Discussion
Would you recommend this product?
8 Reviews
Hey PH! 😁
Over half a year ago we launched the first version of Howler here on Product Hunt.
Since then, we’ve helped over 100 startups pitch their products to journalists, helping them get connected with both major outlets like TechCrunch and BBC and local news and radio stations. (Check out the features on our landing page.) 🏆
Our 1.0 showed us there’s a huge need in the market for a simple way to run targeted PR campaigns without spending hundreds of hours researching journalists and running email campaigns to them yourself (or spending $5k on a PR agency or consultant to do it for you).
While we managed to get our subscribers a lot of journalist attention, our 1.0 and 2.0 (launched outside of PH) showed us that we still had lots to learn––that there was room to improve Howler. That’s why we’re here today with our 3.0.
📣 We’ve added ~100k new journalists to our outreach database (almost 600k total now)
🗽 We’ve on-boarded a team in NYC to manage these campaigns in-house
📊 We now send full campaign reports of journalists targeted and their open & reply rates, not just broad percentages when campaigns are complete
⚡️ You can now download the lists of journalists (and their emails) you're matched with once each campaign is complete
We’ve been focused on improving our matching algos, enriching our dataset, and building better business processes that keep campaigns running smoothly while allowing for transparency.
Howler isn’t intended to be a magic pill to get you press, but rather an alternative to you manually googling for journalists, writing a few cold emails, then giving up when no one answers. It’s a quick blast to test the market and a team behind the wheel to help you follow best practices and not step on any toes.
If you run a campaign and it doesn’t seem like the ROI is there, you can cancel immediately (unlike traditional PR agencies that lock you into time-based contracts regardless of campaign success).
As always we’ll be here to answer any questions you may have! ❤️
–– Matt, Aaron, & Frances
PS: If you’ve used Howler before, we’re offering 20% off discount codes to run another campaign with us! Just leave a message in the live chat on our site with the name of the product you promoted and I’ll share it with you.
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Excited to see you keep improving this Matt! When is the right time for me to use this? When I'm launching a new product?
following this!
@mungerology Thanks man! Yeah, a product launch is a great use-case. You could use Howler to quickly get attention for a new product. You could also just as easily use it for a more mature product that has some credibility in the marketplace already so long as you have some sort of catalyst (new partnerships, fundraising news, new milestone, new features, etc etc)
What kind of product are you working on?
@juhaszhenderson That's reasonable. I'm working on a software product. I found you through Indie Hackers and have been following along with your 24 in 12.
Maker
Super excited for this new and improved version of Howler! 💪🏻💪🏻💪🏻
Stay well away from this service.
I'm the founder of Instaaa, a platform which provides a similar offering to Howler. I started Instaaa last year and after a successful first few months Matt and his friends started Aidem Network. Competition is always welcome and I would've been fine with their launch, however I became aware that a lot of the copy and details provided on the site were duplicated from Instaaa's own website. They went on to address these after I put them on blast, however reviews slowly become negative (check Product Hunt for proof) and earnings slowed (as can be seen on Indie Hackers here - https://www.indiehackers.com/pro...)
Howler was Matt's next launch and offered the same/similar service but it was subscription based. Intrigued by the concept I decided to give it a go - one in an effort to investigate the competition and two; to see if the service they offered was actually legitimate.
Guess what? It wasn't. I paid well over $200 NZD for a basic pitch to be sent out and not receive any proof. All I got at the end of the month was a screenshot of the campaign open/reply rates and that was about it. I had no email list, no way of following up with people Matt & his team reached out to and no way to even prove the service had taken place. I got no traffic, no replies and no interest in the product I paid for them to promote either and Matt stated he wouldn't share a list of the emails/places they submitted as it was a 'privacy issue'.
I was disappointed and contacted Matt in order to discuss a refund. After receiving no replies for weeks, I ended up filing a bank dispute in order to get my money back which (surprise, surprise) Matt responded to immediately. I believe this is still ongoing.
I'm aware the outreach space is hard and a service like Instaaa or Howler is always going to be controversial amongst entrepreneurs and makers for multiple reasons, but the level of service I paid for was not at all delivered. I'm not wanting to cause any major issues or even hurt Matt's other projects (heck, I also experience issues and deal with upset clients sometimes), but Howler is something I'd recommend looking into properly rather than simply going off of the reviews and comments posted below by Matt's friends.
Happy to chat with anyone regarding this if you're wanting proof or more information.
@ryanheybourn Had a very similar experience with another company called Prumio (https://www.prumio.com/) with a very similar proposition (too similar). Lost the money, no PR, no follow up, no way to contact. Highly caution startups thinking of trying out such services.
@ryanheybourn @karthik_mahadevan I had the exact same experience with Prumio. A complete scam. I disputed the charges and got my $$ back.
@ryanheybourn This is a smear campaign. Our service is 100% legitimate. If all the reviews and features on our website aren’t convincing enough, let me run through a close look at our operations & backend through a series of screenshots: https://imgur.com/a/Gvb8fNB.
As you can see here Howler is definitely not a scam. In fact, it took us a ton of effort to build, and continues to take us tons of time to run this. We're probably not charging enough.
Here's a few more notes regarding your scathing review:
1. Yes, Aidem Network 1.0 was not perfect. Neither was Instaaa. On Instaaa 1.0's reviews, the word "scam" is mentioned 8 times. On Instaaa 2.0's reviews, it was mentioned 6 times. On Aidem Network? Zero. No one is calling us a scam, even if they're unhappy with the service. Likewise for Howler: 0 mentions of being a scam. Go check for yourself if you'd like.
2. Journalist privacy was a big issue for us. We interviewed at Y Combinator, and Paul Buchheit told us to be very careful about this. It's of a little less concern now, so we've actually resolved this and now share the complete email list for premium subscribers.
3. The expectation of a journalist outreach campaign shouldn't really be traffic. Sure you get traffic if they feature you, but the initial email blast, much less so––if any. They really only take a look at the pitch and say yes or no. They rarely click through unless they're *super* interested.
4. We didn't really "not reply to your email for weeks." You came to me asking for a refund. I told you we weren't going to give you one because we did everything promised on our website and had already incurred costs. Then you told us you were going to dispute the charge. We let you, believing we had a good case and trusting the bank. We were wrong, and as far as I know the bank sided in your favor.
5. I also recommend looking into Howler properly. We're legit.
6. We paid our Head of Campaigns for around 3 hours of work on your campaign. You paid $199. The hourly rate for someone like Frances (our Head of Campaigns) is ~$100/hr. I don't see how you can be concerned about the cost. Anywhere else offering a service like this at this price is probably a scam. We've barely made the economics work out.
I hope this addresses everything and we can move on.
Again, if you need any more proof Howler isn't a scam, see here: https://imgur.com/a/Gvb8fNB.
@ryanheybourn @juhaszhenderson Matt, what a pity you had to address this as anyone following you is well aware you are not out there to scam people. Kudos for addressing it so thoroughly and diplomatically.
I would perhaps blur out the client names though? Privacy senses are tingling here...
@ryanheybourn @juhaszhenderson I've been with Matt since the launch of Aidem 1.0 (and Howler 1.0) and met his team in their NYC office. A "scam" is far from what this is. They're constantly working on pitching for their clients and improving the service, and they barely make enough doing it.
Even Howlers company's earnings are publicly available for anyone to view. That's the epitome of full transparency. Would a "scam" company reveal their financials?
Competition is good, but please keep it clean and have some good sportsmanship. No service is perfect; this subscription-based PR service is still a novel business model that takes time to build. At the price Howler costs, it's still worth it to use them than hire a dedicated outreach specialist.
Great idea! Are the pitches a/b tested? Is it revised monthly? In the monthly plan, is it 400 new journalists every month? The FAQs say 1 campaign lasts 1 month, so is it 1 campaign / company / month? What's included in the plans is a bit unclear....
@uren_d Thanks Uren! Pitches aren't A/B tested throughout the month, but we compare stats of each campaign and adjust based on that. Yes 400 new journalists targeted every month. Yes, 1 campaign / company / month. If you need to run multiple campaigns at once you can subscribe multiple times (and we can hook you up with a bulk discount)!
@juhaszhenderson thanks!