn’t always work out because I’ve tried it two other times and it’s only worked one two of the three — but I walked up and I saw somebody’s name on the list. I just said that name, and they’re like, “Okay. Go past.”
I walked past, and I got into the party somehow. Literally, it was a little sleazy, but I got to know him, and I’m like, “Hey, Bruce, I was this,” and he’s all, “I don’t know you.” I’m like, “Yeah, I kind of snuck into the party, but I really want to write for you. I’m really good, and look, I know this person, this person, and this person,” because I had established more of an online relationship. I knew two of the people personally, but then I knew two or three others, one of the guys who actually started Forbes, Forbes.com, the main original guy.
I’d read 10 of his posts, and he was passionate about this. I had never met him before. But I went and talked with him. I said, “Hey. I really liked this post.” I was super prepared for this meeting. I’d been preparing for it for like six months, but I knew two or three of his posts from heart, and I’d read countless of them. I’m like, “Yeah, I really like this,” and I got to know him.
Then, literally I talked with Bruce and I said, “Hey. I know this person. I’ve been friends with those couple of guys, and I know the guy who started it. Him and I just had a really good conversation.” Bruce is like, “Oh okay, so you want to write for me?” I was like, “Yeah. I really want to write for you. What can I do to get set up?”
He’s all, “Just shoot me an email,” so I shot him an email the next day. It took me another month after meeting him to finally get set up. It ended up like the way I got a hold of him personally was over Twitter. I found that, that was his method of communication. Now it’s not, but at the time, that was how he communicated.
You have to find these little things out. Again, stalking leads to figuring out where people are. You can go to websites and see that they’ll be at an event and go to the event and try and find that person and plant the seed. Then when you see them again, be like, “Oh. Hey. How’s it going?” It takes a lot of work, but if you can foster that relationship, a personal relationship will get you 10 times further than anything.
The same with Entrepreneur Magazine. I’ve written for them for a long time, but I met one of the editors at a conference. I had been stalking him for a while. Then I flew out to another conference and met them, and I was like, “Hey. I would love to start writing.” He’s like, “All right,” so I emailed him a week later, and I said, “Hey, I’m going to be in New York in two weeks. I’d love to go out to lunch.” He’s like, “Oh, yes. That’d be fun. What dates?”
I’m like, “I’m here this day.” He’s all, “I can’t do lunch,” and I’m like, “Well I’m going to be there for the next three or four days.” He’s like, “All right. Let’s go on this date,” so I booked a plane ticket, and I flew out there.
Loren Baker: Nice.
John Rampton: I made a trip out of it because that was worth it to me to foster that relationship. Now, that personal relationship is actually one of the strongest relationships I have, and it started with stalking. It wouldn’t necessarily — it does sound stalkerish — but it was getting to know that person and know, so I could make that personal connection.
Loren Baker: Yeah. It’s like preparing your networking before you go to an event. Before you go to Pubcon or SMX or whatever, you typically want to find out who’s there. You do a search for the hashtag on Twitter. You make your little list of the top four or five people you want to connect with, and you make it a point to walk up to them at the networking party or maybe talk to them after their presentation or something like that, right?
Building Relationships and Getting to Know Influencers
John Rampton: Yeah. This goes with press in general, like it leads back to those relationships. The more relationships you can have, the better. It’s hard to establish a relationship over email. That’s where I feel a lot of people when they’re pitching press get it wrong. The people who have met me are a thousand times more likely to get a story about them than somebody that’s just cold pitching me email. You really have to tug at my heartstrings to be able to get a story out of me.
Loren Baker: You know Christoph Cemper, right?
John Rampton: Yes.
Loren Baker: For a while there, I don’t know if he does it anymore or not, but he used to run Facebook advertising campaigns where the image was a picture of his face. He would run them before conferences. He would run an ad campaign and target the personas of the types of people he wanted to connect with at a conference.
Of course, he always has a suite of different tools, so sometimes they have a booth. Sometimes they advertise or whatever, but he would run the campaign with his face and, of course, his orange jacket that he usually wears. People would just walk up to him that had never met him before and feel comfortable having that conversation, not realizing that they’ve probably seen him thousands of times every time they log into Facebook. Right?
John Rampton: Yes.
Loren Baker: It was one of those things of getting yourself out there and really getting to people’s comfort zone, too.
John Rampton: Yes.
Loren Baker: That’s cool. What about commenting on blogs? Have you gotten much of a response from that when you’re trying to connect with others or when others are trying to get your attention?
John Rampton: I have a lot of people comment. Not as many people comment on that. That’s not like the biggest one, but a comment for me is just a little bit of extra recognition. It’s not necessarily that I’ll care, but when I meet you and after, if I recognize your name and you’re like, “Oh. I read this article. I commented on it. Great thing,” it’s a lot more valuable of a connection because I might have seen your name or even responded to you.
Loren Baker: Or you can pretend that you saw it, right? You can be like, “Oh, I remember.”
