Vegan Business Tribe Spotlight: Caroline from Eden Green PR tells us how she got into vegan PR and her top tips for vegan businesses
Caroline Burgess-Pike from Eden Green PR has worked on campaigns for Million Dollar Vegan, Squeaky Bean, and countless other vegan organisations.
In this interview, Caroline tells us about her journey into vegan PR and her top tips for how to get your vegan business in the news.
How did you get started in PR?
I began my career as a journalist for a local newspaper, before moving into PR and marketing as I wanted the freedom to be more creative. I worked for a food manufacturer which packed plant milks and smoothies, before joining a PR agency where my clients were mostly in the lifestyle sectors, including vegan food, vegan beauty products and luxury hotels. I then moved to a B2B focused PR agency as an account director, working with clients in the technology industry, but decided to go freelance after my maternity leave so that I had more flexibility to work around my daughter, who is now two and a half (and being raised fully vegan, of course!).
When did you become focused on PR for vegan businesses?
I’ve worked with vegan focused businesses since the start of my career in PR and marketing. At the time I wasn’t vegan, but went vegetarian in 2013, before going vegan in 2015. I became very passionate about helping to promote veganism, as I think most people do when they first make the switch from eating animal products.
I primarily went vegan for animal welfare reasons, so I started volunteering for animal charities to in my spare time, helping to promote their latest campaigns. When my maternity leave was due to come to an end, I answered a job advert from Veganuary, looking for freelance writers. I began writing blogs for the campaign’s news pages, as well as helping with their social media content. Through my contacts there, I landed a job as PR Manager for the Million Dollar Vegan Campaign – which asked the Pope to go vegan for Lent in 2019 in return for $1 million for charity. He didn’t accept, but the campaign garnered a lot of publicity, and shared the ethical and moral arguments for veganism with a global audience.
Working with Million Dollar Vegan gave me the confidence I needed to take the leap into the world of freelancing, and since that time I’ve been working with several vegan businesses and other vegan campaigns like No Meat May. I’ve also set up my own PR agency, Eden Green PR, and am lucky to have a great Account Manager working with me, who is also vegan and has worked with major plant-based food brands.
Are you allowed to name some of the vegan companies you’ve helped?
I’m currently working with brands including cult vegan chocolatier Mummy Meagz, a well as fun and dynamic brand Squeaky Bean, which creates meat alternatives and other ready-to-eat products like pancakes. I’ve also worked with vegan brands and products including Lavera, Benecos, TanOrganic and CLIF Bar.
Moving on to your tips for vegan businesses looking to get themselves in the news, what’s the best way to approach a publication?
Make sure you have a solid pitch in place before approaching the journalist, so you know exactly what you want to tell them, and research the best contact at the publication who is most likely to cover the type of story you’re offering.
For example, if you’re running a straightforward product launch and want to approach a national newspaper, look to speak to someone on the lifestyle team who features new innovations. Or, if you’re linking your brand to a news story, the newsdesk might be a better place to start.
Journalists always like to know you’ve done your research, so if you can reference a similar article they’ve recently published, that can give you a good head start.
Is there a difference in your advised approach between vegan publications and non-vegan publications?
Vegan publications will often run with a different angle to non-vegan publications. For example, a vegan publication could be more interested in your company’s background and how you are supporting the vegan community more widely, whereas a non-vegan publication is likely to focus either on your product, or how your brand is relevant to the news cycle – for example during seasonal events like Veganuary, or if it is linked to new research on veganism.
There’s a growing range of specialist vegan media outlets such as VegNews, Vegconomist, Plant Based News etc. Many of our members have found just sending an email to the submission address rarely gets a response. What are your tips for how to get noticed or get a story on these websites?
‘Newsjacking’ a hot topic is often a good way to secure coverage with the vegan media, as they will often look for a thought leadership style approach.
Having a really strong product that’s new to the marketplace does of course help, especially if you’re launching a product where a vegan alternative doesn’t already exist. If your brand is already established and you can discuss information such as sales growth, for example how sales of your vegan product have increased significantly due to an event like the coronavirus crisis, that can add weight to your pitch.
If a vegan company wants to ‘just get their products out there’ and be found, what sorts of PR activity can they be doing themselves for free (or low cost)?
Sampling is a great way to achieve exposure for a relatively low cost. Most consumer journalists will only feature a product if they receive a sample in return, as they want to ensure the product is good quality before they promote it to their audience. Likewise, if you can send samples to key vegan influencers, that can result in social media exposure, as can running competitions and giveaways. You could also team up with other vegan brands to offer joint giveaways that can be promoted across both your social media channels.
If you don’t have access to an (expensive) media contacts database, you can often reach journalists via their social media pages to ask if they’d like to receive a sample of your product.
What’s your favourite vegan PR campaign that you’ve seen?
1. Do your research: make sure the journalists you’re approaching are relevant to the topic you’re pitching, whether it’s a straightforward product placement or a news led story.
2. Always create an engaging pitch to get your message across – it needs to be well written and contain the vital information journalists look for (who, what, why, when and how). And a newsworthy ‘hook’ will draw attention to your brand.
3. Follow up your pitch with a phone call where possible. Journalists receive hundreds of emails every day, so a call can help your message stand out.
4. Try pitching first thing in the morning when journalists are planning their day ahead – they’ll often have their heads stuck in an article by mid-morning or afternoon, and some will be ‘on deadline’.
5. Be persistent. Success in PR is often down to building relationships with journalists and understanding how you can help them, as well as how they can help you.
You can contact Caroline through her website:
www.edengreenpr.com
Watch our 40 minute Vegan PR masterclass with Caroline
One of the most common questions we get asked at Vegan Business Tribe is “How do I get my message out there”?
In this video interview, David talks with Vegan PR expert Caroline Burgess-Pike from Eden Green PR about how to get your vegan businesses in the news – from practical advice of how to approach a publication through to some examples of the best low-budget PR campaigns she has seen.
