dealnews (www.dealnews.com) is the web’s leading guide to the best deals on laptops, computers, consumer electronics, gadgets, housewares and apparel. Its mission is to save consumers money by directing them to the best bargains online offered by reputable stores. The site relies on a team of expert editors, the collective intelligence of its readers, and proprietary research tools to uncover more than 100 of the web’s hottest deals, coupons and sales everyday at the guaranteed lowest prices.

Traditionally, dealnews has boasted high customer retention, especially among its core user base of urban males, without engaging and extensive public relations and marketing activity. For the 2010 holiday shopping season, dealnews wanted to increase site traffic and acquire new users. The company approached Affect Strategies at the end of the summer of 2010, with hopes that the agency could hit the ground running in September and create and execute a media-relations focused campaign that garner national consumer press coverage for dealnews’ value proposition for holiday shopping. The critical requirement of the campaign was that it would demonstrate the connection between press coverage and driving traffic to the web site.

Strategy:
Affect knew any campaign it created would need to be focused on demonstrating measurable results. While national broadcast coverage was appealing, it didn’t offer up a trackable URL for viewers to click. To this end, the team relied on the following strategies when creating the campaign:

» Focus outreach on national major market consumer media with an online presence and large readership
» Create unique and useful content that exposes compelling data that will underscore dealnews’ value to consumer shoppers
» Position dealnews CEO and editor in chief as expert on where, how and when to find the best holiday shopping deals online
» Build relationships with top tier retail media, who continually need sources for their volume of holiday shopping stories

 

 

Planning & Execution:

Affect had only a few months to create and execute a campaign that would demonstrate measurable results. At the onset of the relationship, Affect and dealnews created an “editorial calendar” of website features that the dealnews editorial team would write, which offered useful tips and facts around online shopping. Affect also created a news pipeline focused on highlighting useful site features and shopping tips. The news and feature stories leveraged key holiday season milestones like Black Friday and Cyber Monday, pricing trends and deal predictions for some of the season’s hottest gifts. The result was a steady supply of fresh content that would serve as fodder for holiday shopping stories throughout October and November.

Using the content and news, Affect conducted aggressive and continual outreach to major market consumer press, with a focus on outlets with a significant online presence as well as wire services for their broad distribution.

Results Overview (Sept. 1 – Dec. 7, 2010):

» Measurable site traffic: 208,957 visitors
o dealnews tracked that media coverage with clickable URLs drove 208,957 visitors to dealnews.com. This figure doesn’t account for consumers who read about dealnews or saw their broadcast coverage and entered the URL into their browser on their own. Given that dealnews had about 649,000 unique visitors in October 2010, media coverage is responsible for driving a significant percentage of the traffic.
» Massive volume of coverage: 483 articles
o Affect secured 483 pieces of coverage and syndication for dealnews in consumer outlets. Coverage was secured in top tier national consumer media including CNN, CNBC, NPR, Associated Press, PC World, U.S. News & World Report and MSN Money.
» More than 30 briefings
o In just three months, dealnews conducted over 30 briefings with press including Associated Press (6 conducted), MSNBC.com, AOL Wallet POP, FOXNews.com, TIME and U.S. News & World Report.