John Rampton: “Oh, yes. Yeah, yeah” — which is most likely going to be the case. At the same time, when I get a comment, every now and then, I’m going to look back. Almost all comment systems email the author.
Loren Baker: Exactly.
John Rampton: So at least I will see your name. That’s just another little like, “Hey … ” when you send an email. I’m like, “Man, I swear I’ve read this name.” You don’t even have to remind me. I actually wouldn’t be like, “Oh, yeah, and I commented on three of your articles.” No. Don’t do that. That’s not really the greatest, and you’re losing the purpose of it. But I will recognize your name.
Loren Baker: It really goes back to personal branding at the end of the day, right?
John Rampton: Yes. Right.
Loren Baker: The more you can get your face, your name, your brand in front of the people that you want to be colleagues with, or influence, or connect with, or become friends with to a degree. I’m friends with most people that I work with, probably my only friends tell you truth.
John Rampton: Yes.
Loren Baker: It’s one of those things where you can just build your following and your audience, and just really get in front of who you want to market to. When you do walk up to someone at that networking party or break in o the party, or even go to the coffee shop downstairs from the BuzzFeed offices. You see that one writer you want to talk, and maybe they may recognize … it does. It gives you more of your foot in the door, right? It’s old PR, publicist thing. I’ve never really met a publicist who’s an introvert. The beauty is with the Internet, introverts can become extroverts.
John Rampton: Yes.
Loren Baker: Any last, maybe three final takeaways to give to the Search & Deploy audience on how to help our friends out there get coverage, get noticed by influential writers, or get a story about something happening with their business?
John Rampton: Just tips that I would give in general is the more personal touch you can have on things, the better. Really get to know what the person you’re pitching behind it writes about. Again, if you pitch somebody something and they don’t write about it, it’s a waste of your time and especially theirs.
Not Letting SEO Goals Get in the Way of Great Coverage
John Rampton: Additional tips that I would give is really focus not on products, but on solutions and what problems you’re solving, because if you’re trying to pitch, “Here’s these five problems that I’m solving,” or “Here’s these five products that I have,” which are people going to write about? They’re going to write about problems that you’re solving and the solutions that you’re really solving. Write about a problem and how you’re really solving that. Uber is solving a problem that people don’t have cars. They need to get from point A to point B, and we all hate taxi drivers.
Loren Baker: Yes we do.
John Rampton: They’re solving that problem. If they’d come out and been like, “Yes, we want to start another cab company,” would anybody have cared? Not really. But they came out of the forefront and said, “We’re trying to change this. We’re trying to add accountability to it,” and it worked.
They’re a large company, and there’s so many other companies out there in that same circumstance that they’re dominating huge markets by just solving simple little problems, and they really focus. That’s one that I love Uber and Lyft and all those companies. That’s a huge problem that they’re solving and what they have really focused on. We want accountability.
Loren Baker: I’ll tell you what, too, because of Uber and Lyft, I sold my second car.
John Rampton: Yeah. Same.
Loren Baker: I just don’t need it. I don’t ever use it.
John Rampton: Yes.
Loren Baker: If I need to go somewhere, I can just hail an UberX and I’m saving money at the end of the day on insurance, on space to store the vehicle, and maintenance. It’s great.
Before we go, there’s one point I want to bring up, and I just realized it. We’re doing a podcast about getting buzz, getting mentions, getting PR, and the word ‘press release’ has not come up once.
John Rampton: Yeah.
Loren Baker: Why is that?
John Rampton: I don’t even … How do you pronounce that? Press release?
Loren Baker: Press release.
John Rampton: Yeah, is it French? Press is changing. The way people are doing things is evolving, and I think the press release is dying because there’s so much garbage out there that anybody can release a press release, and all the people releasing press releases have nothing notable to put out there.
Loren Baker: Right. Right. Do you remember press releases before the Internet, before PRWeb? They were short.
John Rampton: Yeah. It’s the only way you were able to get your message out.
Loren Baker: They were short. They were like one paragraph, three bullet points, then contact information.
John Rampton: Yes. Correct.
Loren Baker: Then, PRWeb came out and SEO got a hold of it and killed that.
John Rampton: Yep.
Loren Baker: Great. That’s another discussion for another time. I’m really glad actually we did not bring up the word ‘press release’ during this podcast.
John Rampton: Yes.
Loren Baker: Really appreciate your time, John. Thank you so much for joining us today on Search & Deploy. Again, where can people find you online? Where can our listeners find you and connect with you online?
John Rampton: I’m just JohnRampton.com/Contact. You can just go to my .com, or I’m @JohnRampton on Twitter and +JohnRampton. That’s how you get a hold of me.
Loren Baker: Great. Thanks a lot, John. One last tidbit out there for our listeners. If you want to get the attention of press, invite them to do a podcast, right?
John Rampton: Yeah.
Loren Baker: All right. Thanks a lot, John. I really appreciate it, and again, thank you for listening to Search & Deploy. This has been Loren Baker, Search & Deploy, a Foundation Digital and Rainmaker.FM production.
John Rampton: Thanks, guys.