Sending out a press release? Do it right!

Even though I'm in radio advertising now, I remain a member of a PR newsgroup, because "you never know" and because I remain entranced with Public Relations as part of the marketing process. As I was reading today, I came across a post that led to the blog to the editor of Wired Magazine.

The upshot is that the editor is ticked off at all the spam he is getting from so-called professional PR people who do not do their research and pitch inappropriately. He's published the email addresses of all those who have done so in a month. It's nuts how long that list is. I'm not saying he was right in publishing the list, but I do feel his frustration at getting unsolicited and unwanted emails from people who really ought to know better.

It's a valuable lesson for those in small business who are submitting their own press releases and hoping to get coverage. You must take the time to build a list of your own and develop relationships with the editors and reporters that you are pitching to.

I don't mean you have to personally go through and make contact with each person you are going to pitch to and make friends with each one before you can start your PR campaign. That would be nuts and would prevent anyone from ever getting to the part about sending it to the targeted publications that are most likely to net coverage.

However, you should at least go through any list that you have not personally compiled (whether it's been provided for you or come with software or you've bought a list) and check the websites to make sure the address is still legitimate. Poke around for a few moments and make sure they are the right target market for your news.

Yes, it's time consuming. There is no arguing that. It's why I gave up distribution long before I gave up writing press releases. I personally could not charge the prices it would have taken to cover the time it takes to create a good distribution list to my target market of small and home based business, so I stopped offering distribution. It's part of the reasons PR Firms charge big bucks, because of the time spent researching, cultivating and developing working contacts for their clients. (Technically, I have not stopped providing press release writing and tweaking - but I don't do it as a full time component of my business anymore...but I digress.)

However, no matter how time consuming it is to develop the distribution list initially. It's worth it's weight in gold to be communicating with people who actually want to read about your business news. You have a much better chance of getting featured when you follow the rules and take the time to do the job right.

Building your list can be done slowly. It doesn't have to be done all at once and suck up all of your available time prior to sending out your first release. Start small and add to your list with each subsequent release.

The One Money Saving Marketing Technique You Need

Want to know the one thing that will cost you nothing but time and net you a return of almost 40% off some of your marketing costs?

It’s really quite simple and I bet you’ll be kicking yourself for not thinking of this one yourself.

Ready?

It’s a plan.

Yup, all you need to save up to 40% on some of your marketing costs is a plan.

If you know how are you going to market this coming year, you can save money on most of your direct and indirect marketing costs. Once you figure that out you can start making contact with potential advertising sites, start coming up with press releases and in general get your marketing campaign underway.

Breaking it into grocery store terms it’s like buying bulk versus per use sizes, you end up paying for convenience.

Advertising With a Plan vs. Seat-of-the-PantsBuying Habits

I thought it best to illustrate it with a comparison...

Store X comes up with a yearly marketing plan. They use it to roughly sketch in dates for print advertising in the newspaper, public relations events, outlines for their in-house customer appreciation lists.

Store Y makes do with buying when the newspaper lady drops by or calls with special offers and doesn’t do much to contact customers outside of flyers and in store displays.

Store X takes advantage of lower overall pricing and can integrate several branches of their marketing plan at the same time. He's also able to plan around co-op marketing dollars that some of his manafacturers offer and commit the savings to personal branding efforts.

In order to do the same Store Y will have to bring together each of his marketing branches within a short period of time, resulting in a possibly lower newspaper invoice coupled with higher prices for rush advertising at his printers and web developer. Due to his lack of planning, he often misses out on coop dollars by not gettings his ads and proofs to the manafacturer by the appropriate deadlines.

Store X can get all of his printing needs for the year met within one visit during a slow time in the printing industry and will be able to take advantage of seasonal discounts. The same holds true for his web development work and public relations.

Buying in advance helps Store X resist sales offers that don’t fit in to the overall marketing plan, whereas Store Y can often be tempted by time-specials that may not fit his overall target market.

Store X overall spends less time deliberating decisions and more time executing decisions.

Who would you rather be?

I’ll be uploading my Business Basics Guide to Planning over the next few days. If you want to learn how to build a business plan sturdy enough to support your marketing, but simple enough to develop in a week – then stay tuned to the Easy Results with Radio launch list. Members of the list get first dibs at extra sweet pricing.

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I was gonna, then I didn’t -- Learning to take my own advice

I was going to quit working at the radio station. I had it all planned out in my mind, when summer hit I was going to head home and start providing childcare again – as I did 10 years ago when my eldest son was an infant. In a rampant case of “Do as I say, not as I do”, I ignored most of the logical business advice that I’ve dispensed over the past 6 years as a promotion and marketing consultant.

My first mistake was not conducting any market research. Instead of turning to hard facts, I relied on perceptions and anecdotal evidence. Everyone I talked to thought there was a need for quality childcare in Whitecourt, especially with the only daycare closing down last fall, but I didn’t do any research to back it up.

Lesson Learned – You can’t judge the ultimate success of any business on perception. There needs to be a genuine need for your product or service in order for it to sell.

I failed to create a marketing plan. Of course, I have some great excuses for avoiding the process, but by failing to plan, I failed to utilize enough of a marketing mix to be successful in finding the clients within the timeline I had set for myself.

Lesson Learned – There are two lessons here. One is that planning is an essential part of building business. The second lesson is that you must use a variety of methods to reach your target market. Marketing is often a case of the sum of the whole having a higher value that the sum of the parts. In other words, using a variety of marketing tactics provides much more leverage than using only one or two.

I went in without enough passion. By neglecting to acknowledge my true interests, I didn’t develop enough of an enthusiasm for the business I was attempting to launch. My interests really are more about the promotion and marketing of small business than for providing childcare. I can do it. I’m good at it. It really doesn’t rock my boat though.

Lesson Learned – If you aren’t into what you do with all of your heart, the chances of success become slimmer. The idea behind a product or service may be solid, but if you lack a true zeal for are doing, you aren’t going to put in the effort and make the necessary sacrifices to achieve your goals.

Ultimately, I’m thrilled to pieces that I was able to pull back from the decision to leave XM105. It was a decision made out of fear (the fear of not being able to afford childcare for my own children over the summer), rather than one of a true desire to return to the daycare mom lifestyle. With a little creativity, we ended up with a compromised solution that provides for a win-win scenario for everyone involved and I’ve learned that no matter how much I know it doesn’t do me a lick of good if I don’t apply it